Rebound's DISCO NIGHTS [1994-1998]

By the mid-Nineties, the major music labels fully realized that there was gold in dem dere back catalogs, including thousands of songs, albums and artists that had yet to be issued on CD, so in addition to licensing the music out to Rhino, Priority and other compilation companies, they set up their own in-house reissue labels to mine their buried treasure. Sony celebrated their Legacy, Columbia dabbled in some Risky Business, Universal began their Chronicles and Polygram launched Rebound Records, whose motto as seen above was "Great Music - The Second Time Around".

Among several standout discs on the Rebound imprint is the Disco Nights series that began with the first two volumes (above) in May 1994.  Each disc had vivid, colorful cover art and a dozen tracks.  This new series of old music distinguished itself from other disco compilations two ways: 

• there was a theme to each disc and
• they featured longer versions of most songs

Both discs actually touted "Extended Long Play Club Versions!" right on their back covers.  The sound throughout the series is good and if you don;t get too hung up on the lack of liner notes or details about which mixes are featured, Disco Nights is a good listen.

The next four volumes appeared in 1995.  Notable were Volume 3 - The Best of Euro-Disco which did not have the "Extended Long Play Club Versions!" tag (although it returned on the next volume) and Volume 5 - The Best Of House Music which stepped out of the disco category briefly - the series was back on its stated mission with Volume 6 - #1 Disco Hits.  

Around this time, HERC picked up the 3CD set pictured below at Costco for $15. Although the cover art was identical to Volume Two - Disco Funk of the Disco Nights series and the compilation was a licensed Polygram product. Each disc in the set also contained a dozen songs just like the discs in the Disco Nights series.  Because of all the similarities, HERC has always counted Dance Fever - The Best Of Disco as part of the Disco Nights series even though only about 16 of the 36 songs are new to the mix.

Four more volumes appeared later in 1995, bringing the total up to ten volumes.  One of the notable releases this time around was Volume 9 - Motown Dance.  Up until this point, there had been three, maybe four songs from Motown in the entire series.  Two of the twelve songs on Vol. 9 were from the Sixties and the song "Let It Whip" by the Dazz Band had already been included on Volume 2 - Disco Funk.

A final volume in the series was issued three years later in 1998.  Because he already had all the songs on Vols. 10 and 11, he did not buy the discs.

The Disco Nights Series (103 songs)*

[HERC'S M!X]

*Disco Nights Vol 5 - The Best Of House Music

not included in above playlist