Belinda Carlisle: Still in Heaven?
SHEILA ROCK
"I have an original voice," says Belinda Carlisle,
"It may not be the best voice but it's distinct and I think that's what has carried me through the years."
She's being modest, of course. Without that foundation-quaking vibrato, there would be no Heaven Is A Place On Earth, no Circle In The Sand and no Summer Rain.
And then there's her catalogue with The Go-Go's, the new wave girl band she formed in her teens. Hits like We Got The Beat and Our Lips Are Sealed sent their debut album to number one in America.
To this day, Beauty and the Beat is still the only US chart-topper entirely written and played by women.
But through all of that success, Carlisle was harbouring a severe cocaine habit. Even fellow party animal Rod Stewart was shocked, writing in his autobiography that Carlisle "could snort the lacquer off a table".
After two decades, though, the singer finally got clean after hearing a voice telling her: "You are going to be found dead in a hotel if you don't stop."
That was in 2005. Now, aged 59, she's releasing her first album in a decade, Wilder Shores, which is built around the Kundalini yoga chants that helped her recovery.
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