12. Overview Fixing Dates for the Beginning and End of a Genre Is A
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12. Overview Fixing dates for the beginning and end of a genre is a challenge in combining various factors and fuzzy boundaries. In the case of disco, there are varied postulations on both beginnings and ends. Part of the problem is that commentators have generally defined "disco" as the years that the mainstream embraced it. Herein is a different argument. The discotheque-- the style of dancing in clubs with continuously-blended records overseen by curator DJs-- and its attendant music-- a style involving affirming melodies with emphasis on percussionists-- this disco genre has a clear beginning that is earlier than most recognize. So many of the published commentators wrote at a distance to disco. Some were reviewers during the 70s, many came afterwards. Few wrote having danced in the clubs at the time. For example, Village Voice reviewer Robert Christgau was a non-dancer who generally ignored disco until the late 70s, and even his favored disco group Chic he misunderstood when he reviewed their first two albums. He seemed to catch on to the goals and function of the genre as he spoke to dancers and observed a couple of clubs. Rolling Stone reviewer Dave Marsh was also a non-dancer who seemed to be exposed to disco only on the radio, and even then he couldn't help himself from enjoying some of the releases despite having little regard for the genre. Even when contemporaneous to the releases, the critics couldn't appreciate the sonic qualities of the genre unless hearing them on the specialized equipment of the club. There was no way to replicate on home stereos the rumble in the solar plexus and an airy treble bouncing above one's head. Stephen Holden writing for Rolling Stone, the Voice, and others gave no indication he had visited a club. Record World reviewer Vince Aletti did at least attend some of the clubs, but not until 1972 when a visit to The Loft shed a strobe of light on what the disco genre meant to serious dancers. Edward Buxbaum was a receptive reviewer; he noted listening at home and never indicated whether his reviews included the club experience. Andrew Holleran caught on to the scene in a year or two after he relocated to NY in late 1970, but although he was a discerning club-goer, we only encountered his perceptive writing on disco after Christopher Street magazine had been publishing for a couple of years following its 76 premiere. Few bothered to write about disco in the 80s, but from the 90s writers depended on received wisdom in ascribing dates to the beginning of the genre, having not been around for the advent of the club scene. The first clubs where we danced-- The Loft private parties in 68 and 69, The Sanctuary rock disco in 69, Haven, Ice Palace, Continental, Machine, and Tamburlaine in 70-- became defined because of the singular event of the Stonewall uprising, which occurred because of arrests for same-sex dancing and which after July 1969 freed NY clubs to open for gay social dancing. The style of DJing unique to disco-- curated records played continuously in meaningful sequences for hours at a time-- also coalesced in 1969. These sequences were only meaningful because they spoke to the perspectives of oppressed gays. The sequences were performances-- songs weren't necessarily considered singly but in sets. Sets were presented to and influenced by the dancers of a particular night. Seminal DJs had good record collections to choose from, messages to convey, and sensitivity to how dancers were receiving the messages. Out of the mid60s discotheque scene, Arthur and Salvation DJ Terry Noel came to use two turntables to eliminate the silence when changing records, but wasn't focusing on danceable soul records per se and employed a jukebox potpourri playlist (he recalls playlists of the Doors, the Stones, Hendrix, the Beatles, Chamber Bros). His replacement in 1969 at Salvation, Francis Grasso, extended the two-turntable technique to blend records, playing the end of one record over the intro of the next. This added a new technique vital to the disco approach, although Grasso was playing lots of rock with his soul tracks during a brief stint at Salvation and later in the year at Sanctuary (he cites playlists of Led Zeppelin, Santana, Credence Clearwater Revival, Temptations, Sly Stone, Chicago, Four Tops). David Mancuso in his private Loft dance parties throughout 1968 into early 1969 preferred to play a record in its entirety, all the way through the fade-out before introducing another record, in respect for the full recording, but he embodied the concept of DJ as curator. He amassed a library-- a discotheque-- of records in danceable, soulful music. He employed sequences of recordings, he tweaked audio system quality, and he used ambient mood to convey to dancers a social setting, a celebration, that set the standard for the most effective discos. By 1969, then, the places for disco were set (Loft rent parties, Sanctuary), the dancers were eager for gay gathering, and the practices of disco DJing were established (Mancuso was DJ as curator, Grasso was extending DJ technique with blended records). 1970 saw these elements spread to additional sites. Continental Baths added a disco to its entertainment venue in 1970, although its casual and changing roster of DJs didn't have a curatorial, performance-art approach for a year or two. The Haven was a rock&soul dance bar. By this first summer after Stonewall, early discos at the Loft, Sanctuary, Continental, and Haven were sufficiently popular that the concept was replicated outside Manhattan, at Fire Island. The Ice Palace carved a disco out of a hotel bar, and the enthusiastic vacationers embraced the dancing habit so enthusiastically that another club popped up farther along the beach at Pines, and then when both shut down after Labor Day, the disco appetite was being fed not only by the first several city venues but also new ones sprouting in the colder months. Machine opened in the Empire Hotel and had a 6 month run, then management opened the short-lived Club Francis for Grasso in the Village. At Tamburlaine restaurant, the Asian dining room cleared its tables after dinner with Steve D'Acquisto helming the turntables. It had a short run, closed by fire by the end of 1970, so management moved D'Acquisto to another fly-by-night spot called Tambourine to capture the dancers' business. Soon after, Limelight opened with Michael Cappello providing DJ direction, and the Gay Activist Alliance held weekly disco dances that were popular. Summer of 71 saw the continuation of Fire Island venues Ice Palace and Sandpiper, which would be mainstays of summer dancing for years. By this point, the most-replicated format for disco was a public club or bar with a good sound system and a resident DJ who could convey a point of view through the nonstop stitching of soulful records while also responding to the moods of the dancers for faster or slower, sexier or more athletic sets. There were also private members-only clubs, after-hours venues without bars, and private parties as variations on the public bar setting. But always the interaction of crowded dance floor and sensitive DJ using good audio was the expected disco format. The convergence of legal venues for gay dancing and a distinct style of DJing would alone define a start point for disco; simultaneously , there was also a convergence in the record industry that was timed almost exactly the same. In counterpoint to Detroit's genre of social dancing, Chicago and particularly Philadelphia in 1969 and 1970 were creating dance music with less Motown clip-clop rhythms. These types of recordings were precisely what the NY club dancers and DJs desired for long-format sequences, and the popularity in the clubs motivated the musicians to create extensions and variations (and imitations) on the themes. Certain record companies that promoted these types of recordings ramped production or were formed in 1969. These include Neptune, Phil-A-of-Soul, Brunswick, Dakar, Wand, and Invictus. A team of rhythm players co-produced with writers, arrangers, and orchestra moonlighters in Philadelphia to create a funky yet lush sound, while in Chicago a smaller, shorter-lived team was doing their own version of this type of music. The genre would filter through not only the discotheques in Manhattan and Fire Island but also through radio (WDAS) in Philadelphia and TV (Soul Train) in Chicago. In these ways 1969 becomes the birth year for disco. Phi-Chi music plays big in NY. An end date for the genre is less anchored. After all, the disco style of nightclubbing has yet to go away. Throngs still go to clubs where DJs play sequences of continuous music. So if there is no end date to be derived from the disco format of nightlife, one has to look at the style of music for the bookend to 1969. Here, the most obvious discontinuity between disco and the genre that succeeded it, alternately called "club," "dance," or "urban," is not in vocals, tempo, or melodic structure so much as in instrumentation. In disco rhythm sections, percussion was varied but carved a wide space for congas and organic drums, while the bass section was largely electric bass guitar. A sub genre of disco was electronic, but the 70s were mostly characterized with organic percussion and electric bass. In club music, percussion was increasingly or even wholly synthesized and the bass portions of arrangements were provided by keyboard synths. Additionally, when disco recordings used background washes and counterpoint, they used organic orchestral arrangements as often as synthesizer washes, while club music virtually eliminated strings.