Pearly Gates

Billups was born in Alabama in 1946. She joined The Flirtations with sisters Earnestine Pearce and Betty Pearce in 1964 and moved with the group to London, England in 1968 where their music was popular. Pearly left the group in 1973 and released her first single "Sad Old Shadow", written by Lynsey De Paul and Don Gould on Polydor Records under the name Vie.[1] She did not adapt her artist name Pearly Gates before her second single "Johnny and the Jukebox" in 1974. Several more singles followed in the late 70s on RCA Records and Bronze Records and she remained a popular artist on TV, being a regular performer on the Cliff Richard show[2] as well as featuring in all eight episodes of the TV variety show, Hi Summer.[3] In 1979, she completed her first disco album Fading into the Night with producer Ian Levine, although the album was supposed to have been released by American singer Cobie Jones who ultimately did not make it to the sessions. The album, however, became a victim of the disco backlash and was not released until 16 years later.

In 1985, she enjoyed a Hi-NRG hit with the song "Action" The video starred Poseur of the year 1986 Dennis Brody on its re-release, and also toured with Madeline Bell and Katie Kissoon, performing with James Last Orchestra. Two of her unreleased disco tracks were released on 12" singles in Levine's Nightmare Gold series in 1987. In 1995,