Stacey Q

Stacey Lynn Swain (born November 30, 1958), known by her stage name Stacey Q, is an American pop singer, songwriter, dancer and actress.

Swain was born on November 30, 1958, in the Orange County suburb of Fullerton, California.

She is the youngest of three children.

Her mother, Joyce, bred Cardigan Welsh Corgis that have appeared in Hollywood films and television.

In 1969, she became the youngest member of the Dance Theater of Orange County, a local company that performed at benefit shows in Anaheim.

She spent 11 years studying ballet and also learned flamenco dancing.

She performed at multiple Disneyland's Christmas Fantasy on Parade events.

She studied at the Community Theatre of Performing Arts and the Wilshire Theatre of Arts.

She also performed in costume as the "Dutch Puppet", a name she used as a publishing alias during her early recording career.

She went to Loara High School during her sophomore year, but then transferred to Anaheim High School.

After graduating from high school in 1976, Swain joined the Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey Circus, where she performed as a showgirl in her first year, and as an elephant rider in her second year.

Her first singing project was a Los Angeles radio spot where she introduced and announced programs while impersonating members of The Go-Go's.

In 1981, Swain was introduced to Jon St. James, the proprietor of Fullerton's Casbah Recording Studio, which hosted recordings for the bands Berlin and Social Distortion.

Jon was a big fan of synth bands like Kraftwerk and M; when he met Stacey Swain in 1981, he knew right away that this impossibly stylish former Ringling Bros. elephant girl and veteran of the Disney Main Street parade possessed star qualities perfectly compatible with electronic music, a genre Stacey also adored.

She was enamored of the obscure Japanese band The Plastics and The B-52's, and simply could not get over David Bowie.

As a student of style, Swain could literally turn rags into a fashion statement.

On one occasion she went to the renaissance fair in Agoura dressed simply in two large pieces of soft leather she bought from a shop in Anaheim.

St. James was developing a synthpop group called Q, named after the James Bond character.

The band consisted of St. James on guitars, and Dan Van Patten and John Van Tongeren on vocoder and synthesizer.

She served as the assistant producer on the band's four tracks for The Q EP when St. James realized they needed a vocalist for their first track "Sushi", which Swain provided as she had previously recorded demos at his studio.

She then became the lead singer for Q, although at that time, she still considered herself more of a dancer than a singer.

In 1981, Q (the original project) was Jon, Dan and myself hence Jon Q, Dan Q and Stacey Q. Q, the original name of the project, references James Bond and the scientist responsible for all his high-tech gadgets.

The Q EP received little airplay except on college radio.

Its success led St. James and Swain to develop more songs.

In 1982, the group added drummer Karl Moet and synth player Rich West, but had to change their name because of copyright issues when producer Quincy Jones reportedly had "established use of the 'Q' moniker".

They renamed the band SSQ, which was inspired partly by a fishing endeavor where St. James "was fishing in a lake 'no bigger than a bathtub' and made a joke that the boat was the 'S.S. Q,'" and also that "SS" stood for Stacey Swain.

SSQ released their debut album Playback in 1983 under Enigma Records, which featured the single "Synthicide" that was also made into a music video.

In 1985, Swain signed a recording contract with Columbia Records.

Using Stacey Q as her moniker for solo works, she released her debut single "Shy Girl".

Her eponymous album later was distributed in cassette format to limited release.

The album contained an early version of "Two of Hearts", which originally was released and performed by Sue Gatlin.

After her singles collectively sold several thousand copies, she signed with Atlantic Records with St. James as manager and the other members of SSQ as backup musicians.

She recorded the album Better Than Heaven in three weeks.

Her best-known single, John Mitchell's "Two of Hearts", released in 1986, reached number one in Canada, number three on the US Billboard Hot 100 and the top ten in five other countries.

Its title track was co-written by Berlin, "He Doesn't Understand" was written by Rusty Anderson, and "We Connect" was written by Willie Wilcox of Utopia "Two of Hearts", its lead single, received substantial radio airplay, along with its music video on MTV, in the latter half of 1986.

It reached number 3 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, and the top 10 in several other countries.

The album reached number 59 on the US album chart, and was certified gold in Australia.

"Two of Hearts" briefly was considered for a "Weird Al" Yankovic parody, but the songwriters declined.

She went on a U.S. and European club tour.

In a 1989 interview, Swain said she was three years old when she asked for dance lessons, but had to wait until she was five, when she did classical ballet.