These days, Sheena Easton can walk her dog, go to her Pilates classes and have lunch with friends mostly without being recognized.
In the 1980s, however, the Scottish singer was the one of the world’s biggest, busiest and most visible pop acts, known for radio hits like “Morning Train (Nine to Five),” “Strut” and “Sugar Walls.” She won Grammys and performed on the Oscars, sang at Live Aid and starred on “Miami Vice.”
Easton, 66, hasn’t released a new album in 25 years, though she still plays about a dozen shows annually, operating at what she describes as an “intimate” level. “When I walk onstage now, there’s 500 people in the room, instead of 5,000 or 50,000,” she said during a recent video interview from her home outside Las Vegas. “I’m not being shoved in people’s faces anymore, which means I can lead a very normal life 99 percent of the time.”
Though her accent has softened after five decades in America, Easton — with her auburn hair and striking blue eyes — still retains something of her ’80s pomp, when she transformed from Glasgow schoolgirl to global superstar. “What got me through the craziness of those years was that my instinct was always to go towards normal things, to stay as grounded as possible,” she said. “I felt like, this is all a wonderful fantasy, but I don’t ever want to start believing it’s real.”
Over the last few years, the British label Cherry Pop has undertaken a deep dive into her catalog, culminating in a pair of boxed sets this year, “Modern Girl” and “Strut” (due Oct. 31), which chronicle her peak years recording for EMI. The reissues recast Easton as a curious creator who segued easily between styles, genres, even languages. She would become the first artist to notch Top 5 records across five major Billboard charts.
“Sheena was magnificent,” said the producer Nile Rodgers, who worked with Easton in the mid-80s. Coming off era-defining records with David Bowie and Madonna, he recalled being “totally seduced by the quality and the ease with which Sheena could sing. She was that sparkling diamond — at that time, she had everything going for her.”
Easton said she is “really proud” of her work, “But there came a point where I thought, I need to change my life. At the risk of a horrible cliché, that’s when I got off the merry-go-round. I didn’t want to be in my 50s and 60s looking back thinking all I’ve ever did was make records, get on a tour bus, do a bunch of TV — rinse and repeat. I wanted something more.”
Born in Bellshill, Scotland, Sheena Shirley Orr came up in a hothouse musical environment, the youngest of six. “There was always music being played, I was always stealing somebody’s records — and I loved everything I heard,” she said. She showed off a natural vocal talent, imitating her father’s favorite Mario Lanza sides and singing along to her siblings’ Carly Simon and Bowie LPs.
In 1975, she got a scholarship to the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama. She married young, gaining the last name Easton, though the union ended after just a few months. Joining up with a local band, Something Else, Easton “figured I’d become a speech and drama teacher, and I would be off playing weddings at the weekend. But some doors started to open, and I decided to step through them to see where it took me.”
In 1980, the unknown Easton was tapped as the subject of a BBC documentary series about aspiring artists called “The Big Time,” which led to a record deal with EMI. Within a year she’d become a star on both sides of the Atlantic, thanks to the pure pop pleasures of singles like “Morning Train (Nine to Five)” and “Modern Girl,” and her appearance in the credits of a 1981 James Bond film singing the titular ballad “For Your Eyes Only.”
When her chart success in the United Kingdom stalled after a couple of records, Easton moved to America, where she’d won the Grammy for best new artist in 1982. Branching out musically, she scored a 1983 country hit with Kenny Rogers on “We’ve Got Tonight,” duetted with the young Latin star Luis Miguel on “Me Gustas Tal Como Eres” and recorded her own Spanish-language album.
With MTV in full effect, Easton ditched her innocent image for a sexy new look on her 1984 LP “A Private Heaven,” which featured provocative, synth-driven songs like its lead single, “Strut.” “I’d become a more sophisticated, confident young woman,” Easton said. “I felt sassy. I took that on as part of a character, but it was also real.” (In his memoir, RuPaul credits Easton with inspiring what became his “true high-femme sexy glamazon look.”)
The album featured another sexually charged hit in “Sugar Walls,” written for her by Prince. “We met in the studio and hit it off right away,” Easton recalled. “We were teasing each other and talking about our shared love of Joni Mitchell. Prince had this enigmatic, mysterious image, though a lot of it was cultivated. I think I got to know the real person.”
Over the next few years, Easton and Prince collaborated closely. He wrote several more songs for her (“101,” “Cool Love”), and she sang on his hit “U Got the Look,” while they also worked together on the “Batman” soundtrack. “He gave me confidence and the freedom of expression,” Easton said. “I never worked with anyone that was so free.”
She teamed with Rodgers on a dance-oriented LP before pursuing a more R&B direction on albums with LA Reid and Babyface, among others. The writer and producer Adam Mattera, who has overseen Cherry Pop’s reissue campaign, gushed about the singer’s successful dabbling across genres: “I mean, who else at that time was performing at the Grand Ole Opry one month and on ‘Soul Train’ the next?”
Between 1981 and 1988, the prolific Easton turned out nine studio albums and toured constantly. Even as she left EMI for a lucrative deal with MCA and landed her biggest hit in years with “The Lover in Me” in 1989, the grind of pop life had started to wear thin. “I didn’t want to give up being a creative person or being a singer,” she said, “but I just knew something had to change.”
In 1992 — following what became her last Top 20 single, “What Comes Naturally” — she made the move to Broadway, starring with Raul Julia in “Man of La Mancha.” “During that time, I really thought about what I wanted,” Easton said. “And I came to the conclusion that I wanted to be a mom.”
In 1994, Easton adopted a son, and two years later, a daughter. Through her romantic ups and downs — Easton married and divorced four times — family became her focus. She left her longtime home in Los Angeles and relocated to Las Vegas, where she took on a casino residency at the Hilton.
“I did eight shows a week for two and a half years straight,” she said, “and it worked out great because the kids would go to bed and that’s when I would go to work.”
Easton’s last album, the disco-themed “Fabulous,” came out in 2000. “Most people thought I’d take a little bit of time off when the kids were young and then I’d be back at it,” she said. “But I found it easy not to return to that life.”
Although she remained active by doing voice-over work in animation and returned to the stage for a production of “42nd Street” on London’s West End, Easton’s decision to scale back came just as contemporaries like Cyndi Lauper and Pat Benatar were enjoying career boosts, riding a postmillennial wave of nostalgia.
While there have been offers, Easton hasn’t been tempted by the prospect of making a splashy comeback, even if that has meant leaving money on the table. She is well past needing the extravagances of stardom. “Now I drive a Prius,” she said with a chuckle. “And I like my Prius.”
Her personal indulgences these days, she said, are limited to one hobby: “I’m a hardcore gamer.” She cited World of Warcraft and Ghost of Tsushima as favorites. “I’ve got to put in like an hour or two into my gaming every day.”
“I’m open to different creative things,” she added. “What I’m not open to is the craziness, the almost compulsory nature of what you have to do be a pop star. I did that once. I don’t need to do it again.”
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