Fleetingwood Mac and Blame Jones singer Leonie Gale goes solo for the first time with gig at The Edge of The Wedge, Southsea

Since then, she’s rarely been off it. In the intervening years she has sung backing vocals for the like of Boy George and acclaimed blues/soul singer Jo Harman, as well as fronting numerous covers and tribute bands, including the enormously popular Fleetingwood Mac and Blame Jones.

But now, 25 years on, the powerhouse vocalist is finally taking to the stage under her own name, to perform her own music, when she plays at The Edge of The Wedge in Southsea this Saturday.

"I'm terrified,” says the mum-of-three. “I've been gigging for 25 years this year, but I've never, ever gone out under my own name, ever. “And so this is my first ever proper solo performance under my name. It's a bit daunting because all the responsibility as it's under my name!”

The show will feature a mix of originals and covers.

"It’s covers that have inspired me over the years – songs that I've never gigged before, but they're all songs that I love so much and have had such an impact on my writing.”

This isn’t the first time Leonie has been involved in creating her own original music, though.

"Years ago, we had an originals band, Tremain (her maiden name, with her sister Amba and Andy Dixon), where the whole goal was for us to release music and write music.

"We got to a lovely place where we were writing with these amazing producers and we were meeting these amazing people. We ended up writing for the X-Factor lot and all that kind of stuff.”

However, because they were gaining traction writing for others, ironically Tremain itself “ended up taking a bit of a backseat.”

They tried to reignite Tremain a couple of years ago.

"Andy, who I've been working with since I was 19, he's really into the pop side of things and the dance production, and that's just not my bag. I love the more organic and raw kind of classic sounding production. “We amicably, and in a really lovely way, decided to stop writing together. I would go and find someone else that matched what I wanted to do and he would carry on doing what he wanted to do – we still do Blame Jones together.

“I felt this real sense of freedom, like the shackles had been taken off of me. It was no longer me, Amba and Andy writing together, where everything had to have another opinion from somebody else. There was this feeling of too many chefs spoil the broth.

"And then... I did nothing with it.”

At the start of this year, reconnecting with Jo Harman, who she’d worked with about 15 years previously proved to be a turning point. Leonie and Amba were invited to sing backing vocals for Jo at the Caribbean Festival back in March this year.

It was Jo’s manager, Mark Ede who forced Leonie to look at what she was doing with her music career.

“He's so supportive of mine and Amba's voices. And he was like: ‘What do you want to do?’ So I told him: ‘I just want to write music and gig music with absolutely no intentions.’

"I don't want to be famous. I don't want my music on Radio One. All of these things that I've had drummed into me over the years – if you write this song, it has to be like this, and it has to sound like this, copy that song, and that will definitely get you on Radio One.

"I just got to a point where I was like, I don't want to do any of that. I just want to write nice music and gig it and see what happens.

“So me and Mark got talking and then it kind of escalated.”

For the first time in a long time Leonie found herself accepting offers she would have typically turned down.

“Years ago, I would have been like: ‘No, no, I can't do that. I'm not good enough’. But instead I've been saying yes. “That led to a gig with Mo Pleasure, who's worked with everyone from Ray Charles to Chaka Khan. Honestly, the list of people he’s worked with is ridiculous.

"Now he goes around playing places all around the country and in America, and he has guest vocalists with him. He showcases his career and all the people that he's worked with – Stevie Wonder, Bette Midler, just everybody. I got thrown into the deep end of being the voice for his show.

“It was a game changer. To have someone of his level on your side, he was so lovely. He said to my friend Ashley, who drove me up there: ‘She is so special. I'm really excited about her’.

“To have somebody say that, I was like, what am I doing? Why am I not just doing more and pushing myself a little bit more?

“And then yeah, I started writing again.

“I sang a song to Jason (Gale, her husband who is also a musician) on a voice note, I told him: ‘Think Al Green but a little bit darker. Let me know what you come up with’.

“He sent me the track back, and it was absolutely spot on to how I envisioned it in my head. He is so talented. It is quite annoying how talented my husband is,” she laughs.

Jason has recently returned to working full-time in music after taking a break. As Leonie says: “He gave up music to get 'a real' job, but he was miserable.”

He’s working with up-and-coming rocker Ulysses Well, has his own ska band Gold Steppers as well as doing production work.

He’s also the bassist in Leonie’s band.

“He's such an unbelievable player and he gets me. When we work together, we are colleagues, we're not a couple at all – it's how we've always been since we were in our band before, before we were even together.

"When we got together, we told the band that it would never affect business and we've stuck to it.”

The couple have recently created a home studio, with the aim.

"Hopefully by the time Buddy (their youngest) is fully into school, we will have time to be creative and I can write the album that I always dreamed of writing 25 years ago!”

Through Mark, Leonie has been put in touch with Freddie V the saxophonist and musical director of Average White Band. Mark asked him to send Leonie one of his instrumental tracks for her to put lyrics to.

“I am a massive Average White Band fan. They're one of the reasons why I created my disco tribute (Lee and The Freaks).

“He sent over the track and I wrote this song to it. It's not probably something that I would release myself, but it's so uplifting and it's so fun and lovely that I've decided to put it in the Edge of The Wedge set.

"To be working with people that I have admired... I've lived and breathed every single record of Average White Band since I was a kid, and to now have someone like that say: ‘Yeah, you can write a song to one of my tracks’, that's great. I'm just like: ‘What the hell is happening here?’” she laughs.

She will also be Jo Harman’s understudy for the forthcoming Van Morrison Alumni Band tour

"Van Morrison’s trumpet player, Leo (Green), has put together a show celebrating and honoring his music and they're touring it all around the world. They've asked Jo to be the vocalist for it – and I'm Jo's understudy for it.

“It's like I've entered a whole new world of class. I feel very awakened and really inspired. Since working with Mark Ede he has just opened me up to a whole new world of music that I didn't know about, and he's introduced me to so many amazing and influential people.

"All of these little opportunities are coming up and blowing my mind and I'm absorbing every little bit of experience. “These are things that I've always dreamt of doing, I feel like I'm finally doing them. It's a really exciting time.”

Leonie also credits her time with the Portsmouth-based, nationally touring tribute band Fleetingwood Mac for pushing her as a performer.

"I learned a lot when I was gigging with Fleetingwood. I've been gigging for a long time, but never, ever on the scale of Fleetingwood. I learned a lot about myself as a performer and I really came out of myself and I think I really blossomed and became a lot more confident.”

For the gig at The Edge, Leonie describes her band as “insanely talented”. Besides Jason on bass, there’s Terry Lewis from Mama’s Gun on guitar, Emily Francis on keys (she’s played with everyone from Toyah to Rumer and Ward Thomas), and in-demand drummer Karl Penney (who also plays with Leonie and Jason in yet another project – Back Spasm Band).

"This show at The Edge is going to be a really lovely little turning point for me. It was the first venue I ever performed an original song in when I was 19. It was an acoustic night in there, I was 19, so it's a very special for me.

"Now I'm finally really proud of what I'm putting my name to and I couldn't think of a better place to do it.”

Leonie Gale, supported by Jasmin Alloway, is at the Edge of The Wedge on Saturday, doors 7.30pm. Tickets £15. Go to wedgewood-rooms.co.uk.