Vandoliers
In the decade Jenni Rose has performed as part of Vandoliers, she’s never seen a response to the band’s music quite like she has over the past few months. The lead vocalist and guitarist is on her first tour with the Texas-based country-punk sextet since coming out as a transgender woman earlier this year. That shift in her personal life is coinciding with a shift for the band.
“The biggest difference from what we have been doing for the last 10 years, versus what we are doing now, is I feel like there’s like an emotional connection now that wasn’t there,” Rose tells the Scene. “The shows feel even more important, or powerful. It’s hard to describe, but people are singing these new songs very intensely. … It just wasn’t like that with our other work.”
After coming out to friends and family in late 2024, Rose came out to Vandoliers fans and the broader public in April, sharing the story of her self-discovery journey in an emotional interview with Rolling Stone. That experience is reflected in the band’s powerful new album Life Behind Bars, released in late June, and seems to be reflected in crowds showing up for the band’s current tour in support of the LP too.
“There are more people, because we’ve gotten more exposure,” Rose says. “But it’s also different now. There are a lot of women, a lot of queer folk, and it’s younger. It’s been really great to play for this new audience, and to see them catch on to something like this has been really surreal.”
To make Life Behind Bars, a follow-up to the band’s 2022 self-titled LP, Vandoliers tapped veteran producer Ted Hutt, known for his work with Flogging Molly, Dropkick Murphys, Lucero and more. They set up shop to record for two weeks at famed Texas studio complex Sonic Ranch. Rose recalls seeing Hutt’s name on records she’s loved throughout her life and thought his vision would be a great fit for Vandoliers.
“I couldn’t think of a better person to co-create with, so I just started putting it out in the universe,” she says. “I think my idea, when I pitched it to him, was like, ‘I don’t give a fuck about writing a hit single. I just want to make something meaningful.’ And I guess he latched on to that part of it, because there wasn’t the commercial pressure that he was used to. I also told him I didn’t have any money. We didn’t have a label, and we didn’t really know what was going to happen. But he was like, ‘Just send me some songs.’”
Rose sent Hutt material she wrote while the band toured Europe. She noted that she penned the pieces while still drinking but shared them with Hutt nine days after she decided to get sober. A non-drinker himself, Hutt found a kindred spirit in Rose. In Hutt, Rose found an encouraging and honest collaborator, as he often “pushed her to dig” into the emotions driving her writing. That digging yielded not just better songs but a season of awakening for Rose, who began to see her internal (and at that time private) struggle with gender dysphoria reflected in her writing.
“So we got to go to Sonic Ranch for two weeks with Grammy Award-winning Ted Hutt to write this career-altering album,” Rose says. “And then I find out I’m a girl. I really came to grips with it in my bungalow at the studio, and I was like, ‘Oh my God, oh no.’ I’m writing all these songs, and Ted’s making me dig really deep, and then all this shit is starting to come out. I’m like, ‘How am I going to explain these songs to these people?’”
Those conversations generally went more easily than Rose anticipated, and the many emotions she experienced found their way into Life Behind Bars. The resulting album is the band’s most dynamic record yet, retaining the rough and rowdy sound that made Vandoliers beloved while including rawer, quieter moments that put more focus on the often vulnerable narratives at the heart of each song.
Highlights include “You Can’t Party With the Lights On,” a collaboration with Joshua Ray Walker and Taylor Hunnicutt that pairs a raucous arrangement with a melancholy lyric. Also a standout is the title track, which likens denying one’s true self to being in a prison of one’s own making.
“We all feel trapped by something in our lives, almost everyone,” says trumpet and keys player Cory Graves, who’s also on our call. “So it’s really relatable on this broad scale, which I think is why people are latching on to it, and why the chorus is so cathartic to scream out at the concert.”
Seeing fans sing along to these new songs just weeks after their release is rewarding for the band, though it’s the strong sense of community radiating from the audience that sticks with Rose the most. She is especially touched by meeting young queer people and their parents, and feels proud that Vandoliers have created a space where people of all backgrounds can feel welcome and included.
“Kids are getting picked on right now by our government, so hard in pretty much every realm,” says Rose. “And it’s not just trans kids. But the parents of trans kids and the trans kids that have come to my shows — I just feel so honored to hear from them and to be up there singing for them.”
