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Throughout the 70's, the gentle folk rocker Cat Stevens sang his songs with lyricial sincerity and a whole lot of heart. Cat Stevens was seemingly capable of plucking meaningful, nuanced ideas out of thin air, and his effortless melodies made songs like "Moondance" and "Peace Train" into timeless delights that still sound great today. Towards the end of his career, Stevens journeyed off in a more spiritual direction, eventually changing his name to Yusuf Islam. During his career as Cat Stevens, the artist now known as Yusuf sold over 60 million records. His best-known works, Tea For the Tilerman and Teaser And the Firecat both hit triple-platinum sales and are still beloved by music fans today. Cat Stevens was also an accomplished artist, and he did his own album art for his later albums. Cat Stevens certainly had a colorful early life. The future folk star was born Steven Demetre Georgiou, to a Greek-Cypriot father and a Swedish mother. Young Steven's family owned the infamous Moulin Rouge nightclub in Paris, and the whole family worked to keep it open. Even after his parents split up they still all worked together and lived above the club. Steven's mother eventually left and took the 12 year old to Sweden. There, Cat Stevens worked on both his drawing and his songwriting, eventually enrolling at London's prestigious Hammersmith Art School. In 1966, Cat Stevens began his folk music career in earnest by gigging around the local pubs and coffee shops. He picked his new name, "Cat" Stevens, because he reasoned that English and Americans loved animals and would have difficulty remembering his Greek name. Cat Stevens quickly rose to fame as a pop idol on the strength of his singles "Mathew and Son" and "I Love My Dog", which owed quite a bit to the catchy rock-pop format that was popular in England at the time. During the late-60's Cat Stevens also penned "The First Cut Is the Deepest", which was later made famous by Rod Stewart. In 1975, Cat Stevens nearly drowned while in Malibu. After his near death experience he converted to Islam and dropped out of the public eye, not to return until 2006's pop album An Other Cup.

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