"Love Is in Control" is a hit single from Donna Summer

Donna Summer

LaDonna Adrian Gaines , known by her stage name, Donna Summer, is an American singer/songwriter who gained prominence during the disco era of the 1970s. She has a mezzo-soprano vocal range. Summer is a five-time Grammy winner and was the first artist to have three consecutive double albums reach...

's self-titled 1982 album

Donna Summer (album)

- Personnel :*David Alexander – photography*Bill Barnum – supervisor*H.B. Barnum – director*Dara Lynn Bernard – chorus*Roy Bittan – piano*Michael Boddicker – programming, vocoder, vocoder programming, polymoog*Larry Bunker – drums...

.

Background

Summer's 1980 The Wanderer album - the inaugural release on Geffen Records

Geffen Records

Geffen Records is an American record label, owned by Universal Music Group, and operated as one third of UMG's Interscope-Geffen-A&M label group.-Beginnings:...

 - had been certified gold in America although it did not enjoy numerous hit singles as some of her '70s releases had enjoyed. Summer had prepped her next album, I'm a Rainbow - a double set which continued her association with Giorgio Moroder

Giorgio Moroder

Hansjörg "Giorgio" Moroder is an Italian record producer, songwriter and performer based in Los Angeles. When in Munich in the 1970s, he started his own record label called Oasis Records, which several years later became a subdivision of Casablanca Records...

 and Pete Bellotte

Pete Bellotte

Peter J. Bellotte is a British songwriter and record producer, most famous for hismain body of work with Donna Summer alongside his partner Giorgio Moroder...

 , but David Geffen

David Geffen

David Geffen is an American record executive, film producer, theatrical producer and philanthropist. Geffen is noted for creating Asylum Records in 1970, Geffen Records in 1980, and DGC Records in 1990...

, compelled by the need for what he considered a guaranteed smash, had shelved I'm a Rainbow and assigned Summer to record an album with producer Quincy Jones

Quincy Jones

Quincy Delightt Jones, Jr. is an American record producer and musician. A conductor, musical arranger, film composer, television producer, and trumpeter. His career spans five decades in the entertainment industry and a record 79 Grammy Award nominations, 27 Grammys, including a Grammy Legend...

. Jones was a much sought-after producer at the time, particularly due to his association with Michael Jackson

Michael Jackson

Michael Joseph Jackson was an American recording artist, entertainer, and businessman. Referred to as the King of Pop, or by his initials MJ, Jackson is recognized as the most successful entertainer of all time by Guinness World Records...

's album Off the Wall

Off the Wall (album)

Off the Wall is the fifth studio album by the American recording artist Michael Jackson, released August 10, 1979 on Epic Records, after Jackson's critically well received film performance in The Wiz. While working on that project, Jackson and Quincy Jones had become friends, and Jones agreed to...

.

"Love Is In Control (Finger On the Trigger)" was the lead single off the Jones' produced album Donna Summer. It was written by Jones and Rod Temperton

Rod Temperton

Rodney Lynn "Rod" Temperton is an English songwriter, record producer and musician most famous for writing a number of songs performed by Michael Jackson, including the title track of Jackson's Thriller, the biggest-selling album of all time.-Biography:As Temperton remembers music was in his bones...

 - who'd also written Jackson's "Rock with You". Summer reports that the recording process for this album was challenging, as she was pregnant at the time and unhappy over I'm a Rainbow being shelved by Geffen Records.

The single was issued in three different versions: the 7" single release (3:42), the LP version (4:19), and a 12" single version (7:04). The 12" version features an instrumental saxophone by Ernie Watts

Ernie Watts

Ernest James "Ernie" Watts is an American jazz and rhythm and blues musician. He plays saxophone and flute. He might be best known for his work with Charlie Haden's Quartet West and his Grammy Awards as an instrumentalist...

 on the B-side.

Reception

"Love Is in Control (Finger On the Trigger)" became a major hit, peaking at #10 on the US Hot 100 in the summer of 1982, giving Summer her sixteenth top 40 hit, and reaching #4 on the US R&B Chart. It was Summer's best R&B showing since "Bad Girls

Bad Girls (song)

"Bad Girls" is a 1979 single released by American singer Donna Summer, co-written by Summer and the Brooklyn Dreams. The inspiration for her to write the song came after one of her assistants was offended by a police officer who thought she was a street prostitute.A rough version of the song had...

" in 1979 -- even using police whistles in the song as in Bad Girls. Although the parent album was certified gold in the US, it did not produce any more major hits and did not prove the powerhouse album Geffen Records had hoped for.

Ironically, Summer would have her biggest success in the 1980s while on Geffen's roster with her next album She Works Hard for the Money

She Works Hard for the Money

-Personnel:*Donna Summer - vocals, composer*Musical Youth - vocals*Matthew Ward - vocals*Michael Omartian - producer, composer, piano, synthesizer, Simmons drum programming, guitars, accordion*Greg Phillinganes - composer*Bruce Sudano - composer...

 and its title cut

She Works Hard for the Money (song)

"She Works Hard for the Money" is a 1983 hit single by singer Donna Summer. It was the first single released from the album of the same name.-Premise:The song, co-written by the singer, told a story of a woman who "works hard for [her] money"...

 - which were released by Mercury Records

Mercury Records

Mercury Records is a record label operating as a standalone company in the UK and as part of the Island Def Jam Motown Music Group in the US; both are subsidiaries of Universal Music Group. There is also a Mercury Records in Australia, which is a local artist and repertoire division of Universal...

 in a one-off arrangement to settle Summer's split with the soon-to-be-defunct Casablanca Records, whose catalogue now resided with Mercury and Casablanca's parent company Polygram Records.

Chart positions

Chart (1982)	Peak position
Australia ARIA Singles Chart ARIA Charts The ARIA charts are the main Australian music sales charts, issued weekly by the Australian Recording Industry Association. The charts are a record of the highest selling singles and albums in various genres in Australia. ARIA commenced compiling its own charts in-house from the week ending 26 June...	17
Canadian RPM RPM (magazine) RPM was a Canadian music industry publication that featured song and album charts for Canada. The publication was founded by Walt Grealis in February 1964, supported through its existence by record label owner Stan Klees. RPM ceased publication in November 2000.RPM stood for "Records, Promotion,...  Top Singles	4
Dutch GfK GfK The GfK Group, established in 1934 as Gesellschaft für Konsumforschung is Germany's largest market research institute, and the fourth largest market research organisation in the world, after Nielsen Company, Kantar Group, and IMS Health...  chart	12
Dutch Top 40 Dutch Top 40 The Dutch Top 40 is a weekly music chart, which started as the "Veronica Top 40", because the offshore radio station Radio Veronica was the first to introduce it. It remained "The Veronica Top 40" until 1974, when the station was forced to stop broadcasting...	6
French SNEP Syndicat National de l'Edition Phonographique The Syndicat national de l'édition phonographique is the inter-professional organization which protects the interests of the French record industry...  Singles Chart	48
Irish Singles Chart Irish Singles Chart The Irish Singles Chart is Ireland's music industry standard singles popularity chart issued weekly by the Irish Recorded Music Association and compiled on behalf of the IRMA by Chart-Track. Chart rankings are based on sales, which are compiled through over-the-counter retail data captured...	14
Italian Singles Chart Federation of the Italian Music Industry The Federation of the Italian Music Industry is an umbrella organization that keeps track of virtually all aspects of the music recording industry in Italy....	18
Norwegian VG-lista VG-lista VG-listen is a Norwegian record chart. It is weekly presented in the newspaper VG and the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation program Topp 20. It is considered the primary Norwegian record chart, charting albums and singles from countries and continent around the world. The data is collected by...  Singles Chart	3
South African Singles Chart	7
Spain Spain Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...	5
Swedish Singles Chart	13
Swiss Singles Chart Swiss Music Charts The Swiss Music Charts are Switzerland's main music sales charts. The charts are a record of the highest-selling singles and albums in various genres in Switzerland.The Swiss Charts include:* Singles Top 75...	5
UK Singles Chart UK Singles Chart The UK Singles Chart is compiled by The Official Charts Company on behalf of the British record-industry. The full chart contains the top selling 200 singles in the United Kingdom based upon combined record sales and download numbers, though some media outlets only list the Top 40 or the Top 75 ...	18
U.S. Billboard Hot 100 Billboard Hot 100 The Billboard Hot 100 is the United States music industry standard singles popularity chart issued weekly by Billboard magazine. Chart rankings are based on radio play and sales; the tracking-week for sales begins on Monday and ends on Sunday, while the radio play tracking-week runs from Wednesday...	10
U.S. Billboard Hot Dance Club Play	3
U.S. Billboard Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs, is a chart released weekly by Billboard in the United States.The chart, initiated in 1942, is used to track the success of popular music songs in urban, or primarily African American, venues. Dominated over the years at various times by jazz, rhythm and blues, doo-wop, soul,...	4

Miscellaneous

The B-side of the "Love Is in Control" 7" single was a non-album track written by Summer herself, "Sometimes Like Butterflies". It is yet to be released on CD and was covered in 1985 by Dusty Springfield

Dusty Springfield

Mary Isobel Catherine Bernadette O'BrienSources use both Isabel and Isobel as the spelling of her second name. OBE , known professionally as Dusty Springfield and dubbed The White Queen of Soul, was a British pop singer whose career extended from the late 1950s to the 1990s...

.

In 2001, Sheena Easton

Sheena Easton

Sheena Easton is a Scottish recording artist. Easton became famous for being the focus of an episode in the British television programme The Big Time, which recorded her attempts to gain a record contract and her eventual signing with EMI Records.Easton rose to fame in the early 1980s with the pop...

 covered "Love Is in Control" on her retro-disco album Fabulous

Fabulous (Sheena Easton album)

Fabulous is an album by the Scottish singer Sheena Easton. Released in 2000, it was Easton's 16th studio album. The album was only released throughout Europe, Japan, Australia, and Argentina....

. The track was intended as the second single from the album and a UK promo single was issued but the single's release was cancelled.