Originally published by L.S. Media. June 19th 2012.
L.S. Media Rating ****
No matter your point of view of Lita Ford, there is no difficulty in recognising the amount of personal turmoil she manages to get out of her system in the second of her comeback albums, Living Like A Runaway.
The ex-Runaways singer/guitarist was out of the scene for so long from 1995 and the 2009 release of Wicked Wonderland that the rock world wondered whether the first woman of heavy metal would ever pick up a guitar in anger again. With this new album, the answer is most certainly yes and reading through the lyrics the anger is so intense, so dramatic and so passionate that it gives the songs that little bit of extra spice that makes you thankful that you never get on her wrong side.
Alongside the anger there also seems to be a nostalgic nod at her life before her solo career. The album title itself is a huge compliment to the band she was associated with at the end of the 70’s and early 80’s but also has the thought of becoming her own woman at last after so many years spent in the wilderness and the kicks she has taken in recent years in her private years.
The first three songs on the album are an open letter to the past and the recent events in the rockers life. Branded, Hate and The Mask are songs that not just deal with a vile part of her life but act as conduit to her understanding of where her life must now take her. Hate and The Mask especially are intense letters of power, of bitterness and showing that she alone had the power to stop it. An all-round cathartic exercise that will prove to bring this woman back into the hearts of rock fans everywhere.
The album is produced by Gary Hoey and as a producer he seems to get the very best out of Lita Ford. It has a tireless feel that will leave you broken hearted in places, especially on the guitar solo in Mother and will also leave you despairing that someone who was always thought of as a quite strong woman idol in the world of rock has shed her skin several times during this album, part painful, part exhilarating, the queen of women’s rock and metal is certainly back to her best.
Ian D. Hall