‘Do something with your actions. Don’t just write a cheque’: Bonnie Raitt on activism, making men cry and 38 years of sobriety
Going back out on tour, the 13-time Grammy winner recalls stark inspirations and steamy studio sessions as she answers your questions
You’ve had a decades-long career. When did you first feel that you had “made it”? LondonLuvver
I wasn’t expecting to do music for a job. I was into social activism in college, and I just had music as a hobby. My boyfriend managed a bunch of blues artists and I asked if I could open for some of them – just to have fun and hang out with my heroes. Unbeknown to me, there really weren’t any women playing blues guitar and doing the mix of songs [I was], and I immediately got more offers of gigs and even a record company offer within about a year. That first gig I got under my own name, when I was 19, was a total surprise: that’s when I felt I had made it.