The music legend has died at the age of 83. But her incredible life of resilience and survival will never be forgotten. Photo / AP
The music legend has died at the age of 83. But her incredible life of resilience and survival will never be forgotten. Photo / AP
1. Turner was born Anna Mae Bullock and brought up in the tiny Southern town of Nutbush, Tennessee, which she celebrated in her self-penned 1973 funk anthem, Nutbush City Limits.
2. When she was in high school, her sister Allene took Tina to Club Imperial in St Louis, where she met the R&B bandleader Ike Turner. When, in 1960, the singer due to record Ike’s latest single, A Fool For Love, didn’t show up at the studio, Tina gladly substituted for her. Her debut scored a number two hit in the R&B charts and made the top 30 in the pop chart.
3. Ike created her raunchy on-stage persona, with golden wigs, flailing legs and breath-taking mini-skirts. Ike figured that any wife of his had to be seen to be the baddest woman in town, but often would fly into a jealous rage as a result.
4. One lothario smitten by Tina was Mick Jagger, who hired Ike and Tina on The Rolling Stones’ ill-fated US tour of 1969. Tina later claimed that Jagger had stolen many of her moves.
5. Another admirer was the producer Phil Spector, with whose help Ike and Tina sought to break out of the black R&B market. During sessions for River Deep, Mountain High, Spector reputedly pushed Tina to the limit in a baking hot studio, to the point where she performed without a shirt.
6. Ike and Turner’s biggest hit was Proud Mary, a cover version of a song by Creedence Clearwater Revival, which reached number four in America and won a Grammy.
Ike and Tina Turner in the early Seventies. Photo / Getty Images
7. Ike lost control of his cocaine habit, spiralling into violent rages, chillingly documented in Tina’s autobiography. In 1974, contrastingly, Tina became a Nichiren Shoshu Buddhist, after being converted by a friend. Much later, while on tour in the Eighties, she would chant for three hours a day.
8. Her first two solo albums, including 1975′s Acid Queen, which aimed to capitalise on her appearance in the Who’s Tommy movie, both flopped disastrously.
9. In 1976 she fled from Ike after a violent row before a show in Dallas. She left, carrying 36 cents and a gas-station credit card. They divorced in 1978, with Tina accepting responsibility for debts incurred by cancelled gigs and unpaid taxes.
10. Two further solo albums, one filled with rock covers, the other a disco affair, also flopped. She toured as a lounge act in America, and, by 1981, no record label would touch her. Her career only perked up after a trip to Europe to work with production team British Electric Foundation, an offshoot of the British synth-pop band The Human League.
Tina Turner in Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome
11. Her big breakthrough came with a sweeping rendition of Al Green’s Let’s Stay Together. With 1984′s What’s Love Got to Do With It?, Tina became the oldest female artist to have US number one hit. However, she reputedly found much of the accompanying Private Dancer album too wishy-washy: she’d wanted to cut a hard-rock record in the style of AC/DC.
12. With Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome, she launched a movie career. Of her startling debut role as Aunty Entity, Tina said: “She was not as fierce as I wanted her to be … I don’t want you falling asleep in my movies.”
13. After leaving Ike, Tina didn’t get into another serious relationship until 1985, when she met a German record executive 17 years her junior named Erwin Bach, while at Heathrow Airport. They started dating and soon moved in together in Cologne.
14. After appearing at Live Aid with Mick Jagger in 1985, Tina was joined on stage during a televised show by David Bowie. Bowie had always admired her from afar, but rarely met her, until they sang Tonight together that night. According to legend, when he whispers in her ear, he’s making an unequivocal proposal. She laughs, and they spend the rest of the song in a cosy clinch.
Tina Turner and Mick Jagger at Live Aid in 1985. Photo / AP
15. Towards the end of 1988′s Break Every Rule tour, which was billed as her farewell, Tina broke the world record for the largest paying audience at a solo concert – 188,000 people, at the Maracanã in Rio de Janeiro. She took over the record from Frank Sinatra.
16. She sold more than 100 million records worldwide.
17. In 1994, Tina and Erwin took her considerable fortune and moved to Switzerland. They also shared a villa on the Côte d’Azur. In 2013, Tina relinquished her US citizenship, after becoming a Swiss citizen.
18. The Tennessee State Route 19 between Brownsville and Nutbush was named Tina Turner Highway in 2001.
19. On her election by the Kennedy Centre Honours in 2005, President George W Bush, at the White House reception afterwards, noted that her legs were “the most famous in showbusiness”. Others paying tribute included Al Green, Oprah Winfrey and Beyoncé.
20. Performing with Beyoncé at the 2008 Grammys, Tina made her first major appearance since 2000. In October 2008 she began her last tour to date, marking 50 years since her first recording.
