DONNA SUMMER - “I Feel Love”
One of the remarkable things about “I Feel Love” is that it still sounds futuristic now. Not because the effects and techniques it uses remain way ahead of what pop’s capable of, but because it helped fix the idea of what “the future” would sound like: its specific mix of voice and electronics evoking gleaming hedonism, endless clockwork pleasure. “I Feel Love”, like robots and spaceships on sci-fi magazine covers, represents a fixed future we can’t ever quite get past.
But at the same time “I Feel Love” is a thing very much of 1977 - its sounds and beats somehow antique, with the way its internal rhythms often seem to shift out of phase giving the track its mechanical feel. It’s the pop equivalent of Voyager (which launched within weeks of “I Feel Love”’s release) - the furthest out we’ve ever gone, but powered by primitive late-70s kit.
Back on Earth “I Feel Love” has been refitted and retooled countless times - if not a remix then another track borrowing its pulsing bassline chassis. That’s testament to its success as a pop song as well as a machine age wonder: for all that Moroder’s innovative arrangement suits the tune’s spacey bliss and transforms Summer’s coo into something entranced, “I Feel Love” is still catchy enough to have worked as a much more trad disco or glam-pop record.
The arrangement is what shifts it from good to legendary, though, from the first interlock of bassline and synthesised pulsebeat. It’s Ptolemaic pop, the play of cycles and epicycles: Moroder setting up minutely intersecting circling rhythms and watching as they interact in a music of the spheres that hasn’t stopped turning yet. 9
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SteveM on July 3rd, 2008
I guess D***** H**** doesn’t count eh.
Re the Patrick Cowley mix, not sure I’ve heard this but someone on ILM mentioned it as being one of the earliest examples of featuring extended 4 bar snare rolls or at least an equivalent of this as breakdown and/or build up. This was from a thread I started looking for the earliest examples of this technique (specifically extended snare rolls as in a snare per 16th note) and I wasn’t aware of anything like that pre ‘92 Harthouse trance monsters like Hardfloor’s ‘Acperience’ and a couple of poppier hits from around the same time.
rosie on July 3rd, 2008
Tom, just as my attitude to “punk” depends very much on how you define “punk” (whatever it is coming up in late ‘78, I think you’ll find my take is very different indeed from my take on GSTQ.) But then life is full of surprises, more than a few of which have come my way via Popular. One that came my way (from elsewhere) quite recently that caused my eyebrows to rise was that some early recordings by the Sex Pistols were produced by one Chris Spedding, a jobbing guitarist who had a mid-seventies mainstream hit of his own in the mid-70s. That in itself came as a surprise to me at the time since I knew Chris Spedding through his work with Nucleus (a kind of British Weather Report, m’lud), and before that with underground, art-rock. distinctly non-populist band the Battered Ornaments. That seems to me to be quite a journey but maybe a circular one because there’s not a lot of clear water between the Battered Ornaments and a lot of what was getting tagged “punk” by about 1978. As I’ve said many times, there’s nothing new under the sun.
Anyway, I digress. Herbie Hancock is apparently a big influence on the hip-hop scene and I adore Herbie Hancock. I’m listening to his Watermelon Man even as I write. It doesn’t distress me that Herbie Hancock never (to my knowledge) ever had a pop hit, though.
FT's Tom on July 3rd, 2008
He did though! “Rockit”, in the early 80s, a classic bit of skinny-tie electro.
DJ Punctum on July 3rd, 2008
Also “I Thought It Was You,” a top 20 hit in 1978 (Charles Fox commented on it on that week’s edition of Jazz Today) and “You Bet Your Love” which likewise went top 20 in early 1979.
Chris Spedding, the missing link between Mike Westbrook, Eno, the Wombles, Mickie Most, Carla Bley and the Pistols. What a man.
SteveM on July 3rd, 2008
I heard a bit of Summer’s new album yesterday via iTunes. Hmm. It’s over 20 years since she last released a single I really liked and that was ‘Dinner With Gershwin’. The SAW stuff doesn’t do much for me although ‘This Time I Know It’s For Real’ might be one of their better productions from that time.
Billy Smart on July 3rd, 2008
Chris Spedding’s punk credentials were immortalised through his solo single ‘Pogo Dancing’
“Pogo dancin’!
It’s the latest sound!
Why move side to side
When you can move up and down?”
You can’t argue with that.
FT's Drucius on July 3rd, 2008
“Chris Spedding, the missing link between Mike Westbrook, Eno, the Wombles, Mickie Most, Carla Bley and the Pistols. What a man.”
And lest we forget, The Vibrators.
DJ Punctum on July 3rd, 2008
Indeed.
The only thing I’ve heard from the new Donna Summer album is a ballad called something like “Be Myself Again” which Ken Bruce helpfully played on his show last Wednesday while I was packing up and moving house. I thought it was amazing but have no idea what the rest of the record is like.
“This Time I Know It’s For Real” can make me cry, for reasons which are nobody’s business here.
Pete on July 3rd, 2008
I think this Time I Know Its For Real is a terrific record which probably doesn’t stretch Donna half as much as she stretches the SAW production. Definitely one of the highpoints of the SAW back catalogue.
Erithian on July 3rd, 2008
Which reminds me - with “Hot Stuff”, she’s the second consecutive Number 1 act to feature in “The Full Monty” soundtrack. Remember that news footage of Prince Charles meeting the cast and trying THAT dance from the dole queue scene?
DJ Punctum on July 3rd, 2008
I see that “Rock ‘N’ Roll Part 2″ is still on the Full Monty soundtrack album so clearly that’s how he’s been making a living.
FT's Lena on July 3rd, 2008
To me, Jay-Z showing up with a band and playing around with AC/DC and U2 was just his nod to the audience as well as to the black roots of rock itself. (My favorite Jay-Z ‘album’ as such is The Slack Album, which is a song-by-song mash-up of The Black Album and Pavement’s Slanted and Enchanted. I wonder if he’s heard it?)
Jay-Z was in the audience for Federer’s match yesterday, did the BBC take note?
My hmphs on July 4th, 2008
You nailed it - It does sound futuristic, and when it was released oh so many years ago, I thought, “Wow. This ain’t disco.”
I’ve always thought Madonna’s “Ray of Light” paid homage to this song.
DJ Punctum on July 4th, 2008
Not to “Sepheryn” by Curtiss-Maldoon, then.
Mark G on July 4th, 2008
I’ve always thought Madonna’s “Ray of Light” paid Money to that song.
DJ Punctum on July 4th, 2008
Oh yes, full composer credits and all that, but I think the track comes out of Madonna long before it comes out of “I Feel Love” if you see what I mean.
SteveM on July 4th, 2008
a little more reminiscent of ‘I Feel Love’ and just after ‘Ray Of Light’ was the synth bassline on Underworld’s ‘King Of Snake’
xyzzzz__ on July 5th, 2008
“Jay-Z was in the audience for Federer’s match yesterday, did the BBC take note?”
Indeed he was!
mike on July 8th, 2008
Yeah but yeah but yeah but… the way I remember it, “I Feel Love” was originally conceived as the final song on Donna’s loosely conceptual I Remember Yesterday album. Since other tracks pastiched different periods - the title track covering big band swing, “Love’s Unkind” covering 1960s Spector girl groups etc - it was deemed necessary to conclude the album with a song that sounded as if it had been made in THA FOOOOTURE. And so, in a sense, “I Feel Love” was a novelty song that ended up accidentally inventing THA FOOOOTURE.
(Not that Moroder was slow to run with his new ideas, of course; his own “From Here To Eternity” and “The Chase” are of course quite wonderful natural follow-ons from “I Feel Love”.)
Meanwhile, somewhere in San Francisco, an unknown musician called Patrick Cowley was most definitely listening. His 1982 remix of “I Feel Love” actually comes quite close to topping the original, and I had a lot of fun reviving it on my dancefloors over the 1988 Summer Of Acid, mixing the long instrumental breaks with Martin Luther King’s “I Have A Dream” speech (on the B-side of the MLK Project’s “I Have A Dream” as the acapella mix!), while turning the smoke and the strobes up to max…
DJ Punctum on July 8th, 2008
Yeah but yeah but post #3…
mike on July 8th, 2008
Well, ahum, I thought it was worth underlining the arguable “novelty song” aspect. The placing at the end of the album is in one sense Radical Future Shock - but in another sense, it’s also kinda showbiz hokey: “Well kids, I hope you’ve enjoyed our little look back at the past - but now, let us transport you into THA FOOOTURE!”
Erithian on July 8th, 2008
And of course another song that signified THA FOOOOTURE back in 1961, “Johnny Remember Me”, was a perfect mash-up partner for “I Feel Love” in one of Bronski Beat’s many fine outings. I dare say you might have played that once or twice?
Erithian on July 8th, 2008
Whoops, nothing meant by the word “outings”!!
DJ Punctum on July 8th, 2008
I still think it works in a SMiLE/”Good Vibrations” sense.
“Love To Love You Baby + I Feel Love + Johnny Remember Me,” a top three hit for Bronski Beat and Marc Almond in 1985 recorded as a direct response to alleged comments made by D Summer apropos urgent and key 1985 issue.
mike on July 8th, 2008
And who could forget Messiah’s 1992 “rave” version, featuring that Precious Wilson out of Eruption?
Or indeed the 1995 Rollo & Sister Bliss remix, which helped the track back into the Top 10? (I remember them making quite a decent job of it, but then my 1995 dancefloor memories are, cough, not always to be trusted.)
DJ Punctum on July 8th, 2008
Who could forget indeed?
intothefireuk on July 11th, 2008
The metallic clank of analogue sequencers, mechanised 4/4 drum beats, phased, synchopated hi-hats, swirling synths and effects - familiar enough now but in 1977 ? It wasn’t entirely without precedence though - Tangerine Dream, Can, Kraftwerk et al had been playing with sequencers & synths for years; as had the majority of prog rock bands. The difference here was employing it as a danceable solution (to teenage revolution ? - sorry). Well that and of course Donna’s sultry soulful vocals turning the automated pulse human. Previously heard being amalgamated into a warm discofied, funked up backdrop but now brought into sharp focus by the machines. Beauty & the Beast. It’s not really disco or funk it’s cold, calculating & warm & soothing and I know it’s a significant record but I just can’t love it as much as I’d like to. No, I actually prefer her/Moroders re-invention of Manilow’s ‘Could It Be Magic’ (album version not the castrated single version) from the previous year (which Take Fat would eventually bastardise) which I find a far more sensuous and enveloping record but that did nothing in the chart so what the hell do I know.
Re: Chris Spedding - still touring with Roxy Music & Bryan Ferry (it all fits !) - he also featured on Ferry’s 1976 version of ‘Let’s Stick Together’.
mike on July 17th, 2008
According to the listeners of BBC Radio 2, this is the second greatest dance record of all time (just ahead of “Sex Machine” and, OMGWTF, “Strings Of Life”).
DJ Punctum on July 17th, 2008
To be fair, Donna’s “Could It Be Magic?” did manage to reach #40 in June 1976, but even Barry’s original didn’t chart in Britain until early 1979 (and Barry won’t be bothering us - at least not directly - on Popular either; much loved in the UK but saleswise predominantly an albums artist).
As for Radio 2 listeners - isn’t democracy a tad overrated (as great a record as the winner is, is it really a “dance” record?)? I don’t approve of the idea of a preordained shortlist but presumably that was a safeguard to ensure that something like “The Birdie Song” or “Agadoo” didn’t come top.
Mark G on July 17th, 2008
10. Key To My Happiness
- The Charades (1966)
uh, what?
DJ Punctum on July 17th, 2008
Northern Soul guv.
rosie on July 17th, 2008
Marcello @ 104: It all depends what you mean by “dance”. The notion of “dance” as a distinct genre of popular music comes after my pop time. For many of us wrinklies (who are alleged to form a large part of the Radio 2 audience but me being a cussed so-and-so I confine myself to radios 3 and 4 these days), the primary purpose of *all* popular music was dancing. We may raise eyebrows now that Rock Around The Clock was labelled a foxtrot, but then in 1955 a foxtrot is what would have been done to it in most dance halls where it was played.
Of course, it depends on what kind of dance you plan to do, how good a track is for dancing to. The top track in that list is a fabulous track for the leroc[*] dancing that was my chosen style before arthritic knees made it difficult. Tracks like I’m Not In Love or If You Leave Me Now are hopeless for leroc but great for smooching and that is also dancing. You can do a terrificly sexy salsa to Nina Simone’s My Baby Just Cares For Me. My absolute favourite track for lerocing to is was always Bruce Springsteen’s Dancing in the Dark.
You can tell what a numpty I was when went into Virgin in Bristol in the early 90s looking for music to practice leroc to, and naively went to the section labelled ‘Dance’!
[*] Leroc is French jiving, that is 50s jiving modified for the less frenetic pop music of the sixties when partner dancing remained dominant while the anglo-saxon world moved away from it. Less flamboyant footwork, more sensuous arm and body movement. I for one regret the passing of partner dancing. It’s almost as if the world became afraid of intimacy.
DJ Punctum on July 17th, 2008
None of this goes any way towards answering my query as to why that record in particular should be considered specifically as a “dance” record.
rosie on July 17th, 2008
Duh! Because, as I said very clearly, it’s a cracking track to dance to. Which part of that don’t you understand, Marcello?
DJ Punctum on July 17th, 2008
So are other records. But their embyronic generation is not in dance-intentional terms. It is not a dance record in the sense of “One More Time” or “Must Be Madison.”
DJ Punctum on July 17th, 2008
More pressing: “Where Love Lives” by Alison Limerick wtf?
FT's Tom on July 17th, 2008
#108-110: No more discussion of that particular record please!
mike on July 17th, 2008
No issues at all with the deserved inclusion of “Where Love Lives” - an absolute classic, and one of those tracks that would always, always drag me onto the floor.
rosie on July 17th, 2008
Without discussing any particular record, I continue to maintain that all pop music is, ipso fact, inteded at least in part for dancing to. Regardless either of whether it specifically alludes to a particular dance or of whether it falls into the genre known as “Dance” (much of which, it seems to me, is difficult to dance meaningfully to as it is devoid of any kind of emotion.)
DJ Punctum on July 17th, 2008
Have you ever tried to dance to any “Dance” music Peggy?
FT's Tom on July 17th, 2008
Yes you’re on dangerous ground here Rosie - everyone who’s been to Poptimism will have seen Marcello glued to the dancefloor all night, glowstick aloft, teeth grinding, raving his bollocks off while the likes of Kat and Lex are forced into humiliating retreats.
DJ Punctum on July 17th, 2008
I’ve no idea what the man’s on about; I’ve not been to Poptimism since February and categorically deny any glowstick (ab)use.
Mark G on July 17th, 2008
#106 yeah, but this got number 10 on a radio2 poll? How did that happen? I mean, I know a bit of NS but I don’t know this one. Should listen more, I guess…..
DJ Punctum on July 17th, 2008
Maybe the panel of experts all brought different compilation CDs and they just picked the tenth track on each. It’s a good one, though, if very “token NS entry” in a non-poll like this.
SteveM on July 17th, 2008
what is meant by ‘dance meaningfully’?! i just dance meanly
emotional connections to “Dance” Music come all too easily for some of us