D I S C O!!!!!!

[newyawker99]

I am listening to some music on TV and they played a disco song. You remember disco, don't you? *cue in the soundtrack from Saturday Night Fever*.

If you were/are a fan of disco, what is your favorite disco song and what is your least favorite disco song?


:-)

[Torgo]

1. Bee Gees - 'You Should be Dancin''

Is still my fave.

A very close second would be Heat Wave's 'Groove Line'.

Plenty of trash too.

Trammps - 'Disco Inferno'

[newyawker99]

7. I also like the songs from the Saturday Night Fever

soundtrack. "Disco Inferno" is a great song.

[Dirk39]

2. Hello from Germany!

Favourite disco song will be from CHIC, but I can't decide for a special song.
Le Freak, Good Times, I Want Your Love, Everybody Dance... ouhuhu...
They are so subversive and elegant and militant.
Maybe Nile Rodgers is one of the richest far Leftwingers on this planet.
And their lyrics are so stupid brilliant and clever...

Blue Monday from New Order, if I'm allowed to call it disco is brilliant, too.
Saturday Night Fever, hmmmm, is ähhh, funny?
Greetings,
Dirk
P.S. And don't forget Boney M. (hey I'm german)
disco, disco, disco...

[newyawker99]

8. I like "Good Times" too.

[TheBigGuy]

13. Blue Monday is a great dance tune.

I guess you could call that new wave disco.

(geez..Boney M...havnt heard that in along timie).

I actually heard a disco version of a big Hildegard Knef hit...Red Roses for Me.

[SoCalDem]

3. I still have a pair of disco shoes...

I paid $60 in 1973 for these little beauties (size 7) Sbiccas..

Those were the days :(

[newyawker99]

9. WOOOOHOOOOO!!!

Those are good looking boogie shoes!! :-)

[Liberal Veteran]

4. Boogie Oogie Oogie.....by A Taste of Honey....

I still like disco.....

[newyawker99]

10. I like that song too!!

[MissMillie]

59. great bass riff! (n/t)

.

[Papillon]

5. Gloria Gaynor's "I will survive"

[newyawker99]

11. Another great song!!!

[acmavm]

6. Stayin' Alive (loved Foul Play) and anything by Donna Summer.

n/t

[newyawker99]

12. Donna Summer was great!!

Bad girls......................

[TheBigGuy]

14. "The Munich Machine" & Donna Summer

Spring Affair..and those other tunes......that album was produced in Munich, I think.

[Bluzmann57]

15. The best thing about disco(shudder)

um... well... er.. well nothing at all. Disco isn't quite dead, but it should be. HEY HEY DA BLUES IS ALL RIGHT!

[RememberJohn]

20. A bit of history...

Disco never died. It disappeared from mainstream radio for about 3 years. New disco was still played on R&B stations. It resurfaced circa 1983 with two important songs - "Let The Music Play" by Shannon and "Holiday" by Madonna. (Madonna had very bitter fights with her management of music style. They wanted rock like Pat Benatar - she insisted on 'disco' - her words.)

The music was redubbed "dance music" to escape the stigma of the word "disco." The various styles of "disco" since then have combined to be the most dominant music force in the world for the past 20 years.

[TheBigGuy]

21. Janet Jackson..."Control"

good dance music on that platter. "Late Disco?"

[RememberJohn]

23. Yes, late disco... or mid disco from today's perspective

... just as disco had various substyles in the 70s (straight, latin, rock disco, etc.) so it has had since the 70s.

[newyawker99]

37. Yes, Janet Jackson had some great dance songs!!

[newyawker99]

36. That is interesting RJ. I was never a big fan of Madonna's

but she did have a few good songs.

[RememberJohn]

45. Yeah, see, disco never died...

... it hid from the mainstream for a few years then was renamed to fool the disco bashers. Now, with it's many off-shoots (freestyle, house, dance pop (Paula Abdul, Madonna, etc.) pop-R&B (which disco in the 70s actually was) and other styles of dance music, the genre is stronger than ever.

... and that is the beauty of loving many styles of music.

[Archae]

16. Play that funky music...

white boy...

Great song.

Lover Rollercoaster by Ohio Players, lots of others.

[newyawker99]

39. Lay down the boogie and

play that funky music til you die...................


Great song!!

[DemExpat]

17. Boogie Wonderland - Earth Wind And Fire

K.C and the Sunshine Band - Get Down tonight

Saturday Night Fever

Sister Sledge........

Chaka Khan....

Dirty Dancing - Time of my Life

Just SOME of my favorites. Love that disco music!

:bounce: :bounce: :bounce:

DemEx

[newyawker99]

40. Hi DemEX!!

I love all of those songs too.

:hi:

[KDLarsen]

18. Tough one..

.. though at the moment I have a passion for "The Originals - Down to Love Town". I've heard a remix of it (by Dimitri from Paris) and it's just amazing. But I haven't been able to find it in its original version.

Also, I like Donna Summer's I Feel Love - mainly because it was one of the first Disco tracks to take advantage of the technology introduced by my favourite band ever: Kraftwerk.

[newyawker99]

41. "I Feel Love" is a great song!!

[RememberJohn]

47. "I Feel Love" was a song before it's time!

Very much a forerunner of today's techno/electronica/rave.

[BurtWorm]

58. Hey! We agree!

And I Feel Love is the first mention of a song here that I had an instant visceral reaction to. Great song! And she's a great singer, too.

[RememberJohn]

19. The ultimate top 5 disco songs...

1. If I Can't Have You - Evonne Elliman
2. Ain't No Stopping Us Now - McFadden and Whitehead
3. Stomp - Brothers Johnson
4. Turn The Beat Around - Vicki Sue Robinson
5. Last dance - Donna Summer

[TheBigGuy]

22. Poi Dog Pondering did a great cover of Aint No Stoppin...

PdP has been reviving some of these old disco/dance tunes in their latest albums.

I really liked Turn the Beat Around, too...and If I Cant Have You has some great "instruemental" passages, esp after the chorus.

[newyawker99]

43. That is a great list RJ.

I would add "Everlasting Love" by Carl Carlton.

[liberalpress]

24. I want to put on...

... my my my my my Boogie Shoes! KC and the Sunshine Band

[RememberJohn]

25. What a great band!

If you ever get a chance to see them live, do it. Another disco era band that are incredible live is Earth, Wind, and Fire...

[newyawker99]

44. I love Earth, Wind and Fire!!

:loveya:

[mac56]

26. Disco -

pretty much blows - IMO -

though some good songs were done in the style. "Heart Of Glass" by Blondie, "Train In Vain" by the Clash, "Funkytown" by Lipps Inc. all had that syncopated rhythm.

[RememberJohn]

27. "Train In Vain" by the Clash disco?

[mac56]

29. hell, yeah -

It was constantly played at the clubs back in the day.

[RememberJohn]

31. I'm really not trying to be a smartass or anything...

... but being played at a club during diso's heyday (or second coming) doesn't make a song disco.

I can recall lots of songs with beats being played in clubs that didn't qualify as disco.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Disco is an up-tempo style of dance music that originated in the early 1970s, mainly from funk popular with black audiences in large U.S. cities, and derives its name from the French word "discotheque".

[mac56]

33. I defer to your knowledge.

Sorry.

[RememberJohn]

34. But "Train In Vain" IS a great pop song...

..which is why dance clubs and rock stations both played it. Sometimes songs come along that bridge the gap.

[mac56]

35. I agree about "Train In Vain" -

and I, too, am not trying to be a smartass -

but I'm curious to understand your benchmarks. If a song was performed/recorded in a deliberately "disco" syncopated rhythm, and gets played at a "disco" club, why then would it not qualify as a "disco" song? What is the Missing Ingredient X that would make one song a "disco" song, but not another?

[RememberJohn]

38. I differ with you on the syncopated rhythm, but I guess we're just...

...hearing it differently. To me, it had the basic 4/4 rock backbeat.

As for disco criteria, there were several different sub-generes of disco, but the one people most recognize had these characteristics:

A driving bassline.
Multiple rhythm and woodwind arrangements emphasizing the melody.
Immense, complex horn and string arrangements.

An integral part of disco was not only its grand symphony-orchestra sound but the manner by which the sound was presented. There are not very many time periods in pop music history that can lay claim to widescale employment of the symphony orchestra.

This particular brand of disco actually evolved from the "Philadelphia sound." (Think "Could It Be I'm Falling In Love" by the Spinners and the song "The Sound of Philadelphia" used as Soul Train's theme.)

Disco with more of an edge (Bee Gees for example) was influenced by New york funk with artists like BT Express, Brass Construction, Kool and The Gang and Crown Heights Affair, Detroit with the Motown sound i.e. The Jacksons, Stevie Wonder, The Temptations, Eddie Kendricks.

Rock icons that did disco songs (Rod Stewart for example) drew from that sound.

Then you have the latin influence - KC and the Sunshine Band, Vicki Sue Robinson, etc.

[newyawker99]

46. My definition of disco is dance music. So any song that

fits that description is ok. I was really referring to songs from the mid to late 1970s.

[rppper]

51. KISS did disco too......

if "i was made for lovin' you" aint disco, i dont know what is.......



"dynasty" was there attempt at disco/rock...one of their worst albums sales wise...it was also the album that saw the departure of ace frehly and peter chris from the line-up.

[Insider]

28. brainstorm - loving is really my game

just one of millions of fabulous disco hits...AND THEY CAN ALL BE YOURS FOR $19.99 ON RONCO'S ULTIMATE DISCO MADNESS!!! 1-800-STUDIO54

[newyawker99]

48. That sounds like one of those TV commercials......

Get 2000 hits for only $9.99. :-)

[Shakeydave]

30. More Than a Woman........................

Oooo Ooooooo Ooooooooo More than a woman too meee!

[RememberJohn]

32. Yes! But the Taveres cover is the better than the Bee Gee's...

... IMO

[newyawker99]

49. Good one Shakey!!

[Interrobang]

42. I can't believe nobody said...

"Boogie Woogie Dancin' Shoes" by Claudja Barry (a Torontonian!)... That song is so good, I wish I'd written it. It was my first favourite song, ever! :)

I made a mix CD from Kazaa that I call "The Great 25 Years of Disco Mix" (mostly legal MP3s for me, oh glory!):

"Boogie Woogie Dancin' Shoes" by Claudja Barry
"Love to Love You Baby" by Donna Summer
"Ring My Bell" by Donna Summer
"Du Hast" by Rammstein (which IS a disco song, if you listen to it the right way)
"Can't Get You Out of My Head" by Kylie Minogue
"Boys and Girls" by Blur
"Let's Go All the Way" by Sly Foxx
"Lay All Your Love On Me" (a cover of the old ABBA song) by Information Society
"Megalomaniac" by KMFDM (another of my favourite not-disco disco bands)
"Dupatta" by Hadiqa Kiani (another great new disco song, even if the lyrics are mostly in Urdu)

If I'd been smart, I would have put some Lords of Acid and "Belfast" by Boney M on there, too. (Quick, who else knows that Claudja Barry was the talented one in Boney M?) And maybe I should have put Nine Inch Nails' "Head Like A Hole" on there, too -- listen to that bassline and tell me it *doesn't* belong on a compilation CD with "Love to Love You Baby"!

I also did a disco arrangement of the Dead Kennedys "Let's Lynch the Landlord," once, but don't tell Biafra -- he'll kill me! ;-)

There are so many bad disco songs it's easier to tell you my favourites than my least favourites, sorry.

[newyawker99]

52. That is a great list of songs Interrobang!!

[RememberJohn]

50. And it is so nice to have a civilized discussion about disco on DU!

"Dance music has been the beat at the heart of rock-n-roll from the late 40s jump bands to the techno 90s. The dance pop of the 80s, quickened by disco funkateers and British scenesters has become arguably the most fully integrated universal pop style ever... "

- Writer and USA TODAY music editor Ken Barnes

[ForrestGump]

53. Kinda disturbing

I like most of the songs mentioned.

"Boogie Nights," though, may always be a particular favorite.

And "Disco Duck," of course. In fact, it's going around in my head right now.



"Got to have me a woman!"

[newyawker99]

56. LOL!!

Love those dancing ducks!! :D

[mac56]

54. "Disco Stu likes disco music!"

"Did you know that disco record sales were up 400% for the year ending 1976? If these trends continue... AAY!"

[NightTrain]

55. Since you were kind enough to ask....

FAVORITE: I could change my mind tomorrow, but for now I'll go with Vickie Sue Robinson's "Turn The Beat Around." Gloria Estefan's early '90s remake isn't bad, either!

LEAST FAVORITE: Joe Tex, "Ain't Gonna Bump No More (With No Big Fat Woman)." Actually, I've heard worse disco records, but they were mostly by no-talent one-hit wonders or longer-term artists by whom I'd expect nothing better. Joe Tex, however, was a talented soul singer who made many great records in the '60s and '70s. It's a shame he felt he had to sell his talent out for just one more hit.

[newyawker99]

57. I agree....I never liked that Joe Tex song.

[MissMillie]

60. I love the nightlife, I've got to boogie....

.... on the disco round!

Like all genres, disco has it's place.

[ProfessorGAC]

61. Favorite: Santa Esmerelda's "Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood"

Least favorite, Disco Inferno.

Other on my fave list: Turn the Beat Around, I Can't Stand the Rain, & Flashlight.
The Professor