A Private Heaven is the fifth studio album by Scottish pop singer Sheena Easton, released on 21 September 1984 by EMI America Records. The album featured two US Top 10 hit singles: the lead single "Strut" and the controversial "Sugar Walls". "Swear", a third single, peaked at No. 80.
The album is Easton's most successful studio album in the United States to date, peaking at No. 15 on the US Billboard 200 and selling over one million copies, earning a gold and platinum certification from the RIAA. In Canada, the album also went platinum. The tour that year featured Bruce Hornsby on keyboards in the live band.
The album marked a conscious effort by Easton to change her image to that of a sexy pop singer after cultivating a "sweet and innocent" image since the launch of her career five years earlier.[4] The sexually-charged "Strut" - co-written by Charlie Dore - became Easton's biggest solo hit in the US since 1981's "For Your Eyes Only". Easton collaborated with Prince on the controversial track "Sugar Walls", written by Prince under the pseudonym Alexander Nevermind. The track and its accompanying video were banned in some regions due to its sexually risqué lyrics and was one of several songs cited by Tipper Gore on her Filthy Fifteen list in her efforts to introduce mandatory warning labeling of explicit musical albums. Easton's musical association with Prince continued for the next few years, with him writing "Eternity" for her eighth studio album, No Sound But a Heart (1987) and Easton later featuring on Prince's singles "U Got the Look" in 1987 and "The Arms of Orion" in 1989.
The album also includes cover versionsofTim Scott's new wave track "Swear" and Joan Armatrading's 1976 classic "Love and Affection". Converse to the album's success in America, in the UK, it was her first studio album not to chart, and none of the singles released made the official Top 75.
In 2000, One Way Records released a remastered version of A Private Heaven with bonus tracks and B-sides.
On 23 February 2013, Edsel Records (UK) reissued Easton's A Private Heaven and its follow-up studio album Do You (1985) on two CDs remastered with bonus tracks.
On 24 November 2014, the album was included in a box set in the UK with all of her first five albums with EMI through Warner Music Group.
A 2CD deluxe edition of A Private Heaven, remastered from the original master tapes for the first time with 21 bonus tracks, including 12 previously unreleased tracks, along with 12" mixes and B-sides, was released on 25 February 2022 by Cherry Pop/RT Industries.
On 31 May 2024 RT Industries and Cherry Pop Records released a 40th Anniversary Edition of the album featuring 12" mixes and three previously unreleased tracks on a red vinyl double LP set.
Cashbox magazine reviewed the album in October 1984, writing that with "Virtually unlimited talent, Sheena Easton is at her absolute best", describing the album as "dazzling" and featuring "solid, punchy, techno-pop production with dramatic ballads".
^Kent, David (1993). Australian Chart Book 1970–1992: 23 years of hit singles & albums from the top 100 charts. St Ives, N.S.W, Australia: Australian Chart Book. p. 100. ISBN0-646-11917-6.
