pop singer; songwriter
Personal Information
Born Helen Folasade Adu in 1959 in Ibadan, Nigeria; daughter of Adebisi (an economics professor) and Anne (a nurse) Adu; married Carlos (a filmmaker) Scola, c. 1989 (divorced, c. 1990); children: one, with Bob (a record producer) Morgan.
Education: St. Martin's College of Art, BA, 1979.
Career
Fashion designer, London, 1979-83; backup singer for the funk band Pride, 1982; formed band Sade, 1983; signed with Epic Records, 1984; toured throughout the United States, Europe, and the Far East, 1985--; appeared in the film Absolute Beginners, 1986.
Life's Work
Music writers love Sade's name almost as much as they love her music. Whenever a critic is trying to describe a pop act with a smooth, laid- back, sophisticated, vaguely jazzy sound, her name is immediately invoked. Since taking the pop world by quiet storm in the mid-1980s, dozens of bands have tried to copy the restrained style she and her band have pioneered. Not one has yet managed to replace Sade as the standard for sultriness.
In 1959, Sade (pronounced Shar-day) was born Helen Folasade Adu in Ibadan, Nigeria. Her father, Adebisi Adu, was a Nigerian-born economics professor. Her mother, Anne, was a British nurse. Her parents met while Adebisi Adu was a graduate student at the London School of Economics. After marrying and having a son, the couple moved to Ibadan, where Adu had landed a teaching job. Sade--a diminutive of Folasade--was born shortly after their arrival in Nigeria. Sade's unique and exotic looks--her skin is a fairly light shade of brown, while her features have an unmistakably African quality--represent a striking blend of her parents' ethnic backgrounds.
By the time Sade was four, her parents had separated, and, in 1963, she moved with her mother and brother back to England. They lived with Sade's grandparents while her mother finished nursing school, after which they moved out on their own. The family eventually settled in a working-class town called Holland-on-Sea, where, according to a 1986 People magazine interview, "50 percent of the population was over 65 [years of age]." In a Chicago Tribune interview the same year, Sade described it as "a miserable little seaside town full of go-carts, old ladies, cotton candy, and poodles." Sade and her friends found solace from their dismal surroundings in dance clubs. By her teens, Sade had developed a passion for jazz, funk, and soul music.
At 17, Sade left for London to study fashion and design at St. Martin's College of Art in the city's West End. Upon graduating, she and a friend launched their own business designing men's clothing. The design business never became very profitable, and Sade supplemented her income by taking modeling jobs, which she did not especially enjoy. Meanwhile, she continued to spend as much time as possible at dance clubs, where she felt most at home.
Sade's entry into the music world did not take place through any plan of her own. A popular London funk group called Pride was looking for a backup singer. Her lack of any experience as a vocalist notwithstanding, their manager thought that Sade's stunning looks made her a good candidate. She auditioned for the spot and was initially rejected. When nobody better showed up over the next few weeks, however, Sade was given the job. She continued designing clothes for a living, but music became her main evening hobby.
As a backup singer, Sade quickly developed a following of her own, and at the suggestion of Pride's manager, she and a few other members of the band worked up a set of songs to perform during Pride's between- set breaks, with Sade taking center stage. Sade and Pride saxophonist Stuart Mathewman teamed up to write several catchy songs for the splinter group, and, before long, the newly-dubbed band Sade was overshadowing Pride.
As a band, Sade created a stir almost immediately. Its first break came in 1983, when they were engaged to play a concert at the Institute of Contemporary Arts, sponsored by the glossy British music and fashion magazine The Face. The artsy crowd was captivated by Sade, who was backed only by Mathewman and a small rhythm section. By October of that year, the band, which now included bassist Paul Denman, keyboardist Andrew Hale, and drummer Paul Cooke (later replaced by Dave Early), had signed with Epic. Sade's first single, "Your Love Is King," was released the following February. The Diamond Life album came out just five months later. With one exception, all of the songs on Diamond Life were cowritten by Sade and Mathewman.
Sade quickly became a favorite among trendy artistic types, and Diamond Life soared to the top of the British charts. Fearing that Sade would not go over as well among American listeners, however, Epic did not release the album in the United States until early in 1985. The company need not have worried. On the strength of the single "Smooth Operator," the album became a huge hit there as well. Diamond Life sold six million copies worldwide by the end of 1985, becoming the best selling album ever by a British female singer. It won the British Phonographic Institute's Best Album prize, and Sade received the Grammy for Best New Artist.
Sade spent much of 1985 touring to promote Diamond Life and recording the follow-up album, which was released late in the year. Like its predecessor, Promise carved a quick path up the charts in both Britain and the United States, fueled by its Top 5 single "Sweetest Taboo." And like those on the band's debut album, the new songs were characterized by Sade's subtle, restrained crooning over smoky, swirling soul/jazz riffs. For eight months in 1986, the band toured across the United States and Europe. As the tour wound down, Sade was surrounded by rumors that she was depressed about a busted love affair, hooked on drugs, having a nervous breakdown, or beset by some combination of the three. Her ongoing aversion to public scrutiny only gave the rumors more room in which to perpetuate themselves.
Exhausted from the tour and put off by the unwanted attention, Sade withdrew from the limelight for a while before returning with a new album, 1988's Stronger Than Pride. Like Sade's first two albums, Stronger Than Pride was an instant hit, attaining platinum status after a mere two weeks on the charts. After a huge world tour that included stops in Japan and Australia, and full-blown stadium concerts in the United States, Sade was ready drop out of sight again, this time for an even longer period. She moved to Spain and suffered through an unhappy one-year marriage to documentary filmmaker Carlos Scola.
After the breakup of her marriage, Sade moved back to London. There she bought an old house, gutted it almost entirely, and built a fully- equipped recording studio in the basement. She then reassembled the band and began work on their next album, Love Deluxe, released in 1992. In spite of Sade's extended absence from the public eye, her fans had not forgotten her. The album sold well, remaining on the Billboard charts for 90 weeks and spawning another international tour of sold out concerts in the United States, Europe, and Japan. The featured single, "No Ordinary Love," earned the Grammy for Best R&B Duo or Group Performance and was featured prominently in the hit film Indecent Proposal.
In 1995, Sade took another career break, this time to have a baby with partner Bob Morgan, a record producer. While she concentrated on parenthood at home in Montego Bay, Jamaica, the rest of the band, working under the name "Sweetback," released a self-titled album the following year. Meanwhile, Sade concentrated her energies on repackaging her decade's worth of material into new forms. She released two such products in 1996: a recording called The Best of Sade and Sade Interactive, a multimedia CD-ROM that includes songs, videos, photographs, band biographies, and other information.
Although the gaps between Sade's new projects seem to be widening, her voice--both as a singer and songwriter--remains a distinctive one in the pop music industry. Until a new star emerges who can out-cool Sade, her periodic reappearances are likely to be greeted with enthusiasm by her millions of fans, loyalists of the laid-back.
Awards
British Phonographic Institute prize for Best Album, 1985; Grammy Awards, Best New Artist, 1986, and Best R&B Duo or Group Performance for "No Ordinary Love," 1994.
Works
Selective Discography
- Albums Diamond Life (includes "Your Love Is King" and "Smooth Operator"), Epic, 1984.
- Promise (includes "Sweetest Taboo"), Epic, 1985.
- Stronger Than Pride, Epic, 1988.
- Love Deluxe (includes "No Ordinary Love") Epic, 1992.
- The Best of Sade, Epic, 1996.
- CD-ROM Sade Interactive, OmniMedia, 1996.
Further Reading
Sources
- Book Bego, Mark, Sade!, Paperjacks, 1986.
- Ebony, May 1986, p. 155; April 1993, p. 124-127.
- Essence, April 1986, pp. 86-88.
- Jet, November 7, 1988, p. 30-32.
- New York Daily News, September 22, 1996, p. 35.
- People, February 3, 1986, pp. 46-47.
- Rolling Stone, May 23, 1985, pp. 48-49.
- Additional information for this profile was obtained from Epic Records publicity materials.
— Robert R. Jacobson
