Billy Ocean (born Leslie Sebastian Charles; 21 January 1950) is a Trinidad-born English Grammy Award winning popular music performer who had a string of rhythm and blues international pop hits in the 1970s and 1980s. He was the most popular British-based R&B singer / songwriter of the early to mid-1980s. After scoring his first four UK top 20 successes, seven years passed before he accumulated a series of transatlantic successes, including three U.S. number ones.