90’s advert for DeepHeat 6 Album

What was initially unique about the Deep Heat collections was that they contained exclusive 12″ Remixes of recent Club Hits, instead of Extended versions of Chart Hits featured on similar collections such as Now Dance 89 which was charting around the same time as the first Deep Heat albums. The success of the series was partly due to the CD boom of the late 1980s and early 1990s and it was the first time full 12″ Mixes could be commercially bought on Compact Disc, offering the listener at home a whole new experience of enjoying digitally enhanched Dance Music. Tracks on the first and longest running release kicked-off with Adeva’s version of ‘Respect’ while Underground favourites such as ‘Break 4 Luv’ by Raze and Hithouse’s ‘Jack To The Sound Of The Underground (Acid Mix)’ ensured the album reached the top of the newly created Compilation Chart, the first of many.

During 1989, Telstar saw each of their 5 Deep Heat compilations reach the Compilation Top 5, the first four peaked at either #1 or #2, all gaining Gold BPI Awards for UK sales over 250,000. The December release Fight The Flame collected the biggest hits of the year and became one of Telstar’s four Platinum selling albums of 1989. An influx of similar releases appeared on rival labels, including Stylus collections, The Right Stuff ~ Remix 89 and Where’s The House? who also teamed up with another rival K-Tel for Hip House ~ The Deepest Beats in Town. Both companies had disappeared by the end of 1990.

An interesting addition to Telstar’s marketing of the Deep Heat series was the release of a Megamix of the biggest hits from two albums; Feed The Fever and The Sixth Sense. This was the first time the Megamix had been used to promote a Compilation series, but Telstar would use the gimmick again with the Megabass series (itself a compilation of Megamixes) and a Technotronic Remix Compilation in 1990.

During 1990, another five Deep Heat albums were released each with declining popularity. This was due in part to a general swamping of the Compilation market of Dance collections, with EMI Virgin Polygram increasing their Dance album output with an unprecedented three Volumes of their Now Dance spin-off, while a newcomer in the TV-advertised concept-compilation field, Dino Entertainment, would go on to steal the Deap Heat thunder with their Hardcore series they launched in early 1991. Telstar only added to this ‘swamping’ effect by launching Get On This! in 1990, and then replacing it with Thin Ice the following year to run concurrently with Deep Heat, often containing very similar track listings. Another factor was the difficulty in licensing tracks from different record companies. By 1991, the major companies were either keeping tracks for their own Compilations, or wanting high licensing fees. Furthermore, later editions of the series featured Edited 7″ Mixes so that each album could contain more tracks, mainly to compete with the other albums on the market. This served however to make them less popular with serious Dance music buyers who liked the series’ earlier ‘underground’ feel with rarities and remixes.

Also unique to the Deep Heat Compilations was that there would often be ‘Exclusive Remixes’ of tracks, such as the previously mentioned Megamix of Technotronic’s biggest hits. This appeared on Deep Heat 7 ~ Seventh Heaven several months before it was commercially released, while “Exclusive Deep Heat Mix”s of tracks by The KLF featured on later editions. It would be these ‘exclusive tracks’ that would form the focal point of Deep Heat’s extensive Television Advertising campaigns launched by Telstar to promote each release. These would feature clips of videos of the albums biggest Club hits, usually with graphics in the style of the albums theme on the sleeve.

 

The packaging of each album was also a factor of the album’s popularity, with often a striking design gracing the front and interior packaging. Earlier themes revolved around fire, heat, flames, temperatures and burning – metaphorically suggesting the tracks will make the dancefloor burn (an idea used again later with the Megabass track.) Later releases, such as Deep Heat 6 ~ The Sixth Sense used mystic symbols as a theme; Deep Heat 7 ~ Seventh Heaven cools down the collection with heavenly blue skies and Angelic artwork; Deep Heat 9 ~ Ninth Life Kiss The Bliss features Egyptian monuments praising heavenly skies and Deep Heat 10 ~ The Awakening contains graphics of an alien being.

Vinyl was still relatively popular with DJs and this format of Deep Heat sold well with each Volume being released on Vinyl when other Companies such as Arcade (who came on board in 1991 with the Groovy Ghetto series) had largely abandoned the format, preferring to concentrate on packing as many tracks as they could onto a 74-minute single CD.

 

Info Taken from Wikipedia

 

Telstar Records’ range of Deep Heat compilations were one of the first house music collections to be released by a Specialist Marketing firm in the United Kingdom.

Launching in March 1989 with the Number 1 album Deep Heat – 26 Hottest House Hits, the brand achieved a successful four year run and set the footprint for Dance Music Compilations for many years to come. The record company, which had formed in 1982, had achieved modest success with Dance-themed multi-artist compilation albums with notable successes in the genre including the Dance Mix collections of 1987 and 1988 and The Best Of House ’88.