Cher - Icon

Few artists have achieved success in both music and movies more assuredly than Cher. Her career is a classic rags-to-riches story. Born Cherilyn Sarkisian to an Armenian-American truck driver and his wife, she initially found fame with record producer Sonny Bono in the duo Sonny and Cher, becoming darlings of the 1960s pop scene with worldwide hits like “I Got You Babe.” But, ultimately, Cher became more successful on her own, first as a solo recording artist and then as an actress.

After establishing herself as a TV personality, renowned for her quick wit and dark beauty, Cher broke into Hollywood in the ’80s with a succession of films that showed her increasing depth as an actress, with Silkwood, Mask and Moonstruck, for which she won the Academy Award for best actress. Most recently, she co-starred with Christina Aguilera in the musical Burlesque, in which she performs the hit song “You Haven’t Seen the Last of Me.”

That song title could serve as Cher’s epitaph. As a singer, Cher has continuously reinvented herself over four decades—and topped the charts in each of them. The newly compiled Icon CD gathers Cher’s post-’60s solo hits, beginning with 1971’s “Gypsies, Tramps and Thieves” and culminating with 1991’s retro remake “The Shoop Shoop Song (It’s in His Kiss).” In between are her slickly produced ’80s rock hits like “If I Could Turn Back Time.” The compilation proves that Cher, a gifted actress with an instantly recognizable contralto, truly deserves to be called iconic.