Sheena Easton cannot remember the last time she performed in Atlanta, and The Atlanta Journal-Constitution archives going back to the early 1980s don’t show any references to her in concert in the city at all.
She booked a show for Oct. 6 at the Byers Theatre inside Sandy Springs Performing Arts Center at City Springs but just a few days before the concert, the promoter Reed Foust cancelled the show. Easton’s tour promoter Susan Holder confirmed the concert wasn’t going to happen. Foust said ticket sales fell short.
Easton, in an interview before the cancellation, said she works now when she wants to.
“There were several phases in my life where I was feeling burned out and tired,” Easton said from her home in Las Vegas, where she has resided since 1989. “I felt like I was on a treadmill.”
Credit: Rob Grabowski/Invision/AP
Credit: Rob Grabowski/Invision/AP
But that’s not the case anymore.
“I’ve gotten to the point in my life where I pick and choose what I want to do,” said Easton, 65. “I really want to have a life. I’m not going to kill myself and take every gig that comes to me and work too much.”
Easton, who was born and raised in Scotland and was discovered on an early British reality show, became a regular fixture on the top 40 charts throughout the 1980s with a raft of bright pop hits such as “Telefone,” “Strut” and “The Lover in Me.”
She wasn’t a songwriter and readily admitted that she didn’t pick her songs for message consistency, especially when she was in her early 20s. “My first hit was ‘Modern Girl’ where she doesn’t build her life around a single man,” Easton said. “Then my baby takes the morning train, works from 9 to 5 and finds me waiting for him. You can’t overanalyze every ’80′s pop song and look for a save-the-world moment. It’s not always going to be that way.”
“Morning Train (Nine to Five),” the more retrograde song, did far better than “Modern Girl” in the United States, becoming her sole Billboard No. 1 hit in 1981. “There’s space for everybody’s point of view,” she said. “That’s one of those things that doesn’t happen much nowadays. Instead, we try to find ways to divide our points of view. I’m not buying into it.”
But she isn’t using her concerts to express her political views. “That’s not my kind of concert,” she said. “My fans aren’t coming to hear that.”
Easton, with two hits under her belt, also managed to land one of the more memorable James Bond themes after “Morning Train” hit it big: torch ballad “For Your Eyes Only.”
“It broadened my exposure worldwide,” she said. “It set up a solid foundation for me to build my career. And being a kid growing up in the U.K., Bond was special. The franchise always tied music into the film. I never thought I’d be in the same world as Shirley Bassey (who recorded songs for three Bond films) and Carly Simon (who performed the hit theme song for 1977′s “The Spy Who Loved Me”).”
Easton quickly left “Morning Train” behind with racier tunes like “Strut.”
Credit: ASSOCIATED PRESS
Credit: ASSOCIATED PRESS
“My early stuff reflected a young, inexperienced person,” Easton said. “By the time we got to ‘Strut,’ I was living in the States. I’d been around the world several times. My approach to things had become more sophisticated. ”
She then made headlines with her top 10 hit “Sugar Walls” in 1984. Televangelist Jimmy Swaggart and Tipper Gore’s Parents Music Resource Center groused about the song’s euphemistically suggestive lyrics. Gore’s group placed “Sugar Walls” in its “Filthy Fifteen” along with songs by Judas Priest, Motley Crue and Prince, who actually wrote “Sugar Walls.”
At the time, she defended the song saying that “men have never had to apologize for being sexy. Art is all about being free, and if you don’t like it, then tune in to something else.”
In 1987, she teamed with Prince in a funky duet called “U Got the Look,” which peaked at No. 2, and 1989′s “The Arms of Orion.”
“I was blessed to work with Prince,” she said. “We did quite a few collaborations. It’s kind of weird that he’s gone. You just get so much energy and light from him. I believe spiritually people are still here. Prince’s influence lives on.”
As her chart-topping days ended, she settled in Las Vegas and raised her two adopted kids. She focused more on corporate gigs, casinos and Vegas shows. “I wanted to be a proper mom,” she said.
Now, even with her kids grown, she continues with comparable gigs. This year, she has performed in Canada, Switzerland and the Caribbean for The 80s Cruise. She also does spot shows in her home of Las Vegas. “I can say no,” she said. “Sometimes take an entire month off, much to my agent’s delight. I do what feels good for me now.”
She has also dabbled with Broadway musicals over the decades, including “Man of La Mancha,” “Grease” and, most recently, “42nd Street” in London in 2017.
“Those were eight shows a week,” she said. “I’d do it again. You just kind of get into a frame of mind to do that. I am just happy I don’t have to make decisions to satisfy a record company or promoter or anybody else. I’ve earned the right to do things for me.”
IF YOU GO
Sheena Easton
7:30 p.m. Sunday. $69-$105. Byers Theatre at Sandy Springs Performing Arts Center, 1 Galambos Way, Sandy Springs, citysprings.com.
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