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 and most critically acclaimed album of Summer’s career. It was also her final studio album for Casablanca Records. In 2003, Universal Music re-issued Bad Girls as a digitally remastered and expanded deluxe edition.
Bad Girls reached atop the US Billboard 200, where it stayed for six weeks: for one week on June 16, 1979, and then for five consecutive weeks, from July 7 to August 4, 1979. Bad Girls also topped the Billboard R&B Albums chart for three weeks, from June 23 to July 7, 1979, and all cuts from the album topped the Disco Top 80 for seven weeks, from May 26 to July 7, 1979. It contained the US Billboard Hot 100 number-one hits “Hot Stuff” and “Bad Girls”, and the number-two hit “Dim All the Lights”. Summer also achieved further success when she became the first female artist to have two songs in the top three of the Billboard Hot 100, when on the week of June 30, 1979, “Hot Stuff” fell to number two and “Bad Girls” rose to number three.
Bad Girls was universally acclaimed and was certified platinum—now double platinum—by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) within just a week of its release. At the 1980 Grammy Awards, Bad Girls was nominated for Album of the Year and “Hot Stuff” won Best Female Rock Vocal Performance. Additionally, “Bad Girls” was nominated for Best Female Pop Vocal Performance and Best Female R&B Vocal Performance and “Dim All the Lights” was nominated for Best Disco Recording.
Bad Girls is widely considered one of the greatest disco albums. It was ranked by Rolling Stone’s list of the Women Who Rock: The 50 Greatest Albums of All Time at number 23, where the magazine wrote, “The late great Queen of Disco pulls out all the stops for an album that sums up Seventies radio, from ladies-choice smooch jams to filthy funk.” In a BBC Music review of the album, Daryl Easla wrote, “Bad Girls is a fantastic reminder of when [Summer] was the Britney, Christina, Mary J and Missy of her day all rolled into one.”
1. “Hot Stuff” 5:14
2. “Bad Girls” 4:55
3. “Love Will Always Find You” 3:59
4. “Walk Away” 4:27
5. “Dim All the Lights” Summer 4:40
6. “Journey to the Center of Your Heart” 4:36
7. “One Night in a Lifetime” 4:12
8. “Can’t Get to Sleep At Night” 4:45
9. “On My Honor” 3:34
10. “There Will Always Be a You” Summer 5:07
11. “All Through the Night” 6:01
12. “My Baby Understands” 4:03
13. “Our Love” 4:51
14. “Lucky” 4:37
15. “Sunset People” 6:27
16. “Bad Girls” (demo version) 4:00
1. “I Feel Love” 8:12
2. “Last Dance” (from the soundtrack Thank God It’s Friday) 8:11
3. “MacArthur Park Suite” (“MacArthur Park”/”One of a Kind”/”Heaven Knows”/”MacArthur Park (Reprise)”)
17:35
4. “Hot Stuff” 6:47
5. “Bad Girls” 4:57
6. “Walk Away” 7:16
7. “Dim All the Lights” Summer 7:14
8. “No More Tears (Enough Is Enough)” (duet with Barbra Streisand) 11:44
9. “On the Radio” (long version; from the original soundtrack Foxes) 7:35
Donna Summer – lead and background vocals, composition, production
Giorgio Moroder – bass guitar, synthesizer, guitar, composition, production
Pete Bellotte – bass guitar, composition, production
Harold Faltermeyer – bass guitar, composition, drums, keyboards, synclavier
Bruce Sudano – synthesizer, composition
Joe Esposito – background vocals, composition
Keith Forsey – background vocals, drums, percussion, composition
Jeff Baxter – guitar (solo on “Hot Stuff”)
Bob Conti – percussion, composition
Edward “Eddie” Hokenson – composition
Pamela Quinlan – background vocals
Jai Winding – piano
Jay Graydon, Paul Jackson Jr. – guitar
Al Perkins – steel guitar
Sid Sharp – strings
Scott Edwards, Bob Glaub – bass guitar
Gary Grant, Jerry Hey, Steve Madaio – trumpet
Gary Herbig – saxophone
Dick Hyde, Bill Reichenbach Jr. – trombone
Stephanie Straill, Julia, Maxine Willard – backing vocals
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