{"id":202729,"date":"2024-05-30T12:11:05","date_gmt":"2024-05-30T11:11:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.musicbusinessworldwide.com\/?p=202729"},"modified":"2024-06-03T12:18:22","modified_gmt":"2024-06-03T11:18:22","slug":"pete-bellotte-on-working-with-giorgio-moroder-and-donna-summer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.musicbusinessworldwide.com\/pete-bellotte-on-working-with-giorgio-moroder-and-donna-summer\/","title":{"rendered":"‘We were of that time, and everything was absolutely wonderful.’"},"content":{"rendered":"

MBW\u2019s World\u2019s Greatest Songwriters series celebrates the composers behind the globe\u2019s biggest hits. This time out we talk to Pete Bellotte, the British composer who helped shape the sound of modern dance music. World\u2019s Greatest Songwriters is supported by AMRA<\/a> \u2013 the global digital music collection society which strives to maximize value for songwriters and publishers in the digital age.<\/p>\n

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Leonard Cohen was renowned for many things, but his role in the creation of disco and influence on the sound of dance music has all too often been understated.<\/p>\n

Nonetheless, if it wasn\u2019t for the godfather of gloom, it\u2019s entirely possible that the future of electronic music would have sounded very different, or maybe not happened at all.<\/p>\n

Certainly, if Pete Bellotte \u2013 the co-writer and co-producer of such influential Donna Summer songs as Love To Love You Baby<\/em> and I Feel Love<\/em> \u2013 had not gone to see Cohen at Munich\u2019s Circus Krone, he would not have run into a photographer he knew and told him: \u201cIf you hear of anyone who\u2019s looking for someone to do anything in the business, I\u2019ll do anything to get it\u201d.<\/p>\n

And if Bellotte hadn\u2019t done that, the photographer would not have let him know that Giorgio Moroder was looking for an assistant. And Bellotte and Moroder \u2013 after an interview for which Bellotte shaved his voluminous moustache, only to find Moroder sporting the exact same face fuzz \u2013 would not have gone on to completely reshape the sound of modern pop music.<\/p>\n

Bellotte\u2019s story is peppered with such tales of coincidence and happenstance, as if his role in such momentous musical events was merely down to a stroke of luck at being in exactly the right place at precisely the right time.<\/p>\n

But lightning rarely strikes twice, never mind as often as the thunderbolt of innovation has hit home whenever the self-deprecating Bellotte is in the studio.<\/p>\n

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His journey began many years earlier when the arrival of Elvis Presley triggered an obsession with music. Bellotte saved up money from his paper round to buy a guitar, playing in various amateur bands before joining Linda Laine And The Sinners.<\/p>\n

The Sinners made a few records without overly troubling the charts, but would regularly travel to Germany for month-long residencies. Amidst the \u201cgangsters and prostitution\u201d of Hamburg, Bellotte made friends with Elton John (then Reg Dwight and playing with Bluesology) and took him clothes shopping in funky local emporium Karstadt (\u201cI told David Furnish that I was the first man to dress Elton,\u201d he chuckles). Sir Elton still greets him with a cry of \u201cBellotte, you bastard!\u201d whenever they meet.<\/p>\n

Eventually, Bellotte realised the Sinners weren\u2019t destined for greatness and returned home, before coming back to Germany in search of more permanent work.<\/p>\n

\u201cI realized the best job in the business is being the producer,\u201d Bellotte chuckles today. \u201cIf you\u2019re in a band and it doesn\u2019t work out, the record company isn\u2019t too bothered, because they\u2019ve got another band. But if you\u2019re the producer and it doesn\u2019t work out, you can produce someone else. I\u2019d seen what was done to be a producer in those days, and it looked relatively easy\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

Having gone to work with Moroder \u2013 then best known as a purveyor of slightly cheesy pop music \u2013 the pair enjoyed a huge hit in 1972 with Son Of My Father<\/em>, a U.K. No.1 for Chicory Tip. (\u201cElton rang and said, \u2018Bellotte, you bastard \u2013 I\u2019ve just been to the record shop to buy Son Of My Father<\/em> and your name\u2019s on there \u2013 did you write it?\u2019\u201d).<\/p>\n

Bellotte left Moroder briefly to become an in-house producer at Ariola Records, but soon returned, this time as an equal partner. And it was when he was shopping a song called Denver Dream<\/em> \u2013 the demo of which featured Donna Sommer, n\u00e9e Donna Gaines, an American backing singer then based in Germany \u2013 that things really took off.<\/p>\n

The song was picked up by a French label, who wanted to put it out as it was. Donna agreed, as long as her surname was changed to Summer and the Bellotte-Moroder-Summer axis was up and running.<\/p>\n

More records followed until Love To Love You Baby<\/em> in 1975 and I Feel Love<\/em> in 1977 established the disco template and rewrote the studio rulebook, inventing the click track and the 12\u201d remix \u2013 not to mention outraging public decency with Summer\u2019s erotic performances \u2013 along the way. 1979\u2019s Hot Stuff<\/em> proved even bigger, hitting No.1 on the US Hot 100, winning a Grammy and becoming one of the biggest American hits of all time.<\/p>\n

Record company politics derailed the trio and, while Bellotte also worked with Elton John, Janet Jackson and Tina Turner, he largely walked away from the industry for a quiet life in the West Sussex countryside.<\/p>\n

“I\u2019m very grateful that some of my work is so appreciated, and I really enjoy talking about it now.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The ultimate background boy, who never did interviews or even displayed his awards, clearly enjoys his days playing tennis, going for walks and reading (he\u2019s a leading collector of the writings of Gormenghast<\/em> author Mervyn Peake).<\/p>\n

He has no plans to sell his catalog (\u201cMerck\u2019s been on to me a few times!\u201d he laughs. \u201cBut it\u2019s personal, it\u2019s mine\u201d), and he is now making tentative steps back into the industry. His songs are regularly covered, synched and interpolated and he recently took part in The Other Songs Live, an Ivors Week event that celebrates the craft of songwriting, receiving a standing ovation for his tales of studio innovation.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, I Feel Love<\/em> was inducted into the Grammy Hall Of Fame and the songwriter says The Other Songs co-founder Alastair Webber \u201cis reviving me in quite a way\u201d as he works on new songs.<\/p>\n

First though, he has to shrug off his natural shyness to sit down and talk MBW<\/em> through the importance of songwriting, Moog synths and, er, orgies at Neil Bogart\u2019s house.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m very grateful that some of my work is so appreciated, and I really enjoy talking about it now,\u201d he says. \u201cIt\u2019s that far removed that it doesn\u2019t necessarily feel like I\u2019m part of it. I feel like I\u2019m telling someone else\u2019s story at times\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

Hallelujah, as Leonard Cohen might say\u2026<\/p>\n

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WHEN YOU MET GIORGIO MORODER, DID YOU THINK, \u2018WE\u2019RE GOING TO CHANGE THE FACE OF POP MUSIC\u2019?<\/h6>\n

Oh gosh, no, not at all. Giorgio was very successful when I met him, but he was doing bubblegum music. We were a great combination \u2013 Giorgio loves every bit of publicity, and I just stayed out of the way. I\u2019m happiest in a studio, producing and writing, that was enough for me.<\/p>\n

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DID YOU REALIZE HOW INFLUENTIAL LOVE TO LOVE YOU BABY<\/em> WAS GOING TO BE WHEN YOU MADE IT?<\/h6>\n

Not really, but a couple of things happened that were quite important in music.<\/p>\n

When we recorded it the first time, we used a different drummer and the song really slowed down in the middle.<\/p>\n

So, we decided to record it again and I thought, \u2018How can we make sure that doesn\u2019t happen this time?\u2019 In the restaurants I used to go to, they had these trios which used small music boxes with awful sounds like cha-cha-cha. I thought if we got one of those and laid it down on tape for five minutes, that could be our guide for tempo. That was the first time a manual syncing \u2013 a click track, essentially \u2013 ever took place.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, the band were jamming and the drummer Keith Forsey had been listening to The Crusaders\u2019 song Sugar Cane<\/em>. In the middle of that song, the drummer briefly played \u2018four on the floor\u2019 [a 4\/4 rhythm with the bass drum hit on every beat] and no one had ever played that before. It seems impossible now, but \u2018four on the floor\u2019 didn\u2019t exist.<\/p>\n

Keith was also doing the hi-hat from Rock The Boat<\/em> [by The Hues Corporation] and we appropriated those two things and that gave it this early disco sound, which was quite different.<\/p>\n

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IT WASN\u2019T A HIT AT FIRST THOUGH, WAS IT?<\/h6>\n

No, that happened when we took the record to MIDEM and Neil Bogart [founder of Casablanca Records] saw its potential.<\/p>\n

He called us from the States one night saying, \u2018We\u2019re definitely going to release this record. I\u2019m having a party at my house and it\u2019s turning into an orgy \u2013 and they want to hear Love To Love You Baby<\/em> playing all the time. I\u2019ve got someone on the record player just lifting the arm up each time and putting it on again and again. And that\u2019s given me the idea to copy In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida<\/em> by Iron Butterfly and do a whole side of one song. I need you guys to do that as fast as possible\u2026\u2019<\/p>\n

As we had a six-minute song with a click track, all we had to do was copy the click track for 16, 17 minutes and we could drop in anything we wanted, at any part of the song, and it was all in time. That was revolutionary. All because of Iron Butterfly and sex at Neil Bogart\u2019s house!<\/p>\n

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AND THEN I FEEL LOVE<\/em> CAME ALONG AND WAS EVEN MORE INNOVATIVE\u2026<\/h6>\n

Yeah. I was reading A Dance To The Music Of Time<\/em> by Anthony Powell, and I thought, \u2018How about we make an album like that; start off with a fifties song, go through the different periods and then go into the future with a futuristic song?\u2019<\/p>\n

I Feel Love<\/em> was the \u2018future\u2019 track. We\u2019d done a lot with the Minimoog at the time, but we decided to bring in the big 3P Moog. This particular one had been used by The Beatles on Abbey Road, but Lennon said it was too complicated, so they\u2019d returned it and [composer] Eberhard Schoener bought it. It came with an operator called Robby Wedel, a very quiet chap in a tweed suit, not from the rock world at all.<\/p>\n