SHE was part of one of the coolest female-led groups of the 90s and inspired an all-time modern rock classic.
And 30 years on from Veruca Salt’s first scuzzy anthems, co-frontwoman Louise Lightner Post has barely aged a day.
The 57-year-old is still making music, now as a solo artist backed by her band The Smokeshow, after Veruca Salt went on an indefinite hiatus.
The cult 90s band – Post, fellow frontwoman Nina Gordon, bassist Steve Lack and drummer Jim Shapiro – emerged at the tail end of the decade’s grunge glory years with debut album American Thighs.
The follow up album in 1997 had a more commercial sheen courtesy of super producer Bob Rock, who had worked on massive albums with Metallica, Motley Crue and Bon Jovi.
Just a year after their commercial zenith, a bitter row between Post and Gordon saw the latter leave the group in favour of a solo career.
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Veruca Salt went through numerous line-up changes in the years that followed, before calling it a day in 2012.
The following year the original line-up made a comeback, delighting alt-rock fans. It led to a new album in 2015, Ghost Notes, bringing the group full circle, however, there are no plans for any more music.
Post previously told Glide Magazine: “Veruca Salt was on an indefinite hiatus and still is. There’s nothing negative happening except that we’re not creating music together. We don’t all live in the same city and the stars aren’t aligned for the moment.”
She has since released her first solo record, 2023’s Sleepwalker.
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“The solo record was demanding to be made,” she said. “It wasn’t that I set out necessarily to create, write and release a solo record. I felt more like there was no escaping it.”
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In the late 90s Louise hit it off with former Nirvana drummer and Foo Fighters frontman Dave Grohl.
The pair enjoyed an intense relationship that ultimately inspired the Foos’ best-loved track, Everlong.
Grohl told Kerrang in 2006: “That song’s about a girl that I’d fallen in love with, and it was basically about being connected to someone so much that not only do you love them physically and spiritually, but when you sing along with them you harmonise perfectly.”
Post has previously spoken of a late night call she had with Grohl while the anthem was in production.
She shared an edit of a recording in which she could be heard singing backing vocals.
We don’t all live in the same city and the stars aren’t aligned for the moment.
Louise Post
Writing on the Veruca Salt band page on Instagram, she said: “I sang these back-ups over the phone at 2am after being woken up from a deep sleep in Chicago by DG who was tracking the vocals for ‘Everlong’ in LA. He wanted me to sing the doo-doo’s
“He wanted me to sing the doo-doo’s, which were inspired by [Veruca Salt’s] song ‘Shimmer Like A Girl’. While I was at it, I wrote a harmony for the chorus and sang that too.”
“The whispered section of this song was originally the dream I was having when the phone rang. It was a dream about us. [Grohl] later removed it and replaced with his own whispers, one which was a love letter to me.
“Maybe I’ll tell the full story…eventually…if I feel like it. But I just came across this post and thought I would share for anyone who is interested.”
The pair’s romance came to an end over the phone when Grohl called Post while she was on tour in Australia. He would soon go on to date Hollywood actress Winona Ryder prompting Post to accuse him of cheating.
The heartache appeared to be referenced on Veruca Salt’s 2000 track Disconnected, which has the lyrics: “It’s kind of scary when your lover leaves you for a movie star.”
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Seemingly distancing the episode from the song, Post would later tell the Sydney Morning Herald: “People definitely read things into my songs. It was a private relationship, but it got so much publicity. I didn’t mean for it to happen. I’m friends with him now.”
