LITA FORD Has Found 'The Missing Link' In Getting Her Long-Awaited New Album Released

In a new interview with Robert Miguel of Uvalde Radio Rocks, '80s hard rock queen Lita Ford spoke about the delay in releasing her long-awaited new studio album. She said (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET): "Well, I just did an interview a little while ago and I was just saying that there's a lot of pieces of the puzzle in moving forward with things, especially now in the music industry, there's so many moving parts and stuff. So I just need to have all my ducks in a row before I try to release this record. And I think just recently, I wanna say just over the last couple of weeks, the missing link and the biggest pieces of the puzzle, besides me, have been found. And we're gonna be moving forward real soon with this record. Of course, the holidays always throw a wrench in the spokes. And so we've gotta kind of wait for the holidays to get over with. And then we get on with the rock and roll."

She continued: "I think we're gonna have a new Lita record in '24. I was hoping for '23, but I didn't find those missing pieces of the puzzle. So this year we found them, this Thanksgiving. So we're on. We're moving up."

Ford's upcoming follow-up to 2012's "Living Like A Runaway" was once again helmed by guitarist/producer Gary Hoey, who contributes some guitar playing to the disc, alongside the rest of Lita's longtime backing band, consisting of guitarist Patrick Kennison, drummer Bobby Rock and bassist Marty O'Brien.

In May 2022, bassist Marten Andersson (STEELHEART, LIZZY BORDEN, LYNCH MOB) officially joined Lita's touring band. Andersson replaced O'Brien who became the touring bassist for DAUGHTRY.

In a recent interview with "THAT Rocks!", the weekly YouTube series hosted by Eddie Trunk, Jim Florentine and Don Jamieson, Lita stated about her next LP: "The problem is we've had so many things happen over the last few years. Our manager died; George Marshall died a year ago, [in] '22. And then my songwriting partner died. And it's just been devastation. But we take all that pain and everything and we just put it right back into the album. And then we recorded the drum tracks in Minneapolis during Black Lives Matter and COVID. Everything was locked down and the place was boarded up and the guys had shotguns and Rottweilers. And then we went in and did drum tracks. And it was awesome. Just memories of just pure badassery And so the record is almost done. [There are] a couple things I have to fix and change. And it looks like we might be signing with Frontiers [Music Srl]. But they've gotta to do me right before I put pen to paper. And they're pretty cool over there. So, we're talking March release. 2024, March release."

Regarding what her plans are for live shows in support of her upcoming LP, Lita said: "Well, what I would like to do is put together a theatrical show, sort of like a rock guitar opera kind of thing. It's been done before and different bands have done it before, but I think in this case, it might be a little different and just to bring the whole show not to life just for audio, but for visual reasons also. So we're going to go into rehearsals mid-November and start putting that together for 2024, the Lita Ford rock guitar rock opera. I'd love to have Hoey with me too, if I can get Gary Hoey to [do] the tour."

In January 2021, Lita told SiriusXM's "Trunk Nation With Eddie Trunk" that her new album contains "some of the best guitar playing" she has heard "in decades." She added: "And I'm not blowing smoke up my own ass, but Gary and I just nailed it with the guitar playing on this record.

"I'm a huge fan of people like Dick Wagner and Steve Hunter from Alice Cooper's 'Welcome To My Nightmare'. I mean, there's some really great duo guitar players — [JUDAS PRIEST's] Glenn Tipton, K.K. Downing… Those guitar players don't exist anymore — they just don't exist. If you wanna hear them, you have to go back in time a little bit and dig them up into your favorite library, favorite music catalog. But I think Gary and I really nailed it on this next record. It's, like, oh my God. I'm crying — I'm just, like, crying listening to this stuff. It's so badass."

Ford's last release was 2016's "Time Capsule", a collection of songs that were recorded by Lita in the past, but never before made available.

Seven years ago, Lita released an autobiography, "Living Like A Runaway: A Memoir", via Dey Street Books (formerly It Books),an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.