The Guardian's Alexis Petridis pays tribute to Bonnie Tyler, who has died aged 75, reflecting on a career marked by two distinct phases of global success that seemed almost unconnected beyond her name. Tyler first broke through in the mid-1970s with catchy "medium wave pop" hits before reinventing herself, later in her career, through a partnership with the flamboyant producer and songwriter Jim Steinman, whose bombastic epics became her signature and cemented her lasting fame.

Her early hits included 1976's Lost in France and 1977's It's a Heartache, the latter selling six million copies, though the article notes an operation to remove nodules on her vocal cords gave her the distinctive husky voice she became known for. After her label struggled to position her, Tyler approached Steinman, resulting in 1983's Total Eclipse of the Heart — a seven-minute production that reached No 1 on both sides of the Atlantic, went platinum in nine countries, and surpassed a billion Spotify streams in 2026. She came close to repeating the feat with Holding Out for a Hero from the Footloose soundtrack, though her collaboration with the now in-demand Steinman later waned.