Deborah Bonham Band – live album to be released in the spring

“We are going to record the live album on February 2 in Blackpool and then it will be out in the spring but it's going to be the set that we will do in Emsworth,” says Deborah who lives close by. “It's a new set and we have dug deep into other songs that we haven't done for a long time. It is going to be a real mix from all the records and there'll be a couple of crowd pleasers in there as well. It going to be great.”

Deborah might even slip in a song by Cream. In November she was part of the release of Heavenly Cream, an acoustic tribute to Cream (Quarto Valley Records), on which Deborah took the lead on two tracks amid fellow musicians including original Cream drummer Ginger Baker who recorded his parts not long before he died, plus Bernie Marsden, Joe Bonamassa, Maggie Bell, Bobby Rush, Pete Brown, Pete Bullick and Deborah’s long-time friend and collaborator Paul Rodgers of Free and Bad Company fame.

“I did the opening track on the album I Feel Free and I did Badge as well. When I was growing up my brother John (Bonham, 1948-1980, Led Zep drummer) would be playing Cream but I hadn’t heard Badge but when I was 15 my mate had a little band playing in the local youth club and they played Badge along with some Tom Petty as well and I just heard it I thought ‘Wow! I love that song!’ and that was me completely a Cream fan then, just absolutely loving it. So when I was offered I Feel Free and Badge I just thought ‘Wow!’ I don't think I will do I Feel Free (at Emsworth Blues Festival), but I might well do Badge.

“But it was such an honour to be on that album, and to get to be on the same record as Maggie Bell was amazing. She was one of the reasons I started singing. She's always been one of my greatest heroes. When I first heard her she was flying the flag for women in the UK like Janis was doing in America, these great inspiring women who were making it possible and coming up with this incredible music.

“I think Maggie has just got a black soul. You can hear her influences, the Motown and soul but she was in a very male-led industry. Elkie Brooks was fronting Vinegar Joe and Maggie Bell was fronting Stone The Crows, and they just had such great power with what they sang. They had some balls. They were going out there and being fantastic women singers in a male-dominated world.”

Deborah’s other recent album Bonham-Bullick, released on Quarto Valley Records, offered a blend of blues, rock and soul interpretations of some classic and contemporary compositions spanning seven decades. The album peaked at number nine on the Amazon chart, with the lead single See You Again reaching number one. It was also album of the week in the European Hit Tracks Top 100 Blues and Rock chart and hailed by Blues Matters! Magazine as contender for Album of the Year.