In 1978 Donna Summer and Giorgio Moroder released the disco epic I Feel Love. The song totally threw dance music for a loop, sending it in a new direction for iot’s future. Gone were the days of symphonic “hustles”, the new disco would be edgy, dark and sexy.

At the time a young DJ in San Francisco was experimenting with synths at home and in his DJ sound booth at The Legend, the largest gay disco in the city. Patrick Cowley loved the original, but wanted a longer version for his night. He knew just extending the instrumental bits would be a bit monotonous, so he completely remixed the track and gave it a hard-core electro middle that was totally different than the original. He released a demo copy of it which took off like wildfire and became the definative version at all west coast discos.

Cowley would go on to start work on solo projects of his own and produced Sylvester’s biggest hits.

Eventually word of the remix got back to Moroder who loved what he heard. The improvised middle section expanded on themes in the vocal line at the beginning, and the mix seemed even more razor sharp. It took a few years, but eventually Moroder and Summer convinced her label, Casablanca Records, to release a special 12” of the mix with a special edited version as the b-side. It is the only Casablanca Record with the catalog # FEEL.

Cowley died soon after of AIDS.

The record has become a collectors item. It’s highly influential. Even New Order claims it showed them the direction they should move into after the death of Ian Curtis.

The 12” is, by no means rare, but because so few are willing to give up their copies, prices hover around $30 to $40 with mint copies going for up to $80. I found my mint copy (not even any ringwear!) last night at Jive Time in Fremont. $4.

Donna Summer - I Feel Love (Patrick Cowley Mega Mix)