Nancy Whang & Bonar Bradberry – “Working The Midnight Shift” (Donna Summer Cover) (Stereogum Premiere)

Nancy Whang & Bonar Bradberry – “Working The Midnight Shift” (Donna Summer Cover) (Stereogum Premiere)

Over the last year, former LCD Soundsystem member Nancy Whang has asserted herself as a formidable club diva. Whether she’s singing over tracks produced by Classixx, the Juan MacLean, or Shit Robot she consistently impresses every time. Now Whang has made the decision to cover the queen of disco, Donna Summer, and her choice of song couldn’t be more spot on. That’s because “Working The Midnight Shift” is an incredibly dark tune. It first appear on the 1977 release Once Upon A Time, the record where Summer, Giorgio Moroder and co. famously went from nothing to a completed double-album in about 72 hours without any sleep. Summer had to be hospitalized after the third day from exhaustion and “Midnight Shift” shows that. Her voice hovers over one of Moroder’s fiercest and darkest synth productions with a wounded fragility. All of those qualities work perfectly to Whang’s strengths and here she sounds completely in her element shifting between her typical conversational singing and ghostly falsettos. Bonar Bradberry brings all the modern vision that you would expect as half of the loved UK duo PBR Streetgang, but importantly maintains the same early morning darkness. It’s drenched in the same shades of neon light, but they’re new bulbs. Whang meanwhile is sounding more and more like a star with each new release. Listen to it below.

Nancy Whang & Bonar Bradberry – “Working The Midnight Shift (Donna Summer Cover)”

“Working The Midnight Shift” is out 5/16 via Gomma. Stay tuned for Extended and Disco mixes of the song.

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