Sheena Easton

Lore & Background

Easton collaborated with Prince, who wrote 'Sugar Walls' for her under his pseudonym Alexander Nevermind. The song was deemed controversial due to its sexually explicit nature. The source does not specify any other Prince collaborations or co-writing sessions.

In Their Own Story

The studio was humming at 2 a.m., the kind of deep, bone-rattling hum that meant the tape was still rolling and the engineer had long since stopped watching the clock. She set her mic stand a half-inch to the left, the way he liked it, and waited. The room smelled like cold coffee and the particular ozone tang of overdriven tube amps. When the count-in came, she didn't think about the song. She thought about the space between the notes, the breath before the phrase, the way the bass player's ghost-note would land exactly where she'd left a pocket open. She sang the line once, softly, like a secret told to no one in particular. He nodded from behind the glass. The tape kept rolling. Outside, the Minnesota night was flat and black and the parking lot empty, and for those four bars, the whole world was just the room and the sound and the next take.

Reader's Guide

Easton's career includes the Grammy Award for Best New Artist (1982), the Grammy Award for Best Mexican-American Performance (1985) for her collaboration with Luis Miguel on 'Me Gustas Tal Como Eres', and the James Bond theme 'For Your Eyes Only'. She remains the only Bond theme singer to appear in the opening credits performing the song.

Did You Know?

• Easton's debut single 'Modern Girl' originally peaked at number 56 in the UK before being reissued after her TV documentary aired, reaching number 8.
• Her US number 1 hit 'Morning Train (Nine to Five)' was renamed to avoid confusion with Dolly Parton's '9 to 5'.
• Easton was the first artist in Billboard history to have a top-five hit on each of the Billboard primary singles charts.