Oh, what I wouldn’t give to have been a disco dancing fag in 1977! I would have boogied my ass off to all the disco classics and I would have also been the biggest slut. (Well.. I don’t think I have to go back in time for that last one.)
Many people consider Donna Summer the Queen of Disco music but with the release of her 6th album “Once Upon A Time…” she proves that she was oh so much more than that. To begin with this was another concept (double) album which featured a modern day Cinderella story and it took listeners on a journey that, even to this day (30 something years after it’s release), is bold, fresh and exciting.
Ms. Summer worked with her longtime collaborator Giorgio Moroder and created a musical masterpiece that contains everything an album must have in order to be considered classic. The album was divided into 4 acts.
Act 1 contains the more upbeat/disco sounding music with tracks such as “Fairy Tale High,” “Say Something Nice,” and the standout track “Faster & Faster to Nowhere,” which just sounds very personal as she screams and pleads “Can somebody, please, get me outta here?” During this time Donna’s fame was kinda getting to her head, she couldn’t go anywhere without being mobbed by hundreds of screaming queens and that song gives us a bit of an insiders look as to what was really going on up in that glittered disco dream she had created.
Listen To: Donna Summer – “Faster & Faster To Nowhere”
Act 2 takes a darker turn into a more futuristic techno/electro-sound that sounds very Kraftwork. The journey into the unknown begins with the operatic cascades of “I Need You.” The sounds are eerie and mysterious, add in her divine whispery vocals and it’s a song that you will not be forgetting anytime soon. Then comes the epic (and favorite) “Working The Midnight Shift,” which takes us deeper into the night. Working all day and all night to make some extra cash while her friends are out dancing the night away. Talk about an unlikely topic for a song! It just sounds like something out of electronic sci-fi movie and features Donna at one of her finest moments. The act ends with “Queen For A Day” and her head is still up in the clouds as she daydreams about the finer things in life. A truly amazing act that left me wondering what could possibly come after?
Listen To: Donna Summer – “Working The Midnight Shift”
Act 3 sees the first “Lady Of Love” gettin’ down and nasty with the funky opener “If You Got It, Flaunt It.” It truly shows her versatility as an artist, moving from genre to genre with the slightest of ease. Teasing us with more grit and soul as her vocals soar on the ballads “A Man Like You” and “Sweet Romance.” To finally close with a slight hint of what was yet to come with “Dance Into My Life,” which sounds like an early blueprint for one of Summer’s biggest tunes “Last Dance.”
Listen To: Donna Summer – “Dance Into My Life”
The Final act closes with the culmination of the fairy tale where all is love and full of promise, gliding from cloud to could on romantic promises on the albums biggest hit “I Love You” and an early tale of gossip, the feisty “Rumor Has It.” With over an hour of music on this roller coaster, it ends with the Theme “Once Upon A Time…”
Listen To: Donna Summer – “I Love You”
From the paranoia that fame can bring to the utter heights of love, it’s pretty much all covered on this perfectly produced long play which upon it’s release left many fans scratching their heads thinking: WTF? Maybe it was a bit much for 1977 but just cos people didn’t get it, doesn’t mean it wasn’t any good, they just weren’t ready for all of Donna’s jelly.
Classically brilliant. Nuff said.
