Private Dancer

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Private Dancer
Private Dancer cover
Studio album by Tina Turner
Released May 29, 1984
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
Professional reviews
Tina Turner chronology
Love Explosion
(1979)		 Private Dancer
(1984)		 Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome
(1985)
Singles from Private Dancer
  1. "Let's Stay Together"
    Released: 19 November 1983
  2. "Help"
    Released: 25 February 1984
  3. "What's Love Got To Do With It"
    Released: 16 June 1984
  4. "Better Be Good To Me"
    Released: 15 September 1984
  5. "Private Dancer"
    Released: 17 November 1984
  6. "I Can't Stand The Rain"
    Released: 02 March 1985
  7. "Show Some Respect"
    Released: 04 May 1985
Original US album cover
Original US album cover

Private Dancer is the fourth 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[1]) 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[2][3][4], but also some few sources estimating it sold over 20 million copies[5].

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, Ian Craig Marsh, 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 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.

Contents

[edit] Critical response

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

[edit] Track listing

European edition

Side A:

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

Side B:

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


Original US vinyl and cassette track listing

Side A:

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

Side B:

  1. "Let's Stay Together" (Al Green, Al Jackson, Jr., Willie Mitchell) – 5:16
  2. "1984" (David Bowie) – 3:09
  3. "Steel Claw" (Paul Brady) – 3:48
  4. "Private Dancer" (Mark Knopfler) – 7:11


[edit] Centenary Edition Tracklisting

  1. "I Might Have Been Queen"
  2. "What's Love Got To Do With It"
  3. "Show Some Respect"
  4. "I Can't Stand The Rain
  5. "Private Dancer"
  6. "Let's Stay Together"
  7. "Better Be Good To Me"
  8. "Steel Claw"
  9. "Help!"
  10. "1984"
  11. "I Wrote A Letter"
  12. "Rock N Roll Widow"
  13. "Don't Rush The Good Things"
  14. "When I Was Young"

[edit] 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

[edit] Personnel

[edit] Production

[edit] Chart Performance

Album - Billboard (North America)

Year Chart Position
1984 The Billboard 200 3 (5x Platinum)
1984 Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums 1


Singles - Billboard (North America)

Year Single Chart Position
1984 "Better Be Good to Me" Hot Dance Music/Club Play 16
1984 "Better Be Good to Me" Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Singles & Tracks 6
1984 "Better Be Good to Me" Mainstream Rock Tracks 32
1984 "Better Be Good to Me" The Billboard Hot 100 5
1984 "Let's Stay Together" Hot Dance Music/Club Play 1
1984 "Let's Stay Together" Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Singles & Tracks 3
1984 "Let's Stay Together" The Billboard Hot 100 26
1984 "What's Love Got To Do With It?" Adult Contemporary 8
1984 "What's Love Got To Do With It?" Hot Dance Music/Club Play 21
1984 "What's Love Got To Do With It?" Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Singles & Tracks 2(5)
1984 "What's Love Got To Do With It?" The Billboard Hot 100 1(3)
1985 "Private Dancer" Adult Contemporary 30
1985 "Private Dancer" Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Singles & Tracks 3
1985 "Private Dancer" The Billboard Hot 100 7
1985 "Show Some Respect" Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Singles & Tracks 50
1985 "Show Some Respect" The Billboard Hot 100 37

[edit] Miscellanea

 Trivia sections are discouraged under Wikipedia guidelines.
The article could be improved by integrating relevant items and removing inappropriate ones.
  • Mark Knopfler of Dire Straits wrote the title song for this album, "Private Dancer." He originally wrote the song for Dire Straits, but then decided to give the song to Tina Turner. Notably, many original members of Dire Straits are part of the personnel who composed this album.
  • In a 1984 interview[1], Mark Knopfler stated of Jeff Beck's guitar work on the title track, "she (Tina Turner) got Jeff Beck to play the second ugliest guitar solo you've ever heard on it."

[edit] Awards

[edit] Grammy Awards

Year Winner Category
1985 "Better Be Good to Me" Best Female Rock Vocal Performance
1985 "What's Love Got To Do With It?" Best Female Pop Vocal Performance
1985 "What's Love Got To Do With It?" Record Of The Year
1985 "What's Love Got To Do With It?" Song Of The Year

[edit] See also

[edit] References

  1. ^ Official Tina Turner Fan Club Biography
  2. ^ Rollingstone.com: Tina Turner Biography
  3. ^ Tennessee Encyclopedia of History and Culture
  4. ^ Roger Miles Producer Autobiography
  5. ^ Biography.com: Tina Turner Biography
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