Juliette Lewis

Juliette Lewis had taken on numerous high-energy roles in Hollywood films, yet none of those screen personas could foreshadow the extreme ferocity she displayed while fronting both the Licks and the New Romantiques. Her earliest public engagement with rock music surfaced in 1994 via an appearance in the video for Melissa Etheridge's "Come to My Window." The next year she delivered PJ Harvey's "Hardly Wait" inside the film Strange Days, though her own musical ambitions stayed mostly latent across the following eight years. Acting commitments occupied her schedule until she paused them in 2003, the same year she appeared in the video for H.I.M.'s "Buried Alive by Love" and formed her first four-piece band, the Licks. Audiences first encountered the Licks' Van Halen-meets-Iggy Pop sound, along with songs she had written alongside hit songwriter Linda Perry, at Johnny Depp's Viper Room. Over the next twelve months the group toured the West Coast intensively, Lewis taking the stage in spandex, high-heeled boots, and other garments that announced a rocker identity. Listener and critical responses to the live shows ranged from favorable to overwhelmingly enthusiastic. In September 2004 Lewis served as vocalist and co-songwriter on the Prodigy's album Always Outnumbered, Never Outgunned. The Licks issued their debut EP, ...Like a Bolt of Lightning, on Fiddler Records the following month. Additional touring, which included a slot on the tenth annual Vans Warped Tour, preceded the May 2005 release of the full-length debut You're Speaking My Language by Juliette and the Licks. The band returned to the road in support while also developing material for a second album. Their drummer left at the tour's conclusion, but Nirvana/Foo Fighters drummer Dave Grohl intervened, initially intending only to assist with demos before remaining through the recording of Four on the Floor, issued in late 2006. The Four on the Floor DVD followed in December 2007. In 2009 Lewis announced the Licks' dissolution and reappeared with the New Romantiques, who released the album Terra Incognita, meaning "unknown territory." The title proved apt, as the sound differed markedly from prior work, owing partly to producer Omar Rodriguez-Lopez of the Mars Volta. She reassembled the Licks in 2015; alongside several shows that continued into 2016, Lewis declared her return to music. June 2016 brought the pop single "Hello Hero," co-written with Isabella Summers of Florence + the Machine. The solo project's backing musicians included Brad Wilk of Rage Against the Machine, Juan Alderete of the Mars Volta, and Licks colleague Todd Morse.