Heart’s 1977 hit Barracuda has long been a staple in Chappell Roan setlists as the Hot To Go! star has taken her Visions Of Damsels & Other Dangerous Things around the globe in 2025, including a scene-stealing performance of the song at her Reading and Leeds headline shows. But even those can’t match the version she rolled out at the second date of four shows at New York’s Forest Hills stadium last night, when Roan brought on Heart’s very own Nancy Wilson to play guitar and deliver a co-vocal on the track.
It's a team-up that’s been a long time coming. Roan had already declared that Barrcuda was her “favourite song" when Wilson revealed earlier this year that she’d hung out with the Missouri-born singer backstage at a Heart show in LA, speaking to Roan and the members of Boygenius and advising them that she was on hand to be “your rock and roll auntie if you ever need any advice.”
Barracuda, Wilson continued, was written about “a real sleazeball with a satin jacket” who “wanted to make more money out of the sexy chicks in Heart.” Wilson has a good idea of why Roan is drawn to the track. “It’s even more relevant in the salacious billionaire culture with the grab-them-by-the-pussy mentality,” she said. “I think for women in the culture the pendulum will come back again, and there'll be another renaissance in the arts to push back against the oppression of the cranky old rich white guys. I hope I am alive to see that next revolution."
Roan’s US tour rolls on into October, with the singer planning to begin work on the follow-up to her all-conquering debut album The Rise And Fall Of A Midwest Princess once she completes a series of Australian and South American dates in early 2026.
Watch the video of Roan joined by Wilson for a rollicking version of Barracuda below:
