HOT NIGHTS & CITY LIGHTS [1979]

Hot Nights & City Lights is without a doubt the single most requested K-Tel album (thus far) from the Kollection. In addition to a couple of comments posted here on the Kollection itself, HERC has received more than a dozen (but less than fourteen) emails from people 1) wanting to know when the album was going to be featured or 2) wanting to know how much their still-sealed with price sticker album was worth. HERC will attempt to answer both questions with today's post. First, the 1979 album will be featured today on The K-Tel Kollection as the first album of 2015. (Fortunately for all of us, this great collection of disco music can easily be heard HERE in a raw vinyl rip courtesy of Brandon Hixson.) 

Though it's labeled as "Non-stop", the tracks do not overlap and are not mixed in key or by BPM - there is merely an eensy-weensy teeny-tiny gap between each track. HERC doesn't expect Hot Nights & City Lights will do too well on the K-Tel Scale given its emphasis on Pop Top 40 but he is curious how the songs did on the R&B and Disco charts. As for what the album may be worth, the Discogs Marketplace says the median price for copies of the album sold there is $1.25 with the highest priced one, in near mint plus condition, fetching a two dollar premium. Over on eBay, the Buy It Now asking prices are much higher, averaging more than $10 and as HERC types this there are no copies up for auction which would more accurately reflect what buyers are willing to pay. So to answer the value question, Hot Nights & City Lights is apparently worth more to the sellers than potential buyers. Now let's run this baby through the K-Tel Scale.

Hot Nights & City Lights [1979]		K-tel Scale:				24.75
		Billboard Top 40s
		Pop	R&B	Disco	AC	CB	WLS
We Are Family	Sister Sledge	2	1	1	30	2	5
Ring My Bell	Anita Ward	1	1	1		1	1
In The Navy	Village People	3	30	14		3	10
Chains	Bionic Boogie			8
Haven't Stopped Dancing Yet	Gonzalez	26		7
Knock On Wood	Amii Stewart	1	6	5		1	1
Boogie Woogie Dancin' Shoes	Claudja Barry		37	7
I Will Survive	Gloria Gaynor	1	4	1	9	1	1
Heart Of Glass	Blondie	1				1	2
Love And Desire	Arpeggio			4
At Midnight	T-Connection		32	3
I Got My Mnd Made Up	Instant Funk	20	1	1		22	26
I Don't Know If It's Right	Evelyn "Champagne" King	23	7	25		17	23
Shake Your Body	The Jacksons	7	3	20		5	4

Four #1 Pop hits are offset by four songs that failed to make the Top 40 at all. Ten of fourteen made the R&B chart with three going to the top and all but one song made the Top 40 on the Disco chart, with Blondie stalling at #56. Surprisingly, two of the songs crossed over to the Adult Contemporary charts. HERC says the 24.75 score is also a surprise. As an experiment, HERC swapped the roles and the weighted effect that the Pop Top 40 and the Disco Top 40 have on the K-Tel Scale, which yielded a 33.29 score for Hot Nights & City Lights. Collectors note that the album was also released on cassette and 8-track tape, which can be found in both white and black plastic casings. While the cassette contains the same play order as the vinyl album <see first comment below>, the 8-track's playlist was slightly rearranged to accommodate the limitations of the format, as seen below. I was also informed by an anonymous viewer that the 8-track contains some full-length or even longer twelve-inch versions of some tracks.

Hot Nights & City Lights was also released in Australia as Hot Nights City Lights with wildly different artwork (below) and eighteen tracks, only three of which appeared on its American counterpart. One of the weirdest things about the cut and pasted cover is the way the pictures of the Felipe the Indian and Glenn the Leatherman of the Village People line up with Amii Stewart's huge headgear. HERC also gets a giggle from the titles to the Mental As Anything and Dave & the Derros tracks. As well as Jimmy's Review of the album.

The album was also released in Canada with similar cover art to the American version but as a double album with a whopping 24 tracks. HERC was unable to verify if the album was also released as two, single record sets which is usually what K-Tel did with double albums in the States but he did confirm that Hot Nights & City Lights was released on two 8-track tapes in the Great White North. The album features an amazing 21 songs not featured on the US edition including HERC favorites like Dan Hartman's "Instant Replay", Bonnie Pointer's disco-fied version of "Heaven Must Have Sent You", Foxy's "Get Off", Alicia Bridges and her sassy "I Love The Nightlife (Disco 'Round)", Peter Brown's "Dance With Me", A Taste Of Honey's "Boogie Oogie Oogie" and, perhaps his most favorite of them all, "Every 1's A Winner" by Hot Chocolate.

Next time around, HERC trips the Circuit Breaker.

cassette and 8-track scans courtesy of 8-Track Shack
all other images courtesy of Discogs users