No.54 DONNA SUMMER’S I FEEL LOVE IS RELEASED IN THE UK
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Like Rock Around The Clock, Tomorrow Never Knows and Rapper’s Delight, I Feel Love is so much more than just another pop song, it’s three minutes, 47 seconds that changed the course of music forever. Produced by Giorgio Moroder and Pete Bellotte, I Feel Love was originally composed as the closing track for Donna Summer’s 1977 LP, I Remember Yesterday, a concept album which was designed as a musical journey through 40 years of popular music, encompassing 40s swing, 60s girl groups, 70s funk and disco. For the final track, Moroder and Bellotte wanted a song that looked to the future. The end result was a thrillingly urgent slice of electropop, a piece of music that still sounds as fresh and exhilarating as it did 42 years ago. It proved so innovative, it even managed to excite the visionary Brian Eno, then in the midst of recording the “Heroes” album with David Bowie. As Bowie recalled: “One day in Berlin, Eno came running in and said, ‘I’ve heard the sound of the future!’ He puts on I Feel Love, by Donna Summer [and] said, ‘This is it, look no further, this single is going to change the sound of club music for the next 15 years!’” Make that 40-plus years and Eno was bang on the money. Steve O’Brien