ALICE COOPER Guitarist NITA STRAUSS: 'ORIANTHI Fans Hate Me'

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ALICE COOPER Guitarist NITA STRAUSS: 'ORIANTHI Fans Hate Me'

October 13, 2015
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ALICE COOPER Guitarist NITA STRAUSS: 'ORIANTHI Fans Hate Me'

Nita Strauss, the Los Angeles-based guitar shredder for the Alice Cooper band, was asked during a recent appearance on Guitar Player magazine's "No Guitar Is Safe" podcast what it has been like spending time with Cooper for the past year and a half since she joined the group as the replacement for Orianthi. She responded: "I feel very privileged to have [Alice's] advice available to me at any time that I want it."

She continued: "A lot of people are, like, 'Well, how do you guys travel? How do you do this and that?' And a lot of people are surprised to find out we travel on a bus all together. We're a regular band. Alice doesn't have his own bus. It's not like he's here and we're there. We're a family. We live together, we fight [and] we play. I'm in a band with five big brothers and our cool dad and mom. Alice and his wife, Sheryl, are so cool to be around, and they really do give great advice, great insight into the music world.

"Alice has seen it all, he's bene through it all. He's been a megastar for upwards of forty years, and to have that nearby when I say, 'I'm getting overwhelmed with this,' or, 'I'm getting frustrated with this.' Or, 'Somebody was mean me at the meet-and-greet. Somebody was wearing an Orianthi t-shirt at the meet-and-greet and they said mean stuff to me.'"

Nita went on to say: "People say mean stuff to me all the time, 'cause Orianthi fans hate me. She is lovely, and a great player, but we have such disparate styles that the fanbase doesn't cross over. A lot of it does, and a lot of it doesn't.

"Man, fans say weird stuff. It always blows my mind. It's such a weird world that we live in now, especially when you think about the Internet. People go on these web sites, [post] comments and say… Some of the stuff… I don't read it anymore, 'cause some of the stuff people say… It would never occur to me to go up to a professional musician in a band I like and say some of these things. It just would never even occur to me. It's such a strange concept.

"Usually [the Internet trolls hide behind things], but I've had the… I would say… It is kind of funny to encounter the troll outside of [its] natural habitat of under the bridge. They come out from under the bridge and they come to shows, and sometimes they come to a meet-and-greet.

"When I first got in the Alice band, [people would say things like], 'I don't think this guitar player knows anything about real rock and roll. All she wants to do is show off.' It's, like, yeah, it is all I wanna do. So what? That's who I am; I'm a big show-off."

Strauss added: "But it's great having Alice and having this sort of grounding influence. You can learn a lot from watching him. I've seen him be interrupted at dinner with his wife, or when he's at the mall shopping, and he's always so gracious and so cool and so humble and never once acts like somebody is bothering him. When he's eating dinner with his beautiful wife, the last thing, you'd think, he probably wants to hear about is the first time somebody bought 'Billion Dollar Babies' and the first time they heard this and that. But he will never turn somebody away. Even when it would be easier to say, 'Hey, can I finish my food and then I'll come over and talk to you?', he will take time out of his day, whatever he's doing, to talk to anybody about their experience with his music, and it's so inspirational. You see people, like, 'Well, I'm eating now. I'm busy now. And this is my personal time.' He doesn't have any concept of that. Shep Gordon, his manager, said to me… I was talking to him about this, and he said, 'Well, the time you'll have a problem is when they stop coming up to you.' And I was, like, 'Good point.'"

Strauss s a longtime Ibanez signature series endorsee who made her name with THE IRON MAIDENS, FEMME FATALE and LA Kiss.

Read more at http://www.blabbermouth.net/news/alice- ... JLAaHeB.99
 
It's this new crop of young fans. No one cared who was in Alice's band until Orianthi joined. She all ready had a track record with her solo albums and playing with Michael Jackson and really made a name for herself. Sadly Nita is in her shadow and it's really lame of people to be like that. The longer she stays with Alice, eventually Orianthi's memory will wear off over time and she'll get more noticed.
 
WOW! I knew Nita played with Alice Cooper for that Hollywood Bowl with Motley Crue but I had no idea she was now an official member! That is absolutely incredible! What a great band to play in. So can we now all assume she knows how he does the guillotine act when his head is chopped off into a basket? Does she have to sign a contract stating she won't reveal how it's done?

I have seen Orianthi with Alice and she is fuckin really really good! But spewing hate Nita's way is ridiculous! I think Alice Cooper Band is one of those backup bands where it is expected to be top notch flawless all the way like E Street Band or Silver Bullet Band or James Brown's Band, fans expect perfection.

Alice being all super sober now, does Nita get super wasted around him?

When I read about the whole band on the bus together I immediately wanted to know who is banging Nita.
 
Acujer, why do you have such an insulting comment to the Maidens in your sig?
 
It's a quote from a San Francisco based Maiden tribute band called Ancient Mariner. He has it there for laughs. I had them play My B-day party a few years ago and interviewed them for my TV show. They got in big trouble from Maidens fans for saying that. Here's a 2014 interview I did wit hthe girls on that subject and the infamous clip!
 
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That's why I question it. A joke should explain itself. If yo have to explain it, you or the joke failed. Read just as it is, it's an insult to the girls.

But whatever.
 
"I don't think this guitar player knows anything about real rock and roll. All she wants to do is show off."...ummm. How can someone say Nita doesn't know anything about real rock and roll?? Isn't showing off a part of rock and roll? At least it is in arena rock last I heard. Funny, I had a chat with Nita about Ori fans being haters before she joined. Sad this has to happen to musicians. Just enjoy the friggen band.
 
When "N'Roll" is placed after "Rock" are we to assume this refers to 1965 and before like Chuck Berry and Jerry Lee Lewis? But didn't Nita purposefully screw up the Rhime of the Ancient Mariner's solo occasionally just because she hated that song? Nita seems to be from the Dream Theater style guitar school. I think John Petrucci is a big influence on her. Some of this nu-metal stuff I do feel there is a gap from the old school blues until now. All great rock bands over 5o years old seem to be rooted in the blues, where later it seems bands were rooted in the guys who were rooted in the blues and now it is guys who are rooted in the guys who were rooted in the guys who were rooted in the blues. Took me a little to warm up to Nita and then I started to really like her and couldn't get enough! She is fantastic, although Courtney still holds the candle for best Maidens guitarist in my personal opinion, but hey, at least Nita's guitar isn't breaking every 5 songs like Courtney!