In 1975, 16-year-old Lita Ford walked into an audition and walked out a Runaway.
Armed with five years of guitar playing and unshakable confidence, she tried out for the “all-girl” band being assembled by the late rock impresario Kim Fowley. At the audition, she ripped through Deep Purple’s “Highway Star” alongside drummer Sandy West and guitarist Joan Jett — all of them barely old enough to drive.
“I immediately joined,” Ford says. “Me and Joan and Sandy got along like that. We were the first three to join the band and the last three to stay together.”
It was a huge leap for the youngster, who had started out copying Jimi Hendrix, Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath riffs on a nylon-string guitar. Through a part-time job at a Los Angeles hospital she saved $450 to buy an electric — a Gibson SG similar to the ones she had seen in the hands of her heroes Tony lommi and Angus Young.
And now she was a star. Over the next four years, Ford developed into the Runaways’ lead-guitar firebrand, splashing fierce solos across cuts like “You Drive Me Wild” and “Dead End Justice.” As her technique expanded into Hendrix-inspired phrasing, so did her volatility.
“I was a real bitch,” she says bluntly of those early years. “I couldn’t keep my temper. If I didn’t get to play what I wanted, I’d fly off the handle — kick things, throw things.”
On one notorious night, she says, she broke the wrist of a concertgoer who tried to spray her with beer.
Ironically, just as her playing and self-image were finally aligning, the band imploded in 1979.
“I was finally getting my looks and attitude together. My hair was growing real long. I was getting skinny and felt great. My playing was coming out the way I wanted.
“And then the Runaways broke up.”
The collapse hit hard. Ford packed away her Marshall stacks, her SG and Explorers, and retired to L.A. She quit playing for a year.
“Everybody was yelling at me,” she says. “All my boyfriends who played guitar would call me and say, ‘Why don’t you come over and play with me now?’”
What finally jolted her back wasn’t criticism — it was a challenge from Eddie Van Halen.
“Edward Van Halen said to me, ‘What are you doing? Why don’t you play? You could be the best female rock and roll guitar player in the world, and you’re just sitting around.’”
Edward Van Halen said to me, ‘What are you doing? Why don’t you play? You could be the best female rock and roll guitar player in the world, and you’re just sitting around.’”
— Lita Ford
That lit the fuse.
Four years after the Runaways’ breakup, Ford returned with 1983’s Out for Blood, a title that doubled as a mission statement.
“I just want to be the best female rock guitar player,” she declared at the time. “I want to be classified in the same area as an Eddie Van Halen, Michael Schenker or Ritchie Blackmore.”
She also had advice for aspiring players — especially women.
“People say, ‘Lita, I do a lot of drugs. What do you think?’ I go, ‘No! Take your frustrations out on your guitar — beat the shit out of it.’ Many women don’t play because they think it’ll take away from their femininity. But if you really want to be a guitar player, you have to sacrifice something. My nails are gone, but I don’t care.”
Nearly five decades later — after hits like her Ozzy Osbourne co-write “Close My Eyes Forever” — she’s still chasing that standard. Ford is currently touring the U.S., Canada and Europe in 2026 in support of a forthcoming concept album featuring collaborators including Gary Hoey, producer Max Norman and Jean Beauvoir.
The goal hasn’t changed either. She’s still making the guitar — and making sure people are listening.
