Sheila E.

Artist: Sheila E.

LP: 12" single

Song: "The Belle of St. Mark" 
[ listen ]

I was finally making some real progress on getting my sprawling album collection under control when my sister Chass sent me a text on Friday night about the West Seattle Garage Sale Bonanza taking place throughout that neighborhood over the weekend. She highlighted this particular ad for me:

I tried my best to forget about it, but after a restless night's sleep I suddenly found myself at the listed address yesterday morning at 9am.

As you can see, the city's vinyl vultures had already descended upon the place by the time I arrived, so it was good I got there early. "ALL GENRES" was an accurate description of what was for sale, with boxes of LPs by everyone from Grace Slick to Bohannon; from Claudine Longet to Rolling Stones; from Tony Mottola (there was an over-abundance of Tony Mottola for some reason) to...well, to Sheila E. This 12" by the lovely Miss E. is one of the things I picked up at a bargain rate. My favorite of all of Sheila E.'s singles, "The Belle of St. Mark" peaked at #34 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1984. You can read about Sheila E. here, visit her website here, and there's a nice piece from NPR that was aired a few weeks ago here, where the legendary performer-percussionist recalls her very first meeting with Prince.

[ Sheila E. with drums. ]