The Dance Collection - A Compilation of Twelve inch Singles

Yes, my car stereo still has a CD slot in it. It gets rare use as I usually Bluetooth my phone instead. However, I really wanted the McArthur Park long version on the CD and it was way cheaper to pick up a secondhand CD than fork out for the MP3 version. I was lucky as it has been looked after with no skipping or scratches and it is great to sing along once more to this tremendous album. I had it many years ago on a cassette but I lost it somehow.....or, more likely it chewed itself up !!Donna Summer remains timeless.

I had a copy of this CD years ago and every party I went to, I was press-ganged into taking it along! Believe me, ANY kind of party, throughout 80's 90's and the noughties, Whatever dance music was popular at the time, it seemed this was always guaranteed to fill the floor. Why? Well firstly because Ms Summer and her partner in crime in the 70's: Giorgio Moroder were light years ahead of their time when it came to putting out first rate disco music, unafraid of using hypnotic beats and driving rhythms. As someone else pointed out, the original version of "I Feel Love", (The one before all the nasty, cheap, remixer's got their dirty little mits on it, {Faithless being the exception, as they managed to bring it up to date with some credibility and respect for the original} removing the point of the track's driving simplicity. "I Feel Love" was the first and original rave/Club/Trance record and probably the blueprint for every synthesised based dance song ever since. I doubt whther the rave scene would have happened without this classic original trance inducing masterpiece. So to have the 8 minute plus untampered version is owning a piece of history and signals a hint of the quality of what you're buying into.Everything here deserves it's place and although I agree that there are many gems missing from that era, to point out to one reviewer, many of her single releases such as "Love's Unkind", "Spring Affair" and "Rumour Has it" were never extended for a 12" release. However, I agree a double CD or a vol. 2 would remedy the ommisions of such gems such as "Down Deep Inside" and "On the Radio". For a single CD they've packed in a great choice and not gone too far ahead in her career, say after "The Wanderer" album and Giogio was given the boot at which point Donna's music sounded just like every other disco/soul diva, with the exception of the grandoisse "State of Independence", which came out in the 80's, and therefore doesn't really count. The full version of "Love to Love you Baby" was one whole side of an L.P, so really can't be counted as a 12" version.(DJ's just played the LP version). My advice for the purist looking for all those thudding, pumping gems is to buy the original CD's of "Love to love you...", "A Love Trilogy", "Four Seasons of Love",and "I Remember Yesterday", which were all conceptual and in the day when all the tracks beautifully segued into the next, with the beat still driving, keeping the whole thing going chugging along until the end of side 1 with the wonderful Munich Machine providing the fascinating, almost military style rhythmic, beat-thudding instrumentation that carried the albums seamlessly from song to song. So this collection really is nearly as complete as it can be. The outstanding "MacArthur Park Suite" (Which is really three consecutive songs followed by a reprise, again her typical album format) showcases how it's done. Everything thrown in the mix with soaring, climatic vocals which have really stood the test of time. Also the Streisand duet "Enough is Enough", which is hilarious as the two divas try to outsing each other with the backing tracks barely able to keep up with them! Again it's the definitive version that no-one has ever come close to emulating.The whole trip, from the eery elctronic,faded in sustained single note intro of "I Feel Love", to the aforementioned glorious crescendo of "Enough is Enough" it really is just a mind boggling dance heaven journey and a nostalgic reminder of those heady days of long, hot Summers during the 70's when Donna Summer was a name that was synonymous with the just about the best dance music played in every club on the globe. She probably taught Madonna everything she knew about dance music, cos Madge has just about parodied all of her ideas on most of her albums. There's only room for one dance music creator in my mind and Donna did it first. Also her singing voice is possibly a hundred times better too! Buy Buy Buy! "It's so good it's so good, it's so good, it'so goooooooood!"P.S, I've just ordered my second copy as someone wisely coveted my CD, while something else was briefly on the decks!

In 1987, when cds were still new in the market, I purchased my VERY FIRST CD even if I had no cd player yet. This cd was "The Dance Collection" which had just been released around that time. It cost me P300.00 which would be around $6.67 today. I started to save for a player just so the time would come when I would be able to listen to the cd. Every night, I would look at this cd, admire it, read the music information inside and wonder how the songs would sound. At that time, I was already a huge Donna Summer fan and had all her vinyl albums but did not have any of her extended versions since these were not commercially available. You could just imagine how immensely excited I was to hear the cd!Finally, I had saved enough to buy myself a Sony cd player which I attached to the Aiwa component system my grandmother bought for the family. I was mesmerized at this new cd technology because the sound was perfect - thumping bass, wonderful treble, crystal clear sound when compared to vinyl albums which were beginning to get eased out of the market.From the first notes of "I Feel Love," to "With Your Love," to "Walk Away," to "Mac Arthur Park Suite," to "Last Dance," to "Hot Stuff," to "Dim All the Lights," and, finally, the epic "No More Tears(Enough is Enough)" with Barbra Streisand, I was entranced! At that time, I already had the 12" LP of this diva duet but hearing the cd version was pure joy! These wonderful Donna Summer dance classics in their extended form gave me a natural high. It was heaven indeed! This cd was definitely a fitting first-purchase in my vast cd collection.Recently, I ordered a copy of "The Dance Collection" from Amazon UK to update the old copy I had (23 yrs old!). Sadly, the sound quality of this cd now pales in comparison to the new cds I own. This cd has a very low sound level (you have to put the volume all the way up) and bass needs to be enhanced. In short, "The Dance Collection" deserves a remastered version if only to update the sound quality of these classics. Plus, this cd deserves an expanded version which would include other Donna Summer classics:My wish is for the remastered versions of the following:1. Love to Love You Baby2. Try Me I Know We Can Make It3. Prelude to Love / Could it be Magic4. Wasted / Come With me5. Spring Affair / Summer Fever6. I Remember Yesterday/Love's Unkind/Back in Love Again7. Once Upon a Time/Faster and Faster/Fairy Tale High/Say Something8. Rumour Has it/I Love You/Happily Ever After9. Our Love/Lucky/Sunset People10. On The Radio11. She Works Hard for the Money12. Melody of LoveThese 12 classics plus the 8 previous tracks would be Donna Summer's 20 greatest dance tracks, aptly entitled:"The Dance Collection: Remastered and Expanded."Hail to the Queen of Disco Donna Summer!