Bad Girls is the seventh studio album by American singer and songwriter Donna Summer, released on April 25, 1979 on Casablanca Records. Originally issued as a double album, Bad Girls became the best-selling album of Summer's career. The album spent 6 weeks at the top of Billboard's Hot 200 albums in 1979, for one week on June 16, 1979 and then for 5 consecutive weeks, from July 7 to August 4, 1979. It contained the number one hits "Hot Stuff" and "Bad Girls", and the number two hit "Dim All the Lights".
On the week of June 16, 1979, Summer had (for a second time) the No. 1 single "Hot Stuff" and album Bad Girls simultaneously on the Billboard charts. She accomplished this again for a third time, the week of August 14, 1979 when the single "Bad Girls" took the top spot on the Billboard Hot 100 charts for a 5-week run, and the album Bad Girls was at the top of the Billboard 200 album chart. They remained at the top of both charts together for 4 weeks. Summer also became the first female artist to have two songs in the top three, on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, when on the week of June 30, 1979, "Hot Stuff" fell to No. 2 and "Bad Girls" rose to No. 3. Both songs remained in the top three for 4 weeks. The week of July 21, 1979 the single "Bad Girls" took the top spot on the Billboard Hot R &B singles chart, Summer sat on top of 3 major Billboard charts. The album Bad Girls topped the R&B album charts for 3 weeks, June 23 to July 7, 1979.
Background
Since the release of her breakthrough album which contained the sexually suggestive "Love to Love You Baby", Summer had been nicknamed "the First Lady of Love" in the press and her record label wanted her to keep this image, despite the fact that she was never truly comfortable with it. Several years later, Summer became dependent on prescription medication and reportedly suffered a mental breakdown at her California home in 1979; shortly afterwards, one of her sisters and backing vocalists in her band took her to a church in Los Angeles and Summer reconnected with her faith. Upon her recovery, Summer set to work on her new album with long-time partners Giorgio Moroder and Pete Bellotte, as well as various others she had not worked with before. By this time, although disco music was still popular, other styles such as punk and heavy metal were also doing well on the charts, so the team decided to incorporate a rockier sound into some of the songs. Other songs had a more soul/R&B feel to them, and in all it was probably Summer's most diverse album to date. The fusion of rock and disco was particularly evident, and synthesizers were used to augment the sound for a more electronic and dance oriented electro music in the first two songs on the album – "Hot Stuff" and "Bad Girls", which also became the first two singles to be released from the album. Both were huge hits and made number one on the American singles chart. The former also won Summer a Grammy Award for Best Female Rock Vocal Performance and became popular again in the 1990s when it was featured in The Full Monty and again in the film The Martian. "Dim All the Lights" was the third single and also became a huge hit, peaking at number two in the U.S.
Bad Girls was universally acclaimed by music reviews. The album was certified double platinum for sales in excess of 2 million copies in the U.S. on December 1, 1993 (double albums are certified per disc by the RIAA rather than per complete unit). It also became her second consecutive number-one album in the U.S., also spending three weeks at number one in Canada on the RPM 100 national albums chart.[9] As well as the aforementioned Grammy Award for "Hot Stuff" (Best Female Rock Vocal Performance), the song "Bad Girls" was also nominated for Best Female Pop Vocal Performance and Best Female R&B Vocal Performance. "Dim All the Lights" was nominated for Best Disco Recording and the album itself was nominated for Album of the Year. The album was also nominated for "Favourite Pop/Rock Album" at the American Music Awards of 1980. The single took an American Music Award for "Favorite Pop/Rock Single", while Summer took awards for "Favorite Pop/Rock Female Artist" & "Favorite Soul/R&B Female Artist".
Bad Girls would be Summer's final studio album for Casablanca Records, who ended 1979 with the release of a greatest hits double-album. For her next studio album, Summer wanted to branch out into other formats of music but since she and Casablanca could not come to an agreement on her musical direction, Summer opted to sign a new deal with Geffen Records, the then-new label formed by David Geffen. Her first album with Geffen Records was more rock/new wave oriented. In the meantime, Casablanca chose to release more singles from the Bad Girls album into 1980: "Sunset People" and "Walk Away", the latter of which became a moderate hit reaching the top 40. Casablanca/PolyGram also released a special edition compilation entitled Walk Away – Greatest Hits 1977–1980, which featured a selection of her hits from the Bad Girls period and the preceding years. In 2003 Universal Music, owners of the Casablanca/PolyGram back catalogue since 1998, re-issued Bad Girls as a digitally remastered and expanded deluxe edition.
Commercial performance
The RIAA site has the album certified as 1,000,000 sales as of May 3, 1979 (certification on December 1, 1993 is a format change and not due to sales).[10][circular reference] The RIAA did not introduce multi-plantinum awards until 1984, thus there are no artist with multi-plantinum certifications on the RIAA web site before 1984. Bad Girls the album was designated Triple Platinum in 1979.[11] It has sold over 4 million copies in the US.[12]
Track listing
All tracks produced by Giorgio Moroder and Pete Bellotte except "My Baby Understands" by Donna Summer and Juergen Koppers.
[1]
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