'I love this band and the music' Vixen drummer talks band's legacy ahead of local show

During the ‘80s in Los Angeles, several glam-metal bands such as Motley Crue, Poison, RATT and more found mainstream success while several unsigned bands hoped for a chance at stardom.

The scene was mostly all-male bands except for guitarist and vocalist Lita Ford until the all-female band Vixen descended on the scene in the mid-‘80s. They arrived ready to rock with songs such as “Edge of a Broken Heart,” “Cryin,” “How Much Love” and “Love Is a Killer.” The band went on to sell over a million albums, had six No. 1 music videos on MTV and four songs in Billboard’s Top 100.

Guitarist Jan Kuehnemund, who died in 2013, started the band in Saint Paul, Minnesota but took it to Los Angeles where she put together the classic lineup featuring vocalist Janet Gardner, bassist Share Ross, and drummer Roxy Petrucci.

Petrucci, now the sole member from the classic lineup, keeps Vixen going featuring vocalist Lorraine Lewis, bassist Julia Lage and guitarist Britt Lightning.

Vixen will perform on July 29 in the Rock Yard at Fantasy Springs Resort Casino.

"We’re kicking ass live,” Petrucci told The Desert Sun during a recent interview. “Jan’s goal was for Vixen to live forever, so I feel like my job is to keep that legacy going. I love this band and the music. I love playing live, the current members ... they deserve to be here."

Record labels were hesitant to sign the band

According to Petrucci, Vixen didn’t have a hard time getting booked for shows, had an arsenal of well-written songs and crowds welcomed seeing an all-female band for a change, but one of the biggest obstacles was convincing record labels to sign the group.

“They’d say ‘Oh, we already have one girl band’ or ‘We have Lita Ford.’ It was like ‘You can only have one female artist on your label?’” Petrucci said. “We never ran into any problems with fans, and it was always the industry. They had it in their minds that women can’t play rock, but we didn’t care, did what we did because we loved playing rock ‘n’ roll, we were good at it and wouldn’t take ‘no’ for an answer.”

When Vixen was signed to Manhattan Records in 1988 and released its self-titled debut album, the power ballad “Edge of a Broken Heart” went to No. 22 on the Billboard Hot 100. Then, the women went on tour, supporting bands such as Ozzy Osbourne and Bon Jovi. Petrucci remembered Vixen’s first tour with Eddie Money and described him as a “gentleman” She also has fond memories of going on the road with The Scorpions.

“(The Scorpions) were nice and had flowers put in our dressing room that said, ‘Welcome to the big show.’ That was our first arena tour and they were very helpful. We’d watch them every night and learned from them.”

Vixen released “Rev It Up” in 1990 and disbanded in 1992 after the band lost its record contract. Petrucci reformed Vixen in 1997 with Gardner featuring guitarist Gina Stile and Phantom Blue bassist Rana Ross, but Kuehnemund halted the revival after filing a lawsuit for trademark infringement.

VH1 brought the band back together as part of a reality show

During the early 2000s, when reality TV was gaining widespread popularity, the masses wanted more variety than “Survivor.” And to some extent, VH1 and MTV were still music channels at the time and created reality shows around music artists and bands such as “The Osbournes” and “The Ashlee Simpson Show.”

In 2004, VH1 premiered the show “Bands Reunited,” which featured host Aamer Haleem tracking down members of defunct bands such as Frankie Goes to Hollywood, Berlin and New Kids on The Block at homes, places of employment or in public and putting them on the spot in hopes of an agreement to reunite for a one-night concert.

Vixen was featured on the show and Petrucci knew immediately what was going on when Haleem stepped into her backyard.

“I said, ‘I know who you are and yes, I’ll do it,’” Petrucci said. “It was good for us because we got to air out what was bothering us at the time. The band was connected, we had a great experience together and that will never go away. We were like sisters, whether we were fighting or not, we had the experience of a lifetime. We get along great now, keep in touch, still talk about things here and there, go down memory lane, but we weren’t prepared to get back together at the time. We waited, Jan called and we did another tour together. We never stopped and we’re still here rocking today.”

Petrucci said Ross has been on hiatus from the band since 2022 due to a busy real estate career in Florida and that Gardner left in 2019 to focus on her family and pursue a solo career, but she added “the door is always open” for another reunion.

“We all love Vixen,” Petrucci said. “If it happens, it happens. If not, I’m going to continue keeping the Vixen name alive. I don’t plan on stopping anytime soon. I love Janet and Share, I love working with them, we make great music together and we’ll see what happens.”

Desert Sun reporter Brian Blueskye covers arts and entertainment. He can be reached at brian.blueskye@desertsun.com or on Twitter at @bblueskye.

If you go

What: Vixen

When: 7 p.m. Saturday, July 29

Where: The Rock Yard at Fantasy Springs Resort Casino, 84-245 Indio Springs Parkway, Indio

How much: Free

More information: fantasyspringsresort.com

This article originally appeared on Palm Springs Desert Sun: Vixen drummer talks band's legacy ahead of local show