We need to mark the passing of Tina Turner, born Anna Mae Bullock in 1939. A long-time resident of Zurich, Switzerland, she left us at the age of 83. Most people know her string of Mid-80s hits, ‘Private Dancer,’ ‘Simply the Best,’ etc. But Tina was a powerhouse all through the 1960s. (The first single I bought with her singing was ‘Nutbush City,’ in 1969.) The words ‘Icon’ and ‘Iconic’ are so overused. Here they apply…and more.
Tina Turner was a real person.
A giant onstage, in person, she was tiny.
Nu Shooz played two dates with her in the summer of 1982. She’d left Ike a few years before and was fighting her way back up the Show-biz ladder. The tour was called ‘Catch a Rising Star.’ She’d turned the Ike and Tina Revue into something more Rock, something lethal. Tina, fronting three long-legged girls, legs made even longer by the highest heels.
She was playing small venues.
The first night we opened for her at a hotel in Eugene, Oregon. She was playing every gig she could get. Her band was razor sharp.
This story has been told many times, so here’s the short version. Our sound man, David Grafe, liked to bring his daughter Heather along on parts of the tour. At the hotel in Eugene, I forget the name, a dispute arose between Tina’s people and the hotel management. People are running around setting up gear, plugging in wires, and there’s this argument going on. Tina approaches eight-year-old Heather and says, “We don’t need to be around for this. Let’s go find some ice cream.”
Now that’s the way I’ve been telling the story for forty-one years. It turns out I had it all wrong. They went out and bought CANDY. After everything this woman had been through, she was a most compassionate person, someone who saw an eight-year-old girl who could use a treat. Tina Turner embraced Nichiren Buddhism after she left Ike. She said it was a source of Inner Peace, but she loved her candy.
The next date was in Portland.
After the Eugene show, our band and Tina’s broke down all the gear, packed up, and headed an hour North. Both buses ended up at the same gas station in Lebanon, Oregon. Tina’s people jump out of the bus to get snacks. A window slides open. Someone sticks their head out and shouts, “Tina wants FIVE MILKY WAYS.”
The gig in Portland was at Starry Night, a way bigger venue. That was when we really got to see the show. She did a long monolog as the band brought ‘Proud Mary’ to a slow boil. We’d heard it the night before in Eugene. It was the same in Portland, word for word. Tina invested that speech with the same power night after night, like a great actor, like Olivier doing King Lear.
Her music director was a chubby little guy named Kenny, who played the heck out of the piano and could sing EXACTLY like Tina. In fact, he sang her parts while she and the girls were doing the shimmy shake out front. Of course! There’s no WAY you could stay in tune and dance like that. Backwards and forwards and in heels.
After the ‘Catch a Rising Star’ tour, Tina’s star did rise. Just four years later came her massive string of hits, her star turn in ‘Mad Max,’ her status as one of America’s great voices, The Queen of Rock and Roll. Her star continued to rise and rise…straight to the Milky Way.