Once Anna Mae began to sing with Ike, their music struggled to reach beyond the Midwest as they were mostly doing covers of songs and the few original songs that Ike wrote. Although Ike and Anna Mae were not in a personal relationship, his dominant nature still shined, one of the main influences being the change of Anna Mae’s name to Tina. Tina remembers in a later interview that “Anna Mae Bullock ended up as Tina because Ike Turner decided that’s what her name should be” (Ebony, 32). He named her after his favorite character in a television show, but his reasoning being that if Anna Mae left the band, he could easily replace her with another “Tina”. Early on with the band, Anne Mae got pregnant by a member of the band, which led to her mother kicking her out of the house. She now had to fend for herself, but it was difficult as the Revue was not as successful, at that point, as they were expecting to be. “Singing with Ike was how I made my living… And I was living better than I ever had in my life” because he was providing her with enough stipend to cover some of her expenses for her and her baby (Ebony, 34). Critics and reviewers recognized the talent of Tina and Ike’s band, but their success did not come as quickly as Tina had hoped, which did lead to internal issues for the band.

The Ike and Tina Revue gained its first taste of wide recognition after releasing their song, A Fool in Love; a critic commenting that it was “the blackest record to creep into the white pop charts since Ray Charles’ gospel-styled What’d I Say” (Turner and Loder, 79). This initial success spurred Ike’s dominant nature over Tina and the band once again, but it was exacerbated by his drug and alcohol use, as “Ike’s pursuit of money also distorted the intentions of his Revue” (Gulla, 168). As a result, Ike began to physically abuse Tina when he was unhappy with her performances, the other band members, the music business in general, or if he did not get his drug fix. Since Tina had already been forced into the relationship under duress, she began to see performing as “a safe haven, a place where all fear, sadness, and violence disappeared” (Gulla, 169). The success of the Revue continued to grow, bringing recognition, fame, and money not only in the United States, but in other parts of the world too. When A Fool in Love was released, it took longer for the song to be well-received in the United States, but in Europe, the song was a hit. In Ike’s book, Takin’ Back My Name, he commented that “[he] just didn’t expect to be that big…people were just overwhelmed by the Revue” (Turner and Cawthorne, 176). Despite this success, Ike’s vices were taking a toll on Tina. His constant degradation and his abuse exacerbated her depression, even resulting in a suicide attempt in 1976 (Gulla, 184). While the attempt was obviously unsuccessful, she began to create a plan to leave Ike and free herself from his clutches.