Great disco songs:

First Choice - The Player (One of the first big records to signal disco's arrival)
Chic - Soup For One
Chaka Khan - Fate
Anita Ward - Ring My Bell
A Taste Of Honey - Boogie Oogie Oogie
Sylvester - You Make Me Feel Mighty Real
La Flavour - Mandolay
Yvonne Eliman - If I Can't Have You
Vicki Sue Robinson - Turn The Beat Around
Shalamar - Second Time Around
Donna Summer - I Feel Love
Lime - Babe We're Gonna Love Tonight

Chic's Risque (1979) is the most solid DISCO ALBUM ever made. Disco went out with a bang with that record. That is an essential recording IMO!

DavidEye said:

Seeing Larry Numerous times Larry was/is my Idol of Disco Club dj's Many of us wouldnt even go to dance just sit up in the booth and watch this man work 4 tables 2 open reel decks. and work the lights and effects all by himself. i have the cd and it brings a tear to my eyes when i play it, because who knows who has those records that Larry has.. rumor had it that Junior Vasquez and Louie Vega spilt the collection but no one has said anything, but yes The Garage was the place to be. until the night larry Lost it and played abc by the j5 over and over and over for an hour straight

and btw "Eruca" by Jermaine Jackson" can be found on the Soundtrack to Mahogany
[This message was edited Thu Aug 21 14:19:27 PDT 2003 by Finess]

"ABC" by the Jackson 5?? Was it it a late-70s disco remix or something?...lol...

Tell us your stories about Studio 54 (or at least the stuff you're willing to share...lol).

DavidEye said:

Hey everybody, I was inspired to do some research on the "Disco Sucks" movement and I uncovered this information:

http://www.jahsonic.com/DiscoSucks.html

This excerpt really got to me...

The 'Disco Sucks' campaign was a white, macho reaction against gay liberation and black pride more than a musical reaction against drum machines. In England, in the same year as the 'Disco Sucks' demo in America, The Young Nationalist - a British National Party publication - told its readers: 'Disco and its melting pot pseudo-philosophy must be fought or Britain's streets will be full of black-worshipping soul boys.' Dave Haslam

You guys should check that link out. Lots of informative stuff.

DavidEye said:

no the album version... Larry was goin nuts and fuckin up as he got sicker. he ended up getting fired from the Garage and residenting somewhere else, thats when i stopped going to the garage and started going to the Funhouse/Better days

as for 54?.. lol i was rather young, and did way more than ya average kid was allowed to do well except for Drew Barrymore

Marvin's 1977 hit "Got To Give It Up" could be considered one of those "borderline" songs that's a combination of funk and disco.I'd say it's more funk/R&B than disco though.Don't you just love the scene in "Summer Of Sam" where John Leguizamo and his wife are grooving to this jam??



[This message was edited Thu Aug 21 14:23:05 PDT 2003 by DavidEye]

JANFAN4L said:

hmmm can i have this one on cd,j-fan? (smile)
taste of honey were my girls back then (hazel & janice...2
sistahs who could funk) boogie oogie oogie...is still on
my 70's song rotation!

i forgot about donna's i feel love. that synth bass line
was hypnotic,huh?

shalamar...jody watley,jeffrey d and howard h,right?

nice choices.

My favorite disco song is easily "Atomic" by Blondie. They have been quoted saying that it was originally recorded just as a throw-away, a practice session, but once Debbie was improvising lyrics like "Your hair is beautiful...woah tonight," they felt they were on to something. Sensing the end of an era, they wanted to create the last disco song and the rest is history.

Finess said:

Is it true that you had sex with Cher on the dancefloor?


(i'm just being silly,but I'm sure alot of crazy shit like that went on there...lol...too bad I was too young!!)

DavidEye said:

you ever hear the story about the guy who was found dead in the venting system trying to sneak in because Steve refused the guy at the door because of his shoes?.. lol July 78, i was there
[This message was edited Thu Aug 21 14:29:00 PDT 2003 by Finess]

DavidEye said:

thanks david. i kinda like your term "borderline songs"

i was just thinking...what other songs took some aspects of
disco and added it to the palette?

would FLASHLIGHt be a borderline tune (its funk but...)

most of mj's "fast songs on OFF the Wall have disco elements
to them...in fact,,,
well d-eye what U say,man?

who here had a record subscription from "Disconet" i did

I'd like to add something about Techno.

Though techno and house are both electronically-based artforms, house draws a lot more from Disco and is a direct decendant of disco. Techno, while it was inspired somewhat by disco, had a life of its own and was inspired more by the dark political times in Detroit in the early 80s. After the "Death of Disco" record companies started making less and less dance-oriented/disco-sounding records, so DJs turned to other sources for inspiration and grooves. Cats like Juan Atkins, Cybotron, etc. were influenced by a lot of progressive/obsecure dance sounds coming out of Europe (specifically the German-based group Kraftwerk). Techno reflects the industrial, stark nature of inner-city Detroit. If Motown was "the sound of Young America" then Techno was the pulse of post-modern Detroit. You can still hear techno on the radio to this day in Detroit, but it's currently going through a metamorphisis. Ghetto Tech is very popular on Detroit radio and many local DJs mix it into their sets. Ghetto Tech was influenced a lot by the bass music coming out of Miami (a la 2 Live Crew, Luke, DJ Magic Mike, etc.) plus, techno is taking a lot of cues from the current Thug/Materialistic rap culture with songs like "A** & T***s" by DJ Assault & "Hair or Weave" etc. It's hard, more bass, repetitive, emphasis on call & response. Ghetto Tech is even making its way into rave/happy hardcore sets. Kids in Europe are starting to pick it up, too.

Also, if you wanted to be cynical, you could thank the Disco sucks movement for helping expand black/urban music even more. Urban DJs started branching out looking for new sounds and they ran across Kraftwerk and other cats then you had records like "Planet Rock", etc. The seeds to hip hop were starting to blossom even more and the creative juices started overflowing. Then breakdancing (b-boying) just got crazy and all that stuff started coming into the mainstream around '83 and then Urban America took over the nation again! LOL. People STILL haven't gotten over breakdancing. I mean, the music around the mid- to late-70s, early 80s was revolutionary in every sense (disco, techno, hip hop, house) and they're all urban artforms.
[This message was edited Thu Aug 21 14:46:43 PDT 2003 by JANFAN4L]

Finess said:

That's so cool.

awright, i've been readin this thread and there's a lotta interestin thoughts and insight that's been posted here. though i wasn't around at all durin the days of disco, from what i've seen and read and such it seems like the people who didn't like the disco genre stereotyped it as repetitive and annoyin or whatever. it wasn't 'real' music, so to speak. that, and the racial/sexual orientation factor probably did play a big part in that, which shouldnt've been, imo.

but enuff of all that--disco is an awesome, awesome thing. there are some things about it that i don't really care for, like the cheesy novelty tunes ("disco duck", anyone? ), but there's somethin about it all that's just wonderfully excitin and so decadent.


mine!!!

DavidEye said:

That's a great song.

JANFAN4L said:

eloquently spoken. janfan4L ...you know your info.

Janfan pretty much laid down the law already with some of the things I would have brought up. But a couple of other things I haven't seen anyone else touch upon when it came to the music is that Disco was largely a producer's medium, instead of being propelled by the artists themselves. It sacrificed a singer's individuality in favor of the production, or the groove. Whereas in genres like Funk or Soul you better have your own distinct style vocally or you'll fade into the woodwork and won't last long. Of course there are some exceptions to both sides of these equations, as there usually are with most things.

Listen to some of the earliest disco, arguably from '74 and you'll hear how huge an influence Gamble & Huff's sound of Philadelphia International was on the genre. That swish-swish-swishing of the hi hat, those swelling strings, the production sensibilities...

But the most enduring and musically influential group to come out of the genre was Chic. Which is why rappers and non-rappers alike lifted their rhythms left and right, which is why they had so many production duties outside of Chic during and after the band's existence. And many disparate artists wanted that sound. From Duran Duran to David Bowie to Diana Ross to Soul II Soul (the latter group was never produced by Nile or Bernard, but tell me "Keep On Movin" among a couple of other SIIS songs doesn't have that Chic arrangement {sans Nile's famous rhythm geetar} and you'll only be lying to yourself). In actuality, I truly despise it when people refer to Chic as a "disco group" simply because their musicianship defied the traditional disco stereotype. Plus, they weren't one-dimensional as most disco groups tended to be, and their music has stood the test of time without seeming dated. 'Course, as the late '70s turned into the early '80s they had gotten a bit formulaic too, afraid to change for fear of their audience not accepting it. But that could never erase the greatness of their heyday.

Nile and 'Nard's grooves will never die, even if Bernard isn't with us anymore.

Disco, like any other genre, wasn't ALL bad. It had its great recordings, and it had its by the numbers bland recordings too, again, like any other genre. There is nothing wrong with dance music for the sake of dance music. Even Rock and Roll started out as dance music. But I have to add that I don't think most Disco stands the test of time. However, I guess that's ok.

When I think of Disco's fanbase it crossed all racial, and economic backgrounds. It was a part of both the straight and gay worlds. Much like this site's namesake's music.

Some of it was watered down Funk, but hardcore Funk flourished in the same decade, so I can't complain about that either. And lastly, I will say this: I'd much rather listen to most of it than much of what I hear coming from the mainstream today.

£
[This message was edited Thu Aug 21 22:52:13 PDT 2003 by Supernova]

Nova!! Nobody could possibly listen to A Warm Summer's Night and think disco group.

stymie said:

amen to that!!!

Interesting points, Nova. You get cool points. Now, I may be New Wave Forever, but where was that genre spawned from? That's right, Disco (as well as Punk). Sure, I may have a Punk background too, which was a genre whose subjects rallied against the status quo (that being Disco and Prog-Rock), but I lu'zz Da Funk!

That brings me to another thing. I hate it when people think disco and funk are one and the same. Disco was more of a producer's medium and a means of manufactured artists. Sure, you could dance to them both, but come on, I'd pick funk over disco any day.

Heatwave, Michael Jackson, and Chic produced some of the best disco I've ever created, hands down. I look at those guys as disco "artists" not just groups. They could really put together the grooves to make me move. I also like anythign with a Fender Rhodes keyboard, bells, and a pulsing bassy 4/4 beat. That's probably why I like disco's offspring, House.

The worst was the commercial stuff as well as the novelty. I'm all about the deep grooves...yeah.

Was the disco backlash racially/culturally motivated? You damn right, it was!!! They said the same thing about Rock & Roll when that came about. It had the grooves, so it was considered "devil's music". But ironically, around the time when disco came around, rock became dominated by whites. It really showed the bigotry and ignorance that was the underbelly of music.

Interestingly enough, I wasn't even born when disco came and went.

I wanna go back to New Wave. You know, the great thing about my favorite genre is that it came after punk and disco's demise. So a lot of those bands that formed were mixing those 2 styles. Other bands were even going into all kinds of musical directions (reggae, dub, rap, electro, free-jazz). Before New Wave, or I guess about the time of new wave, there was Post-punk. I loved the artists that came out that genre. Check out the CD's New York Noise and Rough Trade Shops: Post-Punk 01, and you'll see what I mean. So, in that respect I liked disco's influence on Post-Punk and New Wave.

Damn, I feel like I'm writing a school paper or something.

NWF said:

nwf what you and Supernova said is better than a college
thesis paper. the same applies to Janfan4l and D-eye.
(and everybody else...take yo bows!!!)
you guys took
my thread topic and made it really GRoove!

u people ROCk!

charles youngca

the worst music always tends to be the novelty ones!

oh yeah...mentioning philly-international's gamble & huff...
those boys made some great disco-soul anthems with the OJAYS.
"i love music" has a superb instrumental break.

anybody remember van mccoy's 'the hustle?"

very early dance hit (d-eye..did it come out in 1974 or 75?0

and mcfadden & whitehead's 'ain't no stoppin' us now..."

youngca said:

Disco is one of my all-time fave genres. It was a huge part of my childhood especially in terms of memories...songs reminding you of something. I think to answer the first question, disco back then was never fully accepted as a genre or subgenre. It was not taken seriously. Many disco songs had little depth, too light- hearted, fun, and in some cases too silly to be taken seriously. Loving disco wasn't something you would profess too loudly unless you fell under the umbrella of a certain group or stereotype who were expected to like it.

I'm just assuming that many critics and rock fans figured that it would never dominate the music scene or last that long, let alone leave a lasting impression. It has taken a decade or more of being removed from that phenomenon to truly look at it as a whole and determine where it fits in the musical landscape. I don't think it was as bad, but I'm being impartial. I love it for the most part, but once it became an opportunity to just crank out random songs to capitalize on the scene and the songs were horrid on top of that, that's when it became bad. Music has its own cycle, and disco served it's purpose for a time and that was it. Disco was perfect as a child because it was just fun dance music that always made me happy.

Ok, on to #3 (excuse the typos, it's almost midnight and I'm practically asleep now):
a) Native New Yorker - Odyssey
b) MacArthur Park - Donna Summer
c) Heaven Must Be Missing An Angel - Tavares
d) Rock Your Baby - George Mc Crae
e) Love's Theme - Love Unlimited Orchestra
f) Boogie Wonderland - EWF & The Emotions (I don't care, I love that song)
g) Lowdown - Boz Scaggs
h) Star Wars Theme - Mecco
i) Love Hangover - Diana Ross
j) Funkytown - Lipps Inc.
k) More More More - Andrea True Connection (yes I like that one too, leave me alone)
l) Can You Do the Boogie? - Michael Jackson or Jackson 5...not sure of title or if it was a group or solo thing for some reason.

Ok, I'm asleep now, so I'll stop...

Great topic Youngca!!!

funkyslsistah said:

thanks f-sis. love's theme by the late barry w & company.
how did i 4get that one,huh? lowdown...man when i was
living in NEw York the summer of 76...this sucker was really
burning up the airwaves! old boz got down in that one,right?

boogie wonderland? i'm not real fond of this one-only cuz
i know both groups's best stuff and i didn't think this one
was that good. (i go back a long way with the Emotions.
those girls sang their best songs as the 70's began.)

and maurice & the boys? well they had the 70's in their hip
pockets with a slew of great singles & albums...

love hangover...diana's best 70's song.

good points overall f-sis.