Long before Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera gave teen pop a raunchy makeover, Debbie Gibson was the undisputed queen of the mall rats.
Born in Brooklyn, New York, on 31 August 1970, Debbie began her musical career at the age of two when her uncle bought her a ukulele (which she promptly broke). She began playing piano at the age of four and wrote her first song when she was five.
After studying song and dance for a few years, she started to make records by recording pop jingles for television, earning enough money to set up her own recording studio in her garage.
Debbie became a pop star while still attending Calhoun High School in Long Island. Thanks to school disco staples Shake Your Love (1987) and Foolish Beat (1988), the toothy New Yorker’s debut album – Out Of The Blue – shifted over five million copies.
Lost In Your Eyes (from her Electric Youth LP) became her second US chart-topper in 1989.
The fact that she wrote and produced the song gave the lie to her image as a teen bimbo, but boy bands like New Kids On The Block were on the rise and by the turn of the 90s, Gibson was yesterday’s news.
In the 90s, she turned to stage musicals, appearing in Les Misérables on Broadway and Grease in London.
Debbie Gibson continued recording and touring, albeit on a much smaller scale.
In March 2005, she posed nude for Playboy (which coincided with the release of a single called Naked).
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After studying song and dance for a few years, she started to make records by recording pop jingles for television, earning enough money to set up her own recording studio in her garage.
