Private Dancer

Private Dancer
Studio album by Tina Turner
Released	29 May 1984
Recorded	1983–1984
Genre	Pop rock Rock Pop R&B New Wave
Length	44:02
Label	Capitol
Producer	Terry Britten John Carter Leon "Ndugu" Chancler Wilton Felder Rupert Hine Joe Sample Greg Walsh Martyn Ware
Tina Turner chronology
Love Explosion (1979) Private Dancer (1984) Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome (1985)
Alternative cover
Original U.S. cover art
Singles from Private Dancer
"Let's Stay Together" Released: 19 November 1983 "Help" Released: 25 February 1984 "What's Love Got to Do with It" Released: 16 June 1984 "Better Be Good to Me" Released: 15 September 1984 "Private Dancer" Released: 17 February 1985 "I Can't Stand the Rain" Released: 2 March 1985 "Show Some Respect" Released: 4 May 1985

Professional ratings
Review scores
Source	Rating
Allmusic	[1]
Rolling Stone	[2]
Robert Christgau	A−[3]

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.

Album history

A&R man John Carter of Capitol Records is credited with relaunching the career of Tina Turner in the 1980s.^[4] In 1983, despite opposition from within Capitol, he signed her and A&Red her first album for the label, Private Dancer.

The album was an outstanding success. Private Dancer has been certified 5 × Platinum (5 million^[5]) in the United States and sold around 250,000 each week for 2 months. Worldwide the album has been estimated to have sold over 20 million copies.^[6]

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 film 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.

Centenary Edition

In 1997, 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. The album remains the only Tina Turner studio album to have been re-issued in digitally remastered form.

Critical response

The critical reviews of the album were ecstatic. The New York Times declared that the album was a "landmark" in the "evolution of pop-soul music." The Los Angeles Times claimed her voice was so hot it "melts vinyl."

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

Slant Magazine listed the album at #63 on its list of "Best Albums of the 1980's" saying "Both a personal liberation and sonic redemption, Private Dancer established Turner not only as a genuine diva, but a bona fide force of nature".^[7]

Track listing

B-sides

	"Let's Stay Together" Tina Turner version of Al Green's "Let's Stay Together" from Private Dancer
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Personnel

Musicians

• Tina Turner – vocals, background vocals
• Gary Barnacle – saxophone
• Jeff Beck – guitar
• Terry Britten – guitar, vocals, background vocals
• Graham Broad – drums
• Alex Brown^{[disambiguation needed ]} – background vocals
• Alexandra Brown – vocals
• Bob Carter^{[disambiguation needed ]} – percussion
• Leon "Ndugu" Chancler – drums
• Alan Clark – percussion, keyboards
• 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 – keyboards
• Glenn Gregory – vocals, background vocals
• Rupert Hine – bass, percussion, keyboards, vocals, background vocals
• John Illsley – bass
• Graham Jarvis – drums
• Hal Lindes – guitar
• Billy Livsey – keyboards
• 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^{[disambiguation needed ]} – keyboards
• 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, John Carter, Leon "Ndugu" Chancler, Wilton Felder, Rupert Hine, Joe Sample, Greg Walsh, Martyn Ware
• Engineers: F. Byron Clark, John Hudson^{[disambiguation needed ]}, Walter Samuel, Greg Walsh, Stephen W Tayler
• Mixing: John Hudson^{[disambiguation needed ]}, Stephen W Tayler
• 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

Charts and certifications

Awards

Grammy Awards

See also

• List of best-selling albums in Germany
• List of best-selling albums worldwide
• Private Dancer Tour

References

1. ^ Allmusic review
2. ^ Rolling Stone review
3. ^ Robert Christgau review
4. ^ "Passings: Bill Summers, John S. Carter, Ruth C. Cole". Los Angeles Times 24 May 2011. Retrieved 25 February 2012.
5. ^ Official Tina Turner Fan Club Biography
6. ^ Biography.com: Tina Turner Biography
7. ^ http://www.slantmagazine.com/music/feature/best-albums-of-the-1980s/308/page_4
8. ^ "ARIA Charts – Accreditations – 1985 Albums". Australian Recording Industry Association. 
9. ^ "Canadian album certifications – Tina Turner – Private Dancer". Music Canada. http://www.musiccanada.com/GPSearchResult.aspx?st=Private+Dancer&sa=Tina+Turner&smt=0. Retrieved 7 April 2012. 
10. ^ ^{a b} "Finnish album certifications – Tina Turner – Private Dancer" (in Finnish). Musiikkituottajat – IFPI Finland. http://www.ifpi.fi/tilastot/artistit/Tina+Turner. Retrieved 7 April 2012. 
11. ^ "French album certifications – Tina Turner – Private Dancer" (in French). InfoDisc. http://www.infodisc.fr/Certif_Album.php. Retrieved 29 March 2012.  Select TINA TURNER and click OK
12. ^ "Les Albums Or :" (in French). Infodisc.fr. http://www.infodisc.fr/CDCertif_O.php?debut=2794. Retrieved 5 May 2012. 
13. ^ "Gold-/Platin-Datenbank (Tina Turner; 'Private Dancer')" (in German). Bundesverband Musikindustrie. http://www.musikindustrie.de/gold_platin_datenbank/?action=suche&strTitel=Private+Dancer&strInterpret=Tina+Turner&strTtArt=alben&strAwards=checked. Retrieved 7 April 2012. 
14. ^ "British album certifications – Tina Turner – Private Dancer". British Phonographic Industry. http://www.bpi.co.uk/certifiedawards/search.aspx. Retrieved 7 April 2012.  Enter Private Dancer in the field Search. Select Title in the field Search by. Select album in the field By Format. Click Go
15. ^ "American album certifications – Tina Turner – Private Dancer". Recording Industry Association of America. http://www.riaa.com/goldandplatinumdata.php?artist=%22Private+Dancer%22. Retrieved 1 April 2012.  If necessary, click Advanced, then click Format, then select Album, then click SEARCH