Nita Strauss

Nita Strauss is considered one of the best guitarists in the world. She became known, among other things, as a member of “The Iron Maidens”. She has been playing in Alice Cooper's band again since the beginning of 2023.

Heavy Metal

Vinita Sandhya "Nita" Strauss (born December 7, 1986 in Los Angeles, California) is an American guitarist. She became known with The Iron Maidens, a female Iron Maiden cover band. In June 2014, she became a member of American hard rock musician Alice Cooper's band, replacing Orianthi on guitar.

Her interest in actively playing the guitar was originally sparked by the 1986 feature film Crossroads - Pact with the Devil in her early teens. In particular, guitarist Steve Vai, who plays a supporting role in the film, had an inspiring influence on her. In June 2014, it was announced that Strauss replaced Orianthi as Alice Cooper's touring guitarist for the 2014 tour dates. She continued this role in 2018. Nita is now open about the fact that her early entry into rock tours with much older musicians and rock greats like Mötley Crüe and Alice Cooper made her an alcoholic. In the fall of 2015, with the help of her partner and manager Josh Villalta, she ended this addiction. She described her friend Jill Janus (Huntress) as her role model for going out in public and potentially using her experiences to help others.

Nita Strauss is the lead guitarist on seven songs in Dockers Guild entitled The Heisenberg Diaries - Book A: Sounds of Future Past, released on January 21, 2016. Strauss met Docker through their mutual friend Jeff Gilooly.

In 2018, Nita Strauss began appearing on WWE shows. On April 8, she appeared at WrestleMania 34, playing guitar in a live performance of Shinsuke Nakamura's entrance theme. On October 28, Strauss appeared at WWE Evolution with Lzzy Hale. In March 2018, Strauss launched a Kickstarter project to fund her own album. Her statement on this was that she was not willing to sign with a record label because it would affect her band's ability and it would allow her to make her own decisions.

In October 2022, Nita Strauss released the song The Wolf you feed in collaboration with Arch Enemy singer Alissa White-Gluz and the accompanying music video.

In March 2023, Alice Cooper announced that Nita Strauss would return to his band as a guitarist.

On July 7, 2023, Strauss released her second solo album entitled Call of the Void, which featured various artists and guest vocalists, including Disturbed and David Draiman, Alissa White-Gluz, Lizzy Hale, Dorothy, Chris Motionless, Alice Cooper, Anders Fridén, Lilith Czar, and Marty Friedman.