Donna Summer: Greatest Hits
There's no scarcity of Donna Summer greatest-hits packages, but this chronological bargain-line disc eschews her rep as extendo-orgasmo dance-floor heroine in favor of her equally deserved rep as mistress of radio-friendly three-minute pocket symphonies. The production of Giorgio Moroder and Pete Bellotte on the early stuff sounds like disco clichés because it invented them, and their fondness for cramming in instrumental details (check out the whistles on "Bad Girls") keeps the songs ecstatic. And the four-song condensation of Summer's post-Moroder career is a great mini-history of the way disco evolved into other kinds of dance-pop through the '80s as she picks up ideas from funk and reggae and ends up wailing her heart out on the gloriously plastic "This Time I Know It's for Real."--Douglas Wolk