She Works Hard for the Money (album)
| She Works Hard for the Money | ||||
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| Studio album by Donna Summer | ||||
| Released | May 10, 1983 | |||
| Recorded | 1982–1983, Lion Share Studios, Los Angeles, California; Hollywood Sound Recorders, Hollywood, California; Rhema Studio, Beverly Hills, California | |||
| Genre | Dance-pop, dance-rock, soul, post-disco,new wave | |||
| Length | 42:06 | |||
| Label | Mercury | |||
| Producer | Michael Omartian | |||
| Donna Summer chronology | ||||
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| Singles from She Works Hard for the Money | ||||
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| Source | Rating |
| Allmusic |
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| Robert Christgau | B+ |
| Rolling Stone |
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She Works Hard for the Money is the eleventh studio album by Donna Summer, released in 1983. It was her most successful album of the decade, and its title track became one of the biggest hits of her career.
After emerging on Casablanca Records as the foremost female star of the disco era of the 1970s, Summer in 1980 had sued for release from Casablanca to sign with David Geffen as the inaugural artist for his Geffen label where her recordings were a comparatively modest success: also Summer and David Geffen developed a contentious relationship evidenced by Summer's 1981 album I'm a Rainbow being shelved and the singer being forced by Geffen to leave her longtime producer Giorgio Moroder to record the 1982 album Donna Summer with Quincy Jones. Recent litigation had determined that Summer still owed Casablanca Records an album. Donna decided to go with Michael Omartian as producer to fulfill the contract. PolyGram issued these tracks on the Mercury label as She Works Hard For the Money with the title cut issued as advance single on May 10, 1983: the "She Works Hard For the Money" single became Summer's biggest hit since 1979 with a #3 peak on the Hot 100 in Billboard where it also spent three weeks at #1 on the R&B chart with this success impelling its parent album, released June 13, 1983, to #9.
She Works Hard For The Money was more pop/dance oriented than the two precedent Donna Summer albums, but also contained some soulful ballads, including "Love Has a Mind of Its Own", a duet with gospel singer Matthew Ward. It also contained a reggae-styled song called "Unconditional Love" which featured vocals by young black British group Musical Youth. Lyrically, the album dealt with subjects such as social injustice ("Stop, Look and Listen"), Jesus Christ ("He's a Rebel") and missing children ("People, People"). Many fans saw the album as a "return to form" for Summer - she was once again presented as a strong, powerful woman very much in control. During the 1970s, Summer's management had worked hard to portray her as a powerful, sexual fantasy figure to the point where they had become too involved in her personal life (which led to a period of depression for Summer before becoming a born-again Christian and filing a lawsuit against her record label). Since the disco era, Summer had experimented with different genres including new wave and rock, and some felt she had got a little "lost" in trying to find her musical place in the new decade. She Works Hard for the Money had helped establish her place as a 1980s pop/dance diva.
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