Private Dancer

Infobox Album |
Name = Private Dancer
Type = Album
Artist = Tina Turner


Released = 29 May 1984
Recorded =
Genre = Pop, R&B, Rock, Soul
Length = 44:02
Label = Capitol
Producer = Terry Britten
Bob Carter
Leon "Ndugu" Chancler
Wilton Felder
Rupert Hine
Joe Sample
Greg Walsh
Martyn Ware
Reviews =
* Allmusic Rating|4.5|5 [http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:rea9qjkbojsa~T1 link]
* Robert Christgau (A-) [http://www.robertchristgau.com/get_artist.php?name=Tina+Turner link]
*"Rolling Stone" Rating|4|5 [http://www.rollingstone.com/artists/tinaturner/albums/album/243615/review/6068266/private_dancer link] |
Last album = "Love Explosion"
(1979)
This album = "Private Dancer"
(1984)
Next album = "Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome"
(1985)
Misc = Singles
Name = Private Dancer
Type = studio
single 1 = Let's Stay Together
single 1 date = 19 November 1983
single 2 = Help
single 2 date = 25 February 1984
single 3 = What's Love Got To Do With It
single 3 date = 16 June 1984
single 4 = Better Be Good To Me
single 4 date = 15 September 1984
single 5 = Private Dancer
single 5 date = 17 November 1984
single 6 = I Can't Stand The Rain
single 6 date = 2 March 1985
single 7 = Show Some Respect
single 7 date = 4 May 1985 Extra album cover 2
Upper caption = Original US album cover
Type = album


Lower caption =

"Private Dancer" is the fifth solo album by Tina Turner, released on Capitol Records in 1984, which became her breakthrough solo album. Turner's success with the album came after several challenging years of going solo after a public divorce from husband and performing partner Ike Turner. It is her best-selling album both in the U.S. and internationally and propelled her back to superstardom during the year of its release.

The album was an outstanding success. "Private Dancer" has been certified 5 × Platinum (5 million [ [http://tinaturner-fanclub.com/biography.htm Official Tina Turner Fan Club Biography] ] ) in the United States and sold around 250,000 each week for 2 months. Worldwide the album has been estimated having sold 14 million copies [ [http://www.rollingstone.com/artists/tinaturner/biography Rollingstone.com: Tina Turner Biography] ] , [ [http://tennesseeencyclopedia.net/imagegallery.php?EntryID=T121 Tennessee Encyclopedia of History and Culture] ] [ [http://www.milesago.com/industry/davies-roger.htm Roger Miles Producer Autobiography] ] but also some sources estimating it sold over 20 million copies. [ [http://www.biography.com/search/article.do?id=9512276 Biography.com: Tina Turner Biography] ]

The album produced a number of highly successful singles including "What's Love Got To Do with It" which went to number one and stayed there for three weeks. At the 1985 Grammy Awards, "Private Dancer" won four of the six awards for which it was nominated. No less than seven of the album's ten tracks (nine in the U.S.) were released as singles; "Let's Stay Together" produced by Martyn Ware and Ian Craig Marsh of British band Heaven 17, a UK Top 10 hit and a US Top 20 hit and the first sign of what was to come (1983), "Help" recorded with The Crusaders, Graham Lyle and Terry Britten's reggae-tinged "What's Love Got To Do With It", Holly Knight and Mike Chapman's "Better Be Good To Me", Mark Knopfler's "Private Dancer" with a guitar solo by Jeff Beck (1984) and "I Can't Stand The Rain" and "Show Some Respect" (1985). The preceding UK single "Ball of Confusion", a cover of The Temptations song which was Turner's first collaboration with the B.E.F. (British Electric Foundation)/Heaven 17 production team and part of their collaborative 1982 album "Music of Quality and Distinction Volume One" was not included on the "Private Dancer" album. A recording of Sam Cooke's "A Change Is Gonna Come" from the same sessions would re-appear in remixed form on B.E.F.'s "Music of Quality and Distinction Volume Two" in 1991, and Turner also performed the track with this arrangement on her 1986/1987 "Break Every Rule Tour", and it was later included on her 1988 live album "Tina Live in Europe".

The "Private Dancer" album was a radical departure from the R&B and soul music Turner had performed with her former husband. The songs reflected a more straightforward rock sensibility, but mixed in elements of pop, R&B, and New Wave music and the album had an overall soundscape with prominent use of synthesizers and drum machines, especially on the tracks produced by Martyn Ware, Graham Lyle, Terry Britten and Rupert Hine.

Following the success of "Private Dancer" Turner released four further singles in 1984 and 1985, the first a duet with David Bowie called "Tonight" from his album of the same name, another duet in 1985 with Bryan Adams called "It's Only Love" taken from Adams' 1984 album "Reckless", followed by two tracks in 1985 from the soundtrack album to the movie "Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome" in which Turner starred against Mel Gibson; "We Don't Need Another Hero" and "One of the Living". This meant that Turner within the space of some eighteen months had managed to release no less than eleven singles altogether - all commercially successful.

In 1998 EMI, the parent label of Capitol Records, released a digitally remastered Centenary Edition of the "Private Dancer" album on CD, then including four additional demo tracks recorded in late 1983 and early 1984 with the producer John Carter, first released as B-sides to some of the "Private Dancer" singles, as well as three extended 12" remixes.

"Private Dancer" remains the only Tina Turner studio album to have been re-issued in digitally remastered form.

Critical response

In 1989, the album was ranked #46 on "Rolling Stone" magazine's list of The 100 Greatest Albums of the 80's. In 2003 the TV network VH1 named "Private Dancer" the 95th greatest album of all time.

Track listing

European edition

Side A:
#"I Might Have Been Queen" (Rupert Hine, Jeanette Obstoj, Jamie West-Oram) – 4:10
#"What's Love Got to Do With It" (Terry Britten, Graham Lyle) – 3:49
#"Show Some Respect" (Britten, Sue Shifrin) – 3:18
#"I Can't Stand the Rain" (Don Bryant, Bernard Miller, Ann Peebles) – 3:41
#"Private Dancer" (Mark Knopfler) – 7:11

Side B:
#"Let's Stay Together" (Al Green, Al Jackson, Jr., Willie Mitchell) – 5:16
#"Better Be Good to Me" (Mike Chapman, Nicky Chinn, Holly Knight) – 5:10
#"Steel Claw" (Paul Brady) – 3:48
#"Help!" (John Lennon, Paul McCartney) – 4:30
#"1984" (David Bowie) – 3:09

Original US vinyl and cassette track listing

Side A:
#"I Might Have Been Queen" (Rupert Hine, Jeanette Obstoj Jamie West-Oram) – 4:10
#"What's Love Got to Do With It" (Terry Britten, Graham Lyle) – 3:49
#"Show Some Respect" (Britten, Sue Shifrin) – 3:18
#"I Can't Stand the Rain" (Don Bryant, Bernard Miller, Ann Peebles) – 3:41
#"Better Be Good to Me" (Mike Chapman, Nicky Chinn, Holly Knight) – 5:10

Side B:
#"Let's Stay Together" (Al Green, Al Jackson, Jr., Willie Mitchell) – 5:16
#"1984" (David Bowie) – 3:09
#"Steel Claw" (Paul Brady) – 3:48
#"Private Dancer" (Mark Knopfler) – 7:11

Centenary Edition Tracklisting

#"I Might Have Been Queen" (Hine, Obstoj, West-Oram) – 4:10
#"What's Love Got to Do with It" (Britten, Lyle) – 3:49
#"Show Some Respect" (Britten, Shifrin) – 3:18
#"I Can't Stand the Rain" (Bryant, Miller, Peebles) – 3:41
#"Private Dancer" (Knopfler) – 7:11
#"Let's Stay Together" (Green, Jackson, Mitchell) – 5:16
#"Better Be Good to Me" (Chapman, Chinn, Knight) – 5:10
#"Steel Claw" (Brady) – 3:48
#"Help!" (Lennon, McCartney) – 4:30
#"1984" (Bowie) – 3:09
#"I Wrote a Letter" (Single B-side, 1983) (Inga Rumpf) - 3:24
#"Rock 'n Roll Widow" (Single B-side, 1984) (Tom Snow) - 4:45
#"Don't Rush the Good Things" (Single B-side, 1984) (Neil Gammack) - 3:46
#"When I Was Young" (Single B-side, 1984) (Eric Burdon, Victor Briggs, John Weider & Danny McCulloch) - 3:11
#"What's Love Got to Do with It" (Extended 12" Remix) (Britten, Lyle) – 5:48
#"Better Be Good to Me" (Extended 12" Remix, fade-out) (Chapman, Chinn, Knight) – 7:03
#"I Can't Stand the Rain" (Extended 12" Remix) (Bryant, Miller, Peebles) – 5:45

Non-released B-sides

*"Keep Your Hands Off My Baby"Written by Tom Kelly and Billy Steinberg
*"Let's Pretend We're Married" (live)Written by Prince

Personnel

*Tina Turner - Vocals, background vocals
*Gary Barnacle - saxophone
*Jeff Beck - guitar
*Terry Britten - guitar, vocals, background vocals
*Graham Broad - drums
*Alex Brown - background vocals
*Alexandra Brown - vocals
*Bob Carter - percussion
*Leon "Ndugu" Chancler - drums
*Alan Clark - percussion, keyboard
*Mel Collins - saxophone
*David Cullen - strings
*Cy Curnin - vocals, background vocals
*Julian Diggle - percussion
*David Ervin - synthesizer
*Gwen Evans - vocals, background vocals
*Charles Fearing - guitar
*Wilton Felder - bass, saxophone
*Nick Glennie-Smith - keyboard
*Glenn Gregory - vocals, background vocals
*Rupert Hine - bass, percussion, keyboard, vocals, background vocals
*John Illsley - bass
*Graham Jarvis - drums
*Hal Lindes - guitar
*Billy Livsey - keyboard
*Trevor Morais - drums
*Simon Morton - percussion
*Tessa Niles - vocals, background vocals
*Nick Plytas - synthesizer, piano
*Frank Ricotti - percussion
*Ray Russell - guitar
*Joe Sample - synthesizer, piano
*Nick Smith - keyboard
*David T. Walker - guitar
*Greg Walsh - synthesizer
*Martyn Ware - synthesizer, vocals, background vocals
*Jamie West-Oram - guitar
*Terry Williams - drums
*Richie Zito - guitar

Production

*Producers: Terry Britten, Bob Carter, Leon "Ndugu" Chancler, Wilton Felder, Rupert Hine, Joe Sample, Greg Walsh, Martyn Ware
*Engineers: F. Byron Clark, John Hudson, Walter Samuel, Greg Walsh
*Mixing: John Hudson
*Remixing: Humberto Gatica
*Mastering: Alan Yoshida
*Programming: David Ervin, Rupert Hine, Greg Walsh
*Drum programming: Martyn Ware
*String arrangements: David Cullen
*Arrangers: Greg Walsh, Martyn Ware
*Compilation producer: Akira Taguchi
*Creative director: Sam Gay
*Art direction: Roy Kohara
*Design: John O'Brien
*Photography: Pete Ashworth

Chart Performance

Album - Billboard (North America)

ee also

*List of best-selling albums worldwide
*Private Dancer Tour

References