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Donna Summer - the Real trailblazer Donna Summer was the first black female artist to have her video played in heavy rotation(SWHFTM) on MTV, and the first to have her videos played in consistent heavy rotation on MTV. She was the first female artist to really dominate the pop charts as well. She kick the door down for women to build career's on dance music. But - somehow some of this trailblazing as been attributed to other women like Janet Jackson and Whitney Houston on the web and wiki. WHY ? [Edited 3/25/17 11:51am] | |
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Her "belief system" didn't translate to her core fanbase and the two gradually became more disconnected throughout the 80s and 90s. Sounds familiar.
. http://www.donna-tribute.com/articles/80/advocate2.htm . The Advocate (mid 80s) Summer and Smoke
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I don't think MTV played her hits until "She Works Hard For The Money". Also, there were bigger world acts (ABBA, Boney M) but I think we were looking for American heroes to award. | |
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This thing about Donna and her anti-gay remarks, I've always heard, "It was reported that she said...". I never saw any interviews, audio or video footage of her making these remarks so I've always questioned their validity. I'm not saying I don't believe it happened. But really the only evidence people have been able to present over the years has been hearsay. "It's not nice to fuck with K.B.! All you haters will see!" - Kitbradley
"The only true wisdom is knowing you know nothing." - Socrates | |
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Is "The Advocate" hearsay? I love her music as much as anyone. She may have lucked out on the lack of technological innovation in regards to hearsay. Regardless of the legitimacy of the comments this is a huge "Why" to the original question. "Hard for the Money" was a "comeback" that fizzled shortly after. What other Donna Summer videos were in heavy rotation on MTV? | |
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Did Donna make those statements during an interview with The Advocate? Magazines print hearsay, rumors and speculation all the time. Or did she make the statements during a concert that only a few people reported hearing? I could be wrong but from what I understood, there has always been a lot of confusion surrounding this subject and no one has been able to prove or disprove the statements due to the circumstances under which they were alledgedly made? "It's not nice to fuck with K.B.! All you haters will see!" - Kitbradley
"The only true wisdom is knowing you know nothing." - Socrates | |
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Even that article doesn't name the "source" of the gay record company executive. For me, the validity of all the stories added up to confusion about her faith. I can see how that lie could have grown and spread in the Anita Bryant, anti-disco era. | |
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The Advocate documented the feedback provided by concert attendees hearing her say she will "pray for them" etc. . I totally agree with you regarding circumstances and what not, the truth of the matter is that regardless of what was or was not said - the "rumor" was a huge blow to her (gay, loyal) fanbase and her career never did fully recover. | |
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Donna was definately a trailblazer for women who were primarily dance music singers. But, I don't think she knocked down any doors for singers like Nippy Houston. Diana Ross was more responsible for opening doors for those types of black female Pop singers. "It's not nice to fuck with K.B.! All you haters will see!" - Kitbradley
"The only true wisdom is knowing you know nothing." - Socrates | |
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huh-huh, huh-huh, huh-huh heh-heh, heh-heh [img:$uid]http://www.thewrap.com/sites/default/files/buttheadtext.jpg[/img:$uid] | |
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y'know, I thought that might happen. | |
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If I'm not mistaken,Donna was also the only artist to have three double albums in a row (Live And More (1978),Bad Girls (1979) and On The Radio (1979) ) reach Number One on the charts.
Interestingly,1977's Once Upon A Time was also a double album,but it didn't reach Number One,though.It's amazing how much music she released in such a short period of time. | |
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During her 1983 concerts,Donna would perform the song "Woman" and start by saying "This is for all the women out there".Some of the gay guys would cheer too,and Donna said "God made Adam and Eve,not Adam and Steve".A gay writer,Jim Feldman,criticized her for this remark in his review of the show.
Any other 'anti-gay' comments atttributed to Donna are just rumors and no one can ever provide a real source.But she did make the Adam and Eve comment.It was tasteless perhaps but not nearly as terrible as the other comments that she has been (falsely) accused of saying. | |
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"She Works Hard For The Money" and "Unconditional Love" were heavily shown on MTV in 1983.
A year later,"There Goes My Baby" got alot of airtime,too.After that,I rarely saw Donna Summer videos on MTV. | |
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I don't know if it was because of any anti-gay comments attributed to Donna,but the Cats Without Claws album was her first flop album.It didn't even reach gold status | |
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1983 was the year when MTV began putting videos by black artists in heavy rotation.As the year began,Prince and Michael Jackson videos began airing...then came videos from Shalamar ("Dead Giveaway"),"Eddy Grant ("Electric Avenue") and others.I wanna say that Donna was the first black woman who had videos on MTV,but I do recall seeing videos from Joan Armatrading before I ever saw "She Works Hard For The Money" on MTV. | |
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Donna didn't put out an album after "Cats" in 1984 until 1987. All 4 of her videos Including She Works Hard for the Money were played in heavy rotation. There were only 2 made per each of those albums. By 1985 MTV had change it's playlist and medium and heavy rotation were designated for the artist who had hits on the charts. | |
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Donna was Billboards' top music artist/act from 1976-1982 (pre-MTV era), with 12 top 10 singles. She was the first female to really dominate the pop charts. From August 1978 to November 1980 she scored 9 consecutive top 5 singles. (Madonna broke that record in 1985) From November 25,1978 to Novermber 24 1979 she had 6 top 4 singles, 4 of them went #1, and one went #2. She was the first female to have 2 songs in the top 3, at the same time. The first of the modern rock era to have the number one single and album simultaneoulsy on the pop charts (she did that 3 times in an 8 month period). She took 3 double ablums to the top of charts in a 14 month period. She was the first to have 3 number one singles in a calander year. Bad Girls went triple platinum in the US (which was the best selling album by a black female - later surpassed by Tina Turner's Private Dancer in 1985) and yes she put out an album about every 6 months while at Casablanca. | |
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I actually meant the "why", for why do Janet and Whitney get credited for the trailblazing, when they were even close to being the first to do anythig ? Donna was the first played in heavy rotation and the first to get consistent heavy rotation - followed by the Pointer Sister and Tina Turner. But somehow it's WH or JJ that get the credit. By the time WH debut the station had changed it's polocies and playlists so artist that had hits would get the proper airplay (like a radio station), there was no guess work left up to the v-jays. | |
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SoulAlive said:I don't know if it was because of any anti-gay comments attributed to Donna,but the Cats Without Claws album was her first flop album.It didn't even reach gold status
[Edited 8/25/15 7:56am] "It's not nice to fuck with K.B.! All you haters will see!" - Kitbradley
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I don't think they are credited with many "firsts" but simply acknowledged for their impact in the medium of video. Rick James was very vocal about MTV not playing his shit, and record companies said they would pull all of their videos if MTV did not add black artists such as Michael Jackson. I don't think the record companies of Donna Summer or Diana Ross broke down those doors. | |
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I agree,Cats Without Claws isn't one of Donna's better albums.It's very ambitious,but it lacks truly great songs.I really like "I'm Free" but several of the other songs fall flat and the album is not really cohesive.I also think it was a mistake to release a midtempo remake,"There Goes My Baby",as the first single. | |
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It was more of a gay thing to begin with. When she first heard of it, back in 1984 she did apologize if anything she had said would have cast her as homophobic (I read it in Xtra), But they have always said she didn't apologize or deny until years later. This was not true, she was on Entertainment Tonight in 1987 with Nancy Odelle and denined every making the statments. She also took out an ad in the Gay New York rag to reach out to the community. The rumour grew to her saying "Aids was God's devine punshiment on gays", and went mainstream because of Act Up. Act Up formed in March 1987 and took direct aim at her; asking radio station not to play her, picketing her concerts, basically telling gay clubs not to play her or the gay community not buy her records. She was black balled from mainstream pop radio in mid 80's through early 90's no question. The only reason TTIKIFR got played was because it was a top 3 hit all over Europe and made radio playlists in the US; they had to play it. The follow up single went no where. It was sort of sad because she was not Anita Bryant campagning against gay people. But Act Up thought this was so important to go after her, like HIV and AIDS shouldn't have been the main concern ! | |
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Janet and Nippy were not trailblazers on MTV. Tina, Donna, Chaka, the Pointers...they were all in heavy rotation on MTV before Janet and Nippy. "It's not nice to fuck with K.B.! All you haters will see!" - Kitbradley
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Yeah,Donna was on a roll back then! When I think about her amazing success back then,I sometimes wonder if she made the right decision when she left Casablanca.It seems like they really understood Donna and her music.They knew how to properly promote and market her.I don't think she ever had that type of support at Geffen Records.Casablanca had no problems with her releasing double albums,but when she submitted the 2-LP I'm A Rainbow album to Geffen,they promptly rejected it. | |
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Rick James video was not played because the station programmer who was a Afro-American female didn't like the video (too sleazy for the times) and she didn't want black people respresented that way - that was back in 1981/82. MTV was not really racist (they were a rock based station) as there were not alot of record companies making videos for there artist, at that time especially black artist. Donna was played in heavy rotation, she was the black female superstar at the time. The playlist appeared in billboard back in the day. Like I said Houston was even close to being the first. Do you know how many black artist got played in heavy rotation before her ? Stevie Wonder, Lionel Ritchie, Rockwell, Eddy Grant, Diana Ross, Sade, Deniece Williams, Shannon, The Pointer Sisters, Tina Turner, Kool and the Gang, Ray Parker Jr, Chaka Khan, Billy Ocean - along with Prince, MJ & DS. I don't know where you get that BS about pulling all there vidoes' either.
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She took a friend advise to go to Geffen, and Geffen himself made alot of promises - like movies and othe things. His personal attention went to Cher; and unfortunately his executives were not great music people - after she left Geffen the president said "it was never our intention to focus on established superstars". They effectively ended her working relationship with Moroder/Belotte/Faltermeyer. And they were not great a picking singles. Donna wanted "Oh Billy Please" to be the first single from Cats. TGMB was a horrible choice - especially for that time.
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I agree,Geffen Records didn't know how to choose the right singles.Excellent songs like "(If It) Hurts Just A Little","Fascination","I'm Free" and "Breakdown" are better choices than some of the songs that actually became singles.In 1980,Geffen was a brand new,unproven label.Donna took a huge risk by signing with them. | |
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I read an article about people that were in the audience at that concert in Atlantic City, and they said the crowd laughed - it was meant as a joke - and was taken as a joke. But the Feldman had an agenda - there had been a story about her getting into it in Florida in November 1983. This is were everthing had started. She tell people she was coming back - if anyone was interesting in hearing about how God had changed her life - to stick around she would be back in 5. She got into a heated argument with some gay fans that called her a hypocrite for praying with a fan who was sick with AIDS. They were the one's who first reported the story of her homophobia. Again had they stuck around they would have seen her hugging and praying with this guy (most people wouldn't have went near him in those days), they left angry. They even burnt her records in San Francisco's gay villiage (ala Dixie Chicks) in 1984. | |
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I always thought that this was a really lame excuse.There were many 'rock videos' in the 80s where the women were scantily dressed and used as sex objects.Those videos got heavy rotation.
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