Those uni-horned geniuses over at Rhino Records never missed an opportunity to repackage their own compilations so The Disco Years beget the first three volumes of Special Editions Disco Hits in 1992 with an additional three volumes following in 1994.
From Andy Kellman over at allmusic:
Rhino's Disco Hits compilations act as redundant, skimpy, budget-line versions of their excellent Disco Years discs... No one who owns the Disco Years sets should go anywhere near these -- overlap abounds... Anyone looking into a proper entry route into disco should keep their options open to compilations that offer more bang for the buck.
These discs were indeed budget priced and contained no liner notes and as far as over-lapping tracks with The Disco Years, HERC's ciphering reckons that 58% of the songs also appeared on The Disco Years. For HERC, that still meant this series offered up 24 songs that weren't yet in hand so he took advantage of the bargain price to shore up his collection. He did the same thing with the '70s Smash Hits series (1993) that followed the Super Hits Of the 70s: Have A Nice Day series and the Soul Hits Of The 70s: Didn't I Blow Your Mind series. (SPOILER ALERT: That '70s Smash Hits post is coming real soon.)
In 1997, Rhino issued the Disco Hits series again on it's new Flashback label with different cover art for each of the six volumes which were now subtitled with a song title just like The Disco Years had been. While each disc contained the same songs, they were presented in a slightly different order on the newer version of the series. In addition, four of the volumes were issued together as a box set (pictured above).
Below, the original Disco Hits cover art appears to the left of the 1997 refresh.
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