Nita Strauss shreds alongside “dream, wish-list singers” on new solo album, ‘The Call of the Void’

Sumerian Records

Nita Strauss‘ debut solo album, 2018’s Controlled Chaos, is completely instrumental. For her sophomore effort, The Call of the Void, the guitar virtuoso is adding guest vocalists to all the riffs and shredding.

“I wanted to evolve, I wanted to do something new, and something fresh and something different,” Strauss tells ABC Audio. “We kept, obviously, the high-octane instrumental songs that people will expect to hear from me, but we collaborated also with a lot of different vocalists for this record.”

“I got to work with some of my dream, wish-list singers,” she adds.

Those featured on The Call of the Void include Disturbed‘s David Draiman, who guests on the #1 Billboard Mainstream Rock Airplay hit “Dead Inside,” as well as Halestorm‘s Lzzy Hale, Motionless in White‘s Chris Motionless, Dorothy and Strauss’ “longtime boss” Alice Cooper, whose live band she joined in 2014.

“We wrote the music parts first, and when we wrote the music, it was really with a specific kind of singer in mind,” Strauss explains. “It wasn’t necessarily for the person that we got, but it’s, like, ‘This would work for, like, a female powerhouse vocal, somebody like Lzzy Hale.’”

Interestingly, though, the song Hale sings on, “Through the Noise,” wasn’t originally intended for her.

“When I say [Hale] took it to the next level, she took it to the stratosphere,” Strauss says. “She did things on that song that I never even conceived of.”

Strauss laughs, “I hope she bought that song dinner first with some of the stuff she did with that track.”

The Call of the Void is out now. Strauss’ current U.S. solo tour in support of the album concludes July 14 in New Orleans.