Cindy Bullens

All Music Guide:

This rock singer/songwriter sang three lead vocals on the movie soundtrack for Grease and sang backup with Elton John before cutting a series of albums of her own. After 1979's Steal the Night, Bullens did not return with new material for a decade, releasing a self-titled effort on MCA in 1989; another ten-year gap preceded the release of Somewhere Between Heaven & Earth, an album inspired by the tragic cancer-related death of the singer's 11-year-old daughter, Jessie. Bullens returned more quickly the next time around with 2001's Neverland. In 2005, Bullens released the tougher-sounding Dream #29. A year later, a live concert album appeared. In 2010, Bullens released her eighth-studio effort Howling Trains and Barking Dogs.

Wikipedia:

Cindy Bullens (born March 21, 1955) is an American singer and songwriter who grew up in Massachusetts. She released two albums (Desire Wire; Steal the Night) in the late 1970s on United Artists and Casablanca, and another on MCA in 1989 (Cindy Bullens). Her 1978 debut album, Desire Wire is described flatly by William Ruhlmann in allmusic as: "One of the great lost rock albums of the '70s, Bullens' debut release is full of tough, passionate, incredibly catchy rock & roll played to the hilt and sung with fire". Her early albums anticipated later work by a host of 1980s female and female-identified rock artists, from Pat Benatar, to Blondie, to the Go-Go's, to Headpins.

She provided vocals on three songs ("It's Raining on Prom Night", "Mooning", and "Freddy, My Love") on the soundtrack of the 1978 feature film, Grease. Her performance on the soundtrack earned her a Grammy Award nomination for best rock vocal performance.

Bullens got her start in the music business by performing as a backup vocalist with Elton John on three major tours, his album Blue Moves, and his hit with Kiki Dee, "Don't Go Breaking My Heart" (both released in 1976). She withdrew from the music business in the early '80s to raise a family, returning in the early and mid 1990s as a songwriter and then later as a touring and recording artist. Since 1999, she has toured extensively all over the US, Canada, Europe and Australia, has appeared on several major TV shows, including Late Night with Conan O'Brien, Today Show, and CBS This Morning and many radio and TV stations around the world. She is featured in two documentaries, "On This Island" and "Space Between Breaths" (for which she scored the music). Cindy wrote the musical "Islands" in 2000, which played on Broadway for a special performance at the Victory Theatre in September 2001, two weeks after 9/11.

Recent work

In 1999, Cindy's album "Somewhere Between Heaven and Earth" was recorded in the first two years after the death of her daughter Jessie. It features Bonnie Raitt, Lucinda Williams, Rodney Crowell, Beth Nielsen Chapman, Bryan Adams, and top-tier musicians including George Marinelli, Benmont Tench, Kenny Edwards, and Michael Rhodes. With Cindy, Steven Soles co-produced one track, Tony Berg co-produced three tracks, and Rodney Crowell co-produced three tracks. It won the AFIM Best Rock Album in 2000 and was widely acclaimed.

In 2001, Bullens released "Neverland" co-produced by Cindy and Ray Kennedy, the album features Emmylou Harris, Steve Earle and John Hiatt.

In 2005, Cindy released "dream #29" again co-produced with Ray Kennedy. The title track features Sir Elton John on piano. Delbert McClinton sings a duet with Bullens on "This Ain't Love" and Boston Red Sox knuckleballer Tim Wakefield adds his voice to "7 Days".

In 2007, Bullens formed a new group, The Refugees, with music veterans Wendy Waldman and Deborah Holland. Their first CD, Unbound, was released in January, 2009, and their second CD, called 3, was released in mid-2011.

In June 2010, Cindy Bullens released her latest album "Howling Trains and Barking Dogs" on MC Records (Koch). The CD is a compilation of co-written songs Cindy wrote in Nashville during the early and mid-1990s with Radney Foster, Bill Lloyd, Al Anderson, Matraca Berg, Mary Ann Kennedy and Kye Fleming, and Jimmy Tittle. The CD also includes two new songs by Cindy alone.

Personal life

In 1979, Cindy married Dan Crewe. Her first daughter, Reid, was born in 1982. Her younger daughter, Jessie, died at age 11, of complications during treatment for cancer in 1996. She lives in Maine.