Turn the Beat Around: The Secret History of Disco

by Peter Shapiro

  Debbie Jacobs. “Hot Hot (Give It All You Got),” 1979, MCA 1857.

  Bob James. Three, 1976, CTI 6063.

  Rick James. “Be My Lady” from Come Get It!, 1978, Motown 5263.

  Patrick Juvet. “I Love America,” 1978, Casablanca NBD 20134.

  _____. “Lady Night”/“Swiss Kiss,” 1979, Casablanca NBD 20160.

  KC and the Sunshine Band. “Sound Your Funky Horn,” 1974, T.K. 1003.

  _____. “Queen of Clubs,” 1974, T.K. 1005.

  _____. “Get Down Tonight,” 1975, T.K. 1009.

  _____. “That’s the Way (I Like It),” 1975, T.K. 1015.

  _____. “(Shake, Shake, Shake) Shake Your Booty,” 1976, T.K. 1019.

  _____. “I’m Your Boogie Man,” 1977, T.K. 1022.

  KC and the Sunshine Junkanoo Band. “Blow Your Whistle,” 1973, T.K. 1001.

  Herman Kelly & Life. “Dance to the Drummer’s Beat,” 1978, Alston 3742.

  Evelyn “Champagne” King. “Shame,” 1978, RCA 11122.

  Kinky Foxx. “So Different,” 1983, Sound of New York SNY 5107.

  Kiss. “I Was Made for Lovin’ You,” 1979, Casablanca 983.

  Eartha Kitt. “Where Is My Man,” 1983, Record Shack SOHOT 11.

  Kleeer. “Keep Your Body Workin’,” 1979, Atlantic 3559.

  Kool & the Gang. “Hollywood Swinging,” 1974, De-Lite 561.

  D. C. LaRue. “Indiscreet,” 1977, Pyramid P 8011.

  Licky. “African Rock,” 1979, Queen Constance 9292.

  Love Deluxe With Hawkshaw’s Discophonia. “Here Comes That Sound Again” from Here Comes That Sound Again, 1979, Warner Bros. BSK 3342.

  Love Unlimited Orchestra. “Love’s Theme,” 1973, 20th Century 2069.

  Cheryl Lynn. “Got to Be Real,” 1978, Columbia 10808.

  Loretta Lynn. “Coal Miner’s Daughter” from Coal Miner’s Daughter, 1971, MCA 936.

  Lynyrd Skynyrd. “Sweet Home Alabama,” 1974, MCA 40258.

  Herbie Mann. “Superman,” 1979, Atlantic 3547.

  Kelly Marie. “Feels Like I’m in Love,” 1981, Coast to Coast 02023.

  Vaughan Mason and Crew. “Bounce, Rock, Skate, Roll,” 1980, Brunswick 211.

  Mass Production. “Welcome to Our World (of Merry Music),” 1977, Cotillion 44213.

  Mastermind. “Hustle Bus Stop,” 1977, Prelude 71090.

  Van McCoy & the Soul City Symphony. Disco Baby, 1975, Avco AV-69006-698.

  Bob McGilpin. “54” from Get Up, 1979, Butterfly FLY 3104.

  Mercury Disco Sampler, 1976, Mercury MK 20 (features Tony Silvester and the New Ingredient’s “Pazuzu” and “Cosmic Lady”).

  Miracles, The. “Love Machine,” 1975, Tamla 54262.

  Walter Murphy & the Big Apple Band. “A Fifth of Beethoven,” 1976, Private Stock 45,073.

  Musique. “In the Bush,” 1978, Prelude 71110.

  _____. “Keep on Jumpin’,” 1978, Prelude 71114.

  Originals, The. “Down to Love Town,” 1976, Soul 35119.

  Gene Page. Hot City, 1975, Atlantic 18111.

  Dennis Parker. “Fly Like an Eagle”/“New York By Night,” 1979, Casablanca NBD 20153.

  Teddy Pendergrass. “Get Up, Get Down, Get Funky, Get Loose” from Life Is a Song Worth Singing, 1978, Philadelphia International JZ 30595.

  Phreek. “Weekend,” 1978, Atlantic DSKO 123.

  Ritchie Family, The. Brazil, 1975, 20th Century T498.

  _____. “The Best Disco in Town,” 1976, Marlin 3306.

  _____. Arabian Nights, 1976, Marlin 2201.

  _____. “Quiet Village,” 1977, Marlin 3316.

  _____. African Queens, 1977, Polydor 454.

  Vicki Sue Robinson. “Turn the Beat Around,” 1976, RCA Victor PB 10562.

  Rolling Stones, The. “Miss You,” 1978, Rolling Stones 19307.

  Rose Royce. “Pop Your Fingers,” 1980, Whitfield 49274.

  Diana Ross. “Love Hangover,” 1976, Motown 1392.

  _____. “Upside Down,” 1980, Motown 1494.

  Saturday Night Fever, 1977, RSO 4001.

  Side Effect. “Always There,” 1976, Fantasy 769.

  Sine. “Just Let Me Do My Thing,” 1978, CBS 6351.

  Skipworth & Turner. “Thinking About Your Love,” 1985, 4th & B’way 7414.

  Slave. “Slide,” 1977, Cotillion 44218.

  Sons of Darkness. “What It Look Like?”/“Black Ice,” P&P PP444.

  Sphinx. Judas Iscariot Simon Peter, 1977, Casablanca NB 7077.

  Rod Stewart. “Do Ya Think I’m Sexy?,” 1978, Warner Bros. 8724.

  Stone. “Crazy,” 1983, Sound of New York SNY 5106.

  Barbra Streisand/Donna Summer. “No More Tears (Enough Is Enough),” 1979, Columbia 11125.

  Sugarhill Gang. “Rapper’s Delight,” 1979, Sugar Hill 542.

  Sun. “Sun Is Here,” 1978, Capitol 4587.

  Johnnie Taylor. “Disco Lady,” 1976, Columbia 10281.

  Titanic. “Sultana,” 1971, CBS 5365.

  Tribe. “Koke” from Ethnic Stew, 1974, ABC/Dunhill ABC 807.

  Andrea True Connection. “More, More, More,” 1976, Buddah 515.

  Tanya Tucker. “I Believe the South Is Gonna Rise Again” from Would You Lay With Me (In a Field of Stone), 1974, CBS 32744.

  Universal Robot Band. “Dance and Shake Your Tambourine,” 1977, Red Greg 207.

  Village People. Village People, 1977, Casablanca NBLP 7064.

  _____. Macho Man, 1978, Casablanca NBLP 7096.

  _____. Cruisin’, 1978, Casablanca NBLP 7118.

  _____. Go West, 1979, Casablanca NBLP 7144.

  _____. Can’t Stop the Music, 1980, Casablanca NBLP 7220.

  Voyage. “Souvenirs,” 1979, Marlin 3330.

  Narada Michael Walden. “I Don’t Want Nobody Else (To Dance With You),” 1979, Atlantic 3541.

  Anita Ward. “Ring My Bell,” 1979, Juana 3422.

  Wild Honey. “At the Top of the Stairs,” 1976, T.K. TKD 1.

  Hank Williams Jr. “The South’s Gonna Rattle Again” from High Notes, 1982, Elektra 60100.

  Wish featuring Fonda Rae. “Touch Me (All Night Long),” 1984, KN1001.

  Wood, Brass & Steel. Wood, Brass & Steel, 1976, Turbo TURB 7016.

  Michael Zager Band. “Let’s All Chant,” 1978, Private Stock 45, 184.

  6. “SO WHY SHOULD I BE ASHAMED?”: Disco Goes Underground

  Black Uhuru. Black Uhuru in Dub, 1977, Jammy’s 227A.

  Cabaret Voltaire. “Nag Nag Nag,” 1979, Rough Trade RT018.

  C-Bank. “One More Shot,” 1983, Next Plateau NP50011.

  Certain Ratio, A. The Graveyard and the Ballroom, 1980, Factory FACT16C.

  _____. “Shack Up” from The Double 12″, 1981, Factory FACT42.

  Clash, The. “Magnificent Dance,” 1981, Epic 4802036.

  Jimmy Cliff. “Treat the Youths Right,” 1982, Columbia 03507.

  Dinosaur. “Kiss Me Again,” 1978, Sire 0785.

  Dinosaur L. “Go Bang #5,” 1982, Sleeping Bag SLX000.

  Divine. “Love Reaction,” 1983, Bobcat 813 821.

  Dominatrix. “The Dominatrix Sleeps Tonight,” 1984, Streetwise SWRL2220.

  “D” Train. “You’re the One for Me,” 1981, Prelude PRL539.

  _____. “Keep On,” 1982, Prelude PRL547.

  Brian Eno & David Byrne. My Life in the Bush of Ghosts, 1981, Sire SRK6093.

  ESG. ESG, 1981, 99 Records 9904.

  Marianne Faithfull. “Why d’Ya Do It?” from Broken English, 1979, Island 201018.

  Freez. “I.O.U.,” 1983, Streetwise SWRL2210.

  Glaxo Babies. Limited Entertainment, 1980, Y Y6.

  Manuel Göttsching. E2-E4, 1984, Racket Records 15037.

  Indian Ocean. “School Bell”/“Tree House,” 1986, Sleeping Bag SLX23.

  Jah Wobble/the Edge/Holger Czukay. Snake Charmer, 1983, Island IMA1.

  Kano. “I’m Ready”/“Holly Dolly,” 1980, Emergency EMDS6504.

  Kinky Foxx. “So Different,” 1983, Sound of New York SNY 5107.

  Li
quid Liquid. Optimo, 1983, 99 Records 9911.

  Lisa Lisa and Cult Jam, with Full Force. “I Wonder If I Take You Home,” 1984, Columbia 05203.

  Lola. “Wax the Van,” 1985, Jump Street JS1007.

  Loose Joints. “Is It All Over My Face?”/“Pop Your Funk,” 1980, West End WES22128.

  _____. “Is It All Over My Face? (Male/Female),” 1980, West End WES22129.

  _____. “Tell You Today,” 1983, 4th & B’way BWAY401.

  Maximum Joy. “Stretch”/“Silent Street”/“Silent Dub,” 1981, 99 Records/Y 9908/Y11.

  J Walter Negro & the Loose Jointz. “Shoot the Pump,” 1981, Zoo York/Island 12WIP6765.

  New Order. “Blue Monday,” 1983, Factory FACT73.

  Normal, The. “Warm Leatherette,” 1978, Mute 001.

  Number of Names, A. “Sharevari,” 1982, Quality QRFC027.

  Peppers, The. “Pepper Box,” 1973, Spark Records SRL100.

  Pigbag. “Papa’s Got a Brand New Pigbag,” 1981, Y Y10.

  PiL. “Death Disco,” 1979, Virgin VS274.

  Pulsallama. “Ungawa Part II,” 1982, Y Y25.

  Arthur Russell. World of Echo, 1986, Rough Trade 114.

  _____. “Let’s Go Swimming,” 1986, Rough Trade RTT184.

  Section 25. “Looking From a Hilltop,” 1984, Factory FAC108.

  Shriekback. “My Spine Is the Bassline,” 1982, Y Y27.

  _____. “Lined Up,” 1983, Y Y(T)102.

  TW Funkmasters. “Love Money” from Various Artists, Re-Mixture, 1981, Champagne CHAMP1.

  Was (Not Was). “Wheel Me Out,” 1980, Ze/Antilles AN805.

  _____. “Tell Me That I’m Dreaming,” 1981, Ze/Island 50011.

  7. “STAYIN’ ALIVE”: Disco Today

  Alcazar. “Cryin’ at the Discoteque,” 2000, BMG 18934.

  All Saints. “Lady Marmalade,” 1998, London 408.

  DJ Harvey. “Cosmic,” 1997, Black Cock 068.

  Faze Action. Full Motion, 1995, EP Nuphonic 102.

  Idjut Boys & Laj. Beard Law, 1995, EP U Star 007.

  Barry Manilow. “Could It Be Magic,” 1975, Arista 0126.

  Metro Area. Metro Area, 1999, EP Environ 008.

  _____. Metro Area, 2002, Environ ENVCD002.

  Pet Shop Boys. “Go West,” 1993, Parlophone 6356.

  Take That. “It Only Takes a Minute” and “Could It Be Magic” from Take That and Party, 1993, RCA 66221.

  Take That featuring Lulu. “Relight My Fire,” 1993, RCA 67722.

  Tavares. “It Only Takes a Minute,” 1975, Capitol 4111.

  Daniel Wang. Look Ma No Drum Machine, 1993, Balihu BAL001.

  _____. Aphroasiatechnubian, 1995, Balihu BAL003.

  _____. The Probe, the Strobe, 1996, Balihu BAL006.

  _____. Silver Trophies, 1999, Environ ENV009.

  Please note that some of the links referenced in this work are no longer active.

  NOTES

  Chapter 1. THE ROTTEN APPLE

    1. Vincent Canby, “New York’s Woes Are Good Box Office,” New York Times, November 10, 1974, Section 2, p. 1.

    2. David Caute, The Year of the Barricades: A Journey Through 1968 (New York: Harper, 1968).

    3. Mark Rudd, leader of the Columbia University chapter of Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), quoted in Terry Anderson, The Movement and the Sixties (New York: Oxford University Press, 1995), p. 195.

    4. Six and a half million African Americans migrated northward between 1910 and 1970. Mary Pattillo-McCoy, Black Picket Fences: Privilege and Peril Among the Black Middle Class (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1999), p. 16.

    5. Bruce J. Schulman, The Seventies (Cambridge, MA: Da Capo, 2002), p. 68.

    6. Vincent J. Cannato, The Ungovernable City: John Lindsay and His Struggle to Save New York (New York: Basic Books, 2001), p. 549. Between 1969 and 1977, New York lost 16 percent of its jobs, and in just one year, from 1970 to 1971, the city’s unemployment rate jumped from 4.8 percent to 6.7 percent.

    7. The white population of New York City declined by 617,127 during the 1960s; at the same time, the minority population increased by 702,903. See ibid., p. 447.

    8. Kenneth T. Jackson, ed., Encyclopedia of New York City (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1995), pp. 165–67. Beginning in 1965, New York City was required to pay 25 percent of welfare and Medicaid costs of all New Yorkers receiving these benefits. Especially when coupled with the demographic changes in the city, this not only drove up municipal spending but also forced the city to greatly expand its bureaucracy in order to meet the new federal and state regulations. Furthermore, higher interest rates on both the city’s debt and the bonds it issued to cover its costs increased the city’s budget by another $1.5 billion.

    9. Sam Roberts, “1977; Summer of Paranoia,” The New York Times, July 1, 1999, p. E1.

  10. Cannato, Ungovernable City, p. 526.

  11. Jim Fricke and Charlie Ahearn, Yes Yes Y’All: The Experience Music Project Oral History of Hip-Hop’s First Decade (Cambridge, MA: Da Capo, 2002), p. viii.

  12. Cannato, Ungovernable City, p. 533.

  13. Ibid., p. 533.

  14. Jackson, Encyclopedia of New York City, pp. 345–46.

  15. David Burnham, “The Changing City: Crime Reports Rise Despite More and Modernized Police,” The New York Times, June 3, 1969, p. 1.

  16. See Christopher Mele, Selling the Lower East Side: Culture, Real Estate and Resistance in New York City (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2000), and Joshua B. Freeman, Working-Class New York: Life and Labor Since World War II (New York: New Press, 2000).

  17. Cannato, Ungovernable City, p. 528.

  18. See www.derechos.net/paulwolf/cointelpro/churchfinalreportIIIc.htm for the Senate’s Church Commitee report on the COINTELPRO programs targeting black nationalist groups.

  19. Street gangs in New York peaked in 1973, when there were 315 gangs and more than 19,000 members. See Nelson George, Buppies, B-Boys, Baps and Bohos: Notes on Post-Soul Black Culture (New York: Harper, 1992).

  20. Ibid., p. 11.

  21. Nelson George, The Death of Rhythm & Blues (New York: Omnibus, 1988), p. 98.

  22. Time, January 5, 1970.

  23. Cannato, Ungovernable City, p. 389.

  24. Quoted in Peter Carroll, It Seemed Like Nothing Happened: The Tragedy and Promise of America in the 1970s (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1990), p. 61.

  25. Ibid., p. 58. From 1960 to 1970, nationwide welfare lists ballooned by 225 percent, most of which occurred after 1968 when Nixon’s anti-inflation strategy produced higher unemployment.

  26. Ibid.

  27. Pete Hamill, “The Revolt of the White Lower Middle Class,” New York, April 14, 1969, pp. 29, 24.

  28. Francis X. Clines, “For the Flag and for Country, They March,” The New York Times, May 21, 1970, p. 1. Homer Bigart, “War Foes Here Attacked by Construction Workers,” The New York Times, May 9, 1970, p. 1; “After ‘Bloody Friday,’ New York Wonders If Wall Street Is Becoming a Battleground,” The Wall Street Journal, May 11, 1970, p. 1; Pete Hamill, “Hard Hats and Cops,” New York Post, May 12, 1970, p. 47.

  29. Carroll, Nothing Happened, p. 59.

  30. Ibid., p. 58.

  31. Jackson, Encyclopedia of New York City, pp. 165–67.

  32. See Homer Bigart, “Negro School Panel Ousts 19, Defies City,” The New York Times, May 10, 1968, p. 1; Leonard Buder, “Parents Occupy Brooklyn School As Dispute Grows,” The New York Times, May 15, 1968, p. 1; Fred M. Hechinger, “Racism and Anti-Semitism in the School Crisis,” The New York Times, September 16, 1968, p. 46; Martin Mayer, “Frustration Is the Word For Ocean Hill,” The New York Times Magazine, May 19, 1968, p. 28; Irving Spiegel, “Jews Troubled Over Negro Ties,” New York Times, July 8, 1968, p. 1.

  33. Roberts, “1977.”

  34. Studio We (193 Eldridge Street) was the first of the lofts and was owned by James DuBois an
d Juma Sultan; Studio Rivbea (24 Bond Street) and Ali’s Alley (77 Greene Street) were probably the two most important lofts and were owned, respectively, by Sam Rivers and his wife Bea and Rashied Ali. Other important loft spaces included Environ at 476 Broadway, Axis at 463 West Broadway, Ladies Fort/Cafe NoHo at 2 Bond Street, Brook on West Seventeenth Street, and Jazzmania at 14 East 23rd Street. For more on the jazz loft scene, see Stanley Crouch, “Jazz Lofts: A Walk Through the Wild Sounds,” The New York Times Magazine, April 17, 1977, pp. 40–42, and Tom Roe, “Generation Ecstasy: New York’s Free Jazz Continuum,” in Rob Young, ed., Undercurrents: The Hidden Wiring of Modern Music, Continuum, 2002, pp. 241–62. The best available audio document of the loft jazz scene is the Wildflower series released on Douglas/Casablanca in 1978.

  35. The “prehistory” of disco that follows is only a sketch. A decent history of the context of music consumption, particularly discotheques, house parties, record hops, and sound systems, has yet to be written. The journalistic accounting of nightlife has largely been left to the society and gossip columnists, skewing the focus toward the jet set and Eurotrash. As Sarah Thornton has suggested, the culture of the discotheque has been largely ignored by music writers because the discotheque is often seen as part of the leisure and service industries rather than part of the music industry and it is a site of music consumption rather than production. See Sarah Thornton, “Strategies for Reconstructing the Popular Past,” Popular Music, Vol. 9, No. 1, 1990, pp. 87–97.

  36. The association of desperation and the discotheque can also be seen in the salsotecas of Cali, Colombia, during the ’70s and ’80s. Here, at clubs called Congo Bongo and Impacto Afro-Latino, men who couldn’t afford to take dates to the dance halls where live bands played would gather to listen to records both old and new and drown their sorrows in the local firewater. In the mid- to late ’80s, when the Cali drug cartel overtook the notorious Medellín cartel as Colombia’s top supplier of cocaine, the town’s sudden wealth, and the cartel’s sponsorship of many local groups, meant that the salsotecas were no longer needed. For more, see Lise A. Waxer, The City of Musical Memory: Salsa, Record Grooves and Popular Culture in Cali, Colombia (Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 2002).

  37. Report by the Reich Youth Leadership, September 1942, quoted in Uta G. Poiger, Jazz, Rock, and Rebels: Cold War Politics and American Culture in a Divided Germany (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000). See also Mike Zwerin, La Tristesse de Saint Louis: Swing Under the Nazis (New York: Morrow, 1987), the excellent Swing Kids Web site at www.return2style.de/amiswhei.htm, and Arvo Vercamer and Marcus Wendel’s history of the Hitlerjugend at www.skalman.nu/thirdreich/youth-historyof-1939.htm.