Originally Posted by
soren1974
Diana Ross was of course already a veteran when Donna Summer burst onto the scene, and although Donna was of course hot in the clubs, she didn't have a big single hit between Love To Love You, Baby and I Feel Love - roughly 18 months. In Larry Harris' book about Casablanca Records, he said they were worried that her albums A Love Trilogy and Four Seasons Of Love had not produced any hit singles [[although both albums went gold). Naturally after I Feel Love, Donna went from strength to strength with her four consecutive double-albums: the gorgeous Once Upon A Time-album, Live And More with the fantastic MacArthur Park, Bad Girls and the brilliant On The Radio-compilation and kept reinventing herself. Diana Ross, during this period, was not doing particularly well commercially with the elegant Baby It's Me album, while still selling well, not generating any hits, then the strange hotchpotch that was Ross '78, then The Wiz-flop, and then finally at least having a decent-sized [[but not enormeous) hit with The Boss, three years after she last had a hit single. Donna entered the 1980s with the turmoil of the court case against her mentor Neil Bogart, leaving the label that had made her famous, just like Diana would do, but the different was that Diana had three massive hits in 1980 whereas Donna's first release on Geffen Records did not do all that well. Donna's Geffen-years and Diana's RCA-years are surprisingly similar. Several good tunes, but lots of songs that were underwhelming, although Donna's stuff were generally better than Diana's, in my opinion. Donna's [[overblown) Quincy Jones album failed to make the sparks fly the same way that Diana's Eaten Alive album with the Bee Gees did. Donna had no real duds like Diana's naff Children Of The World or Nobody Makes Me Crazy. Diana's 1983 album and Donna's Cats Without Claws album hold up the best for me, and they had in common that they did not yield any substantial hits for either. Both had strong comeback singles - Donna's This Time I Know It's For Real [[1989) and Diana's When You Tell Me That You Love Me [[1991) when they both sang the style of material they did best, and both thought it was a good idea to try New Jack Swing [[Workin' Overtime and Mistaken Identity) and both attempts were panned by the public. Both recorded well-executed Christmas albums in the 90s. Donna Summer's final album Crayons was well-produced and modern sounding [[although I did not like it at all) while Diana's I Love You was a tired effort. Donna was often stiff and slightly phony on stage, while Diana was a more natural performer. However, Donna could sing rings around Diana, her voice just growing stronger and stronger as she got older, and she seemed to sing high notes completely effortlessly, whereas Diana started to be less disciplined with her vocals.
Both ladies have left a wonderful legacy of music for us all to enjoy for the rest of our lives.
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