Leather Leone is one of the most powerful vocalists with a very distinctive voice. She began working in music during the 1980s, and soon joined bands such as Rude Girl and Chastain , with whom she released five albums before taking a break from the artistic scene.
Leone, along with Brazilian guitarist Vinnie Tex , released the album We Are The Chosen in 2022. In an exclusive interview with Wikimetal , she spoke about the new record, as well as her career and life.
Working with music wasn't always the vocalist's dream: "I knew I wanted to sing, but I also really wanted to work with animals." Even though it wasn't a "big dream," she says, "The more I had the privilege of doing it, the more I enjoyed it."
Her decision to pursue a music career came when she started singing in cover bands and thought, “Hey, I kind of like this. I should try to figure out more.” So, she moved to California in the 1980s after graduating from college. She described the rock and metal scene at the time as being “crazy!”
Regarding her voice, Leather revealed what she does to keep it healthy: cardio, sleep, and water. “But I have to be fair to everyone. I haven’t sung for twenty-five years. So my voice has been sleeping.” The vocalist took a break from her musical career during the 1990s after releasing a series of albums with Chastain: “The Chastain thing wasn’t really moving forward.” She recounts that “I wanted to try doing bigger national tours and David Chastain never liked touring.” The band never achieved the same level of success as other bands in the genre, “I think it had to do with touring and David Chastain didn’t want to sign with any record label. He wanted to do everything himself and keep it compact.” But that “I really don’t have the answer to that question.”
She also talks about her biggest inspiration, Ronnie James Dio : "I emulate him all the time in spirit, composition and melody." Besides him, Leone also cites Bruce Dickinson and Geoff Tate , vocalist of Queensrÿche , as her influences.
Those who consume music only through digital streaming platforms may not know that the 1990 album For Those Who Dare actually has ten tracks. Heart was included on the album. "I remember it was a record label thing. For some reason they wanted us to do a cover. We didn't do covers." The reason it's not available in digital formats is because the band "didn't even want it on the album."
When commenting on her entire career, she spoke about how she viewed her musical journey so far: “Interesting. Sparse, with highs and lows. But it’s okay. Yeah, you know, the first word that came to mind was unsatisfying, but actually not. I don’t know. I’m still in the middle of the journey.” She recounted how happy and grateful she is to have her fanbase, “I wish it were a little faster and a little bigger at this point, but, you know, talk to me tomorrow.”
Once again, Ronnie James Dio played an important role in her life, and it was he who made her rethink her decision to leave the music world. After his death, Leather Leone went to the vocalist's funeral and recalls feeling "very stupid for having received this talent and not doing anything with it."
He even recounts one of his favorite memories: when Leather Leone met Ronnie James Dio. "When I met Ronnie Dio, I was like, I couldn't speak."
“I got on Dio’s tour bus and he had, my drummer gave him a cassette tape of Rude Girl . And he was listening to it, I went in and he was getting off. He said, ‘Are you the singer?’ And I couldn’t speak.”
Fast-forwarding to 2022, Leather Leone released We Are the Chosen , on which she co-wrote all the songs. She said that, with the pandemic and quarantine, she and Vinnie Tex were able to “start writing a song and then shelve it, which isn’t in my nature.” However, this greater “flexibility” in scheduling “gave us time to record things and really listen to them and renew them, and it was really, really good. I think that’s why the songs are so thoughtful and so well-composed, because we had all this time.”
The pandemic was one of the inspirations behind the songs on We Are the Chosen : "My musical life was definitely in chaos, so the compositions had a lot to do with that."
“I really discovered the truth about people during the pandemic. We discovered who our true friends were, the people who had been forgotten.”
She spoke about the idea behind We Are The Chosen as representing a “united metal family.” “We chose to do this materially. We chose to live this life,” in addition to the cover art being “out of anger, because it was a time of anger.”
The message behind the new album is, “That we are a family. Don’t get discouraged. I tend to be very negative. Don’t go there. Just be strong. 'Take Back Control,' which opens the record. Just organize your life. Make your plan and go for it. Just go for it. Don’t let anything stop you.”
Regarding her partnership with Vinnie Tex, Leather Leone spoke about their differences. The vocalist describes him as a "very organized, perfectionist Leo," while she is "a crazy Aries who doesn't have much patience." "But Vinnie appreciates my voice, and Vinnie tends to write for my voice, which is very different for me. He really helps me with songwriting."
Of the ten songs on the album, Leone cited “Off with Your Head” as his favorite: “It was very personal to talk about an incident I had with someone once. Sometimes I go back and forth reading about medieval times and how they used to behead people when they were angry. So I was saying, 'wow, wouldn't it be nice to be able to do that to someone, theoretically?'”.
Speaking about her discography, she cited Mystery Of Illusion (1985), Chastain's first album, as the most challenging of her career. She recounted that “I didn’t know what I was doing, so I was very insecure, which I still am, often. I was struggling and I would go, learn the song, then go there and he would change the melody.” When asked which album she would recommend to someone who wanted to get to know her work better, she cited We Are the Chosen and then went back to Shock Waves (2013) “so you can see what my voice is like and what I can do.”
Regarding his future plans, Leather Leone said he intends to tour and record more albums: “Now that Vinny and I have reached the stage where we know each other, now we know how to work together, we know what the other does, musically, I just really want to move forward.”
"Yes, 2024 is going to be amazing. I have a lot of things coming together," he concluded.
