“There was a Deluxe Reverb already there, turned everything up to 10, plugged the guitar in and said, ‘Roll tape!’ And that was it”: How Skunk Baxter grabbed a six-pack, a $35 guitar and tracked Donna Summer’s Hot Stuff in one take

Jeff "Skunk" Baxter and Donna Summer.

We often hear about the meticulous preparations session players put in to make sure that they are ready when the red light goes on, but every now and then they have got to shoot from the hip and live in the moment, and Jeff “Skunk” Baxter’s gig on Donna Summer’s 1979 mega-hit Hot Stuff was one of them, with Baxter revealing that he nailed in one take with a $35 electric guitar from the bargain bucket at Guitar Center.

Written by Pete Bellotte, Harold Faltermeyer, and Keith Forsey, Hot Stuff was the big one for the Queen of Disco; a number one in the US, a dance-floor stable in clubs as the disco revolution gripped pop culture. And Baxter’s involvement in it all is quite the tale.