Born in Münster, West Germany, in August 1969, the daughter of an Indo-Fijian British Army officer and a Sarawakian Malay mother, Tanita Tikaram spent her early life in Germany before moving to Basingstoke, England, in her early teens.
She began singing in nightclubs as a teenager and caught the attention of WEA Records. Her debut album, Ancient Heart, released in September 1988, was produced by Rod Argent and Peter Van Hooke and featured hit singles Good Tradition and Twist in My Sobriety, both top 10 hits across Europe.
Following this success, she released three more albums for WEA – The Sweet Keeper (1990), Everybody’s Angel (1991), and Eleven Kinds of Loneliness (1992) – though each sold less than the last.
Her 1992 album, the first fully self-produced, failed to chart.
After relocating to San Francisco and taking a break, Tikaram returned in 1995 with Lovers in the City, which earned better reviews and sales.
However, it was her last album with WEA. Her contract ended in 1996 with the release of The Best of Tanita Tikaram.
Signed to Mother Records, she released The Cappuccino Songs in 1998, then took years off before reappearing in 2005 with Sentimental on a French label. In 2012, she released Can’t Go Back, her first album in seven years, and continued touring across the UK and Europe after 2013.
Her album Closer to the People came out in March 2016, and in December 2015, she released a music video for Food On My Table, though she stated it was not the lead single – the first single, Glass Love Train, was released on 22 January 2016.
In September 2021, Tikaram performed as a special guest at the Glastonbury Festival’s Abbey Extravaganza.
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Following this success, she released three more albums for WEA – The Sweet Keeper (1990), Everybody’s Angel (1991), and Eleven Kinds of Loneliness (1992) – though each sold less than the last.
