Billy Ocean
b. Leslie Sebastian Charles, 21 January 1950, Trinidad, West Indies. Raised in England, Ocean worked as a session singer between employment at the Dagenham Ford Motor Company plant before being signed by the GTO label as a solo artist. His early hits included Love Really Hurts Without You (1976) and Red Light Spells Danger (1977), two purposeful, if derivative performances. The singer's subsequent releases fared less well and for four years, between 1980-84, Billy was absent from the British charts. Paradoxically, it was during this period that he began to win an audience in America. Ocean moved there at the turn of the decade and several R&B successes prepared the way for Caribbean Queen (No More Love On The Run), his first national US pop number 1. Now signed to the Jive label, this million-selling single introduced an impressive run of hits, including two more US chart toppers, There'll Be Sad Songs (To Make You Cry) (1986) and Get Outta My Dreams, Get Into My Car (1988). Despite securing a UK number 1 with When The Going Gets Tough, The Tough Get Going, (which was featured in the film T he Jewel Of The Nile) Ocean's luck with chart success in Britain constantly fluctuated. However his popular appeal secured him three UK Top 5 albums during this period including the GREATEST HITS collection in 1989.