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Tina Turner loved cars

It was fitting that the movie, Beyond Thunderdome, featured Tina Turner driving one of the outlandish cars used in the Mad Max series. She was a car nut from way back.

The Queen of Rock ’n’ Roll died, on 24th March 2023, aged 83.

In the famous movie, the vehicle is driven by Aunty Entity (Tina Turner) and after the movie’s premiere, it was displayed at the Sydney and Melbourne Motor Shows in 1985, along with other Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome vehicles.

Tina Turner’s love affair with cars began early in her career, when she was teamed up with Ike Turner. In 1970, Sammy Davis Jnr bought her a white XJ6 Jaguar as a gift. According to Turner’s 2018 autobiography, My Love Story, she said the Jag awakened her passion for fast cars.

“It may sound silly, but one of my favourite escapes and a secret pleasure, was driving my Jaguar” wrote Tina Turner.

“I loved it because it was something I could do by myself – one of the few times I could be alone and free.”

Then husband Ike Turner bought her a silver XKE in 1973.

“I’ll never forget the moment I got behind the wheel and pulled out of the dealership,” she wrote.

“It was late and a little misty when I drove the sleek silver Jaguar on Wilshire Boulevard.

“As far as I was concerned, there was no one else on the road—just me, driving with the windows down, looking and feeling fabulous.

“ I can still hear the sound of the motor, the vroom that signalled it was ready to take me anywhere I wanted to go.”

In 1978, after enduring years of physical and mental abuse from Ike, she divorced him and nearly lost both cars in the settlement. However, the judge decided that the cars should stay with her.

Her taste then shifted to 4x4s, so after the success of Turner’s 1984 comeback album, Private Dancer, she bought a new Lamborghini LM002.

German record producer Erwin Bach, with whom she later lived for 27 years, before marrying him in 2013, had it customised to Tina’s liking. The standard spec was V12 power and a manual transmission, but Tina couldn’t drive a stick-shifter, so Erwin had the powertrain removed and replaced by a V-8 and automatic gearbox from a Mercedes-Benz 500E. Turner sold the car in 2008.