Founding member of pop rock band Texas, Sharleen Spiteri was born in Glasgow in 1967, to Vilma, a seamstress, and Eddie, a merchant seaman. Spiteri left her job as a hairdresser at the age of 17 to form the group with Altered Images’ Johnny McElhone. They had their first hit in 1989 with I Don’t Want a Lover, but it wasn’t until the release of 1997’s White on Blonde and the omnipresent single Say What You Want that Spiteri became a household name. She is married to the chef Bryn Williams and has one daughter, the model Misty Kyd. With 10 LPs in total and more than 40m album sales, Texas release The Very Best of 1989-2023 on 16 June.
I was four years old and looking like a meringue on the floor of my childhood home in Glasgow when this was taken. As a very quiet child, I was in my own little world a lot of the time, and I wouldn’t have been massively enthusiastic about posing like this. But as Dad was at sea for months on end, it was important that Mum could take photos of me and my sister for him. My grandad built that crazy brick fireplace as he was a stonemason. I guess my parents wanted to bring some Hollywood glamour into our home.
