Her mother was a singer, and Sands grew up listening to artists like Billie Holiday, Dinah Washington, Frank Sinatra, Jackie Wilson, Little Willie John and The Beatles.

She toured with Red Bird star act the Shangri-Las and began a lasting collaboration with the producer-composers Chip Taylor and Al Gorgoni with the release of the blue-eyed soul[2] single "Take Me For a Little While", written by Trade Martin.

Backed by the marketing and promotional muscle of Chess, and with Ross' name attached, this version received the lion's share of airplay.

Sands' follow-up single, "I Can't Let Go", was lost amid the chaos following "Take Me For a Little While", leaving "British invaders" the Hollies clear to score a hit cover in spring 1966.

Despite the single being one of the most-requested radio songs wherever played, and the initial 10,000 copies selling out, the label's pending bankruptcy aborted the record's potential success.

1 hit in Birmingham, Alabama, Sands' "Any Way That You Want Me" also reached the top ten or better in Columbus, Ohio; Houston, Texas; San Diego, California; and a number of other cities.

Several other Sands songs from the Estate of Mind album were also covered by a number of artists, including Dionne Warwick, Dobie Gray, Dusty Springfield, Frankie Valli, Gladys Knight, Arthur Prysock, The Manhattans, Cher/Gregg Allman, José Feliciano and Phyllis Hyman.

The album's musicians included Toto members David Hungate, Steve Lukather and Greg Phillinganes, and also Lee Ritenour and Buzz Feiten.

The vocalists backing Sands included Toto frontman Bobby Kimball, Bill Champlin of Chicago and, on the track "Lady of the Night", Dusty Springfield.

As with her previous album, a few of the songs were covered by other artists, including Helen Reddy, Linda Clifford, Phyllis Hyman, June Pointer, The Weather Girls and Shirley Bassey.

The basic band consisted of Adrienne Torf-keyboards, Carrie Barton-bass, Cam Davis-drums and Ray Obiedo-electric and acoustic guitars.

Despite not having kept actively in touch through the previous years, the experience was so successful that the two re-ignited their collaboration, along with Al Gorgoni, resulting in the critically acclaimed Women In Prison LP, which was released in 1999 (and again in 2000) on Taylor's Train Wreck records.

[5] A more rootsy project than the blue-eyed soul of her late 1960s-1970s output, the album consisted of various Sands-Taylor-Gorgoni originals, including a duet with Lucinda Williams on the track "Cool Blues Story".

Sands' earlier albums Any Way... and Estate... were reissued in September 2005 and June 2006 respectively, on Creation co-founder Joe Foster's Rev-Ola imprint in the United Kingdom.