Throwback Thursday: Bonnie Raitt

For this week’s Throwback Thursday, we’re celebrating Bonnie Raitt’s birthday with a set of her music.

Active since the 1970′s, Bonnie Raitt has been an icon for quite some time.  The early parts of her career are characterized by a roots influenced sound that was heavily acclaimed, if not widely popular.  That changed in the 1990′s, however, as she released a string of hits throughout the decade.  Her mainstream popularity finally was proportional to her renown within the roots community where she was already a legend for her output to that point and her slide guitar playing.  An activist from an early age, she attended Harvard’s Radcliffe College as a Social Relations African Studies Major.  Her plan was, “to travel to Tanzania, where President Julius Nyerere was creating a government based on democracy and socialism… I wanted to help undo the damage that Western colonialism had done to native cultures around the world. Cambridge, Massachusetts was a hotbed of this kind of thinking, and I was thrilled.”

This activism has been intrinsic to her music over the course of her four decade-spanning career.  Some of her notable areas of activism are in the anti-nuclear movement and environmental preservation, in part founding Musicians United for Safe Energy.  Despite her commercial success, she continues this day to be a vocal advocate for the many causes she believes in.  Tune in at 5pm today to celebrate Bonnie Raitt’s birthday with us!

By Bentley J. Holt

If you liked this, check out:
Throwback Thursday: Anthony Kiedis
This Week in Music History