Donna Summer - Once Upon a Time...

Great Memories

If you bought the new cd, make sure you listen to this one again. This is by far the best Donna has ever been. The memories it brings back are fabulous - great time for the club scene. Go ahead and buy her new CD, it is good enough and her voice is in great shape - but don't forget the cd's that preceded this new one. July 25, 2008

She just kept getting better and better

Watch Video Here: http://www.amazon.com/review/R157T5A6MWHT41 My name is Jeremy Gloff. I am a musician (check me out on Amazon!)and retro music enthusiast. If you enjoyed this review make sure to check out my Amazon user profile to check out my other reviews. I am always up for making new friends and discussing the music I love!!! July 5, 2008

What a Once Upon a Time

Listening to Donna Summer's newest album Crayons got me so excited I decided it was time to bring out other classic Donna and just a few weeks ago I was at a used CD store when I stumbled across her 1977 set Once Upon A Time and luckily I bought that sucker up. After hearing it, I honestly can say I don't think anyone has ever given her enough credit.

What a complex little world Miss S lived in - "once upon a time there was a girl.." a girl and two boys actually who knew how to throw down grooves - be it pop standards, disco or electronica. Released in 1977 this was the first of four double albums released by Donna - all of which were huge hits which in itself is terribly unheard of.

Anyhoos, the whole concept and yes there is a concept here is that of a fairytale love - opening with the disco swinging title track we follow our heroine through her journey to find love only to see her stumble through life (the excellent and some what rock ish "Faster and Faster To Nowhere"), having to work the midnight shift, finding a love, losing the love and in the end having it all come around again.

It's completely brilliant and Donna's voice is of course amazing but it's the whole `fairy tale' concept that keeps this thing going through all these songs. Plus Donna with Giorgio Moroder and Pete Bellotte came up with everything - there's voice overs, there's strings, horns, super cool electronics.

For some reason the album didn't lend itself to singles very well as the only two singles released were "I Love You" and "Rumour Has It" - both of which are at the tale end of the album (i.e. once true love has come) but that doesn't make this a loss at all - in fact it just makes it a stronger album.

Between Crayons and Once Upon A Time I am on a Summer kick. I just went back to Amazon and got A Love Trilogy and Four Seasons Of Love - two albums with I Remember Yesterday - were the albums that preceded Once Upon A Time... I'm going to have me a fairy tale life too.
June 25, 2008

Some of this is hard to define.

There are a few dreamy, spacey, strange songs are on this recording. Some songs like "Midnight Shift" sound a little depressed and fantasy-like.

"Faster and Faster to Nowhere" sounds frantic yet the deep, soul-sounding male backup singers repeat "trip to nowhere" as if they could care less about anything while observing the frantic person running.

"Now I Need You" has a drug-induced (as does Midnight Shift,) spacey sound with what sounds like a church choir singing in some medieval cathedral.

"Queen For a Day" is the highlight but Donna is not belting out but is instead singing in a fairytale story-style which I guess is appropriate considering the concept.

A few of these songs have sounds & instruments being used that sound less like pure dance music and more like they have a late 1960s psychedelic foundation without the guitar, and combined with synthesizers used in Eurodisco styles popular during the late 1970s and made for artsy types giving these songs a strange, spacey feel which reside in a category hard to define.


Others such as "If You Got It Flaunt It" sound like typical American urban out at the time or what would be used in American movies during the 1970s. To me it is filler as is "A Man Like You" with it's unremarkable nightclub sound.

"Rumour Has It" is a great song especially it's beginning.

I wish Donna would have returned to this strange-sounding, hard to define category after 1983 instead getting ideas from other American women on what type of music to make.
March 5, 2007

summerfeverloveronafairytalehigh

"Once Upon A Time" has always been my favorite by Donna Summer. She really makes you believe that fairy tales do come true. I just love her music and have admired her since I heard "Love To Love You Baby". There isn't a song that she sings on this CD that I don't like. I love her and I love "Once Upon A Time". I just love "Fairy Tale High". She sings "Don't you believe that your dreams can come true, the fairy tale world inside can bring it to you, you just have to wish and you take off and fly on a fairy tale high, fairy tale high, fairy tale high, fairy tale high". "Rumor Has It", "I Love You", "Heaven Knows" all are masterpieces to me! And if you are a believer in romance and love, I would recommend "Once Upon A Time". The Queen of Disco at her very best. I've been on a fairy tale high since! If you are a true Donna Summer fan, this is one CD that should be in your collection. February 22, 2007

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