For those too young to know Donna Summer, think of her as someone whose music was everywhere, providing the soundtrack to the lives of a zillion gay men as they partied through the 1970's and 1980's. The magnitude of the loss of Donna Summer to men of a certain age is similar to (and quite possibly even greater than) the loss of Whitney Houston for music fans who are 10 to 20 years younger. For a period of several years, there wasn't any recording artist in the world who was selling more records and getting more radio and club exposure than Donna. Michael Jackson sang some background vocals for HER, if that puts anything in perspective. I think her death comes as a shock today and was not something that we could (sadly) foresee like we did with Whitney. It came as a complete surprise to me today to learn that Donna had been dealing with cancer during the past year.
Although DJ'ing was never my primary career, I was a part-time club DJ a couple nights a week throughout the late 70's, 80's, 90's, and into the early 00's and eventually ran a DJ remixing service for a couple of years. I can't tell you how many thousands of times I played (and remixed) various Donna Summer records, and how it was a complete no-brainer that any of us could fill the dance floor any time we played anything she sang. Even after the peak of her radio days in the late 70's, she continued to release songs sporadically up until 2010 and they ALWAYS got massive club play. A survey of thousands of club DJs (both young and old) done in 2010 listed "I Feel Love" as the single most influential song in club music of all time. It changed the sound of all the music that came after it. (Kraftwerk's "Numbers" was #2 on that survey. I'm in complete agreement with both of those choices.)
And yes, as dargelos pointed out, there was that "gay controversy" back in the 80's where Donna supposedly said that AIDS is a punishment from God. There was always a lot of question about what she actually said, and when, and where. One story was that she said made this comment at a concert performance, and yet it always seemed to come down to "A friend of a friend of my friend was there and SWEARS that she said that". The stories about what happened always seemed to involve a friend of a friend rather than anything that could be substantiated. Whatever it was that actually happened, the gossip mill in the pre-Internet days blew it up into something that had very long-lasting legs.
Some people held that against her and never gave up their belief. I don't blame them for that. If you're offended to the core, sometimes you can't ever see things differently. Other people in the gay community either eventually forgave her or else never believed that she made those remarks to begin with. Personally, I won't ever know what she said or what she didn't say because I wasn't there, but I took my own guidance from her actions. She worked with tons of gay people and they were in her band whenever she toured. Many of the songwriters she co-wrote all her songs with were gay men. She was exceptionally kind to her gay fans whenever she played concerts. She invited drag queens on stage. She told everyone to "grab the guy next to you and get up and dance" and she wasn't referring only to the women. She had the light man shine the spotlight on one gay couple who were fantastic dancers. She made light, funny jokes that gently teased her gay fans that were never mean-spirited but made all of us in the audience laugh. Her humor was earthy and funny and often quite a bit bawdier in person than you'd expect. She donated her time to perform at benefits to raise money for AIDS, and often donated the proceeds from selling her paintings (she was also an accomplished painter) to AmFAR (American Society for AIDS Research). Whether this was all her true nature or just an attempt to compensate and make up for things she wished she hadn't said, I can't know -- but when all is said and done I do think that she did right by the gay community and her gay fans.
For me, the things like these which I could see were enough for me to give her a pass and just be able to enjoy her music without being dragged down by the rest of that old baggage. In concert, she was fantastic. Unlike many of the performers of the modern age, she never pre-recorded her vocal tracks or lip-synced. She sang it all live, just like Whitney Houston or Aretha Franklin. Once she got into her 50's and 60's, her voice had dropped about half an octave and some of the high notes weren't there any more, but her voice had a new richness and deepness that sounded better than ever.
So some of the younger guys here might not know much about her, but she had a fantastic natural talent and an honest-to-goodness voice that always sounded great. Back in the day, she had a long string of #1 albums in countries all over the world and a huge string of radio hits, but I think she'll be remembered most of all for a legacy of club music that spanned nearly 35 years.
(I must also admit to being envious of dargelos for having been to the legendary "Heaven" club. I've read about it in DJ magazines for decades but haven't ever made it to London. "State Of Independence" is also a great, great song, easily my #2 favorite from Donna's catalog after "I Feel Love".)
Although I haven't heard much of Donna Summers, I do know of "Hot Stuff". A very good song.
