“The War on Disco” - new PBS documentary airs Monday, October 30 at 8PM

I remember Disco Demolition NIght, it made the national news.

So do I, R1. And you can rest assured that 95% of the participants in that circle jerk are now loud and proud MAGAts.

Disco Demolition Night was the night House music was birthed. Fun fact.

R2 said it before I could—MAGA trash.

I found the whole anti-disco thing to be depressing. And although I was born in 1970, I mostly understood the subtext.

Even disco can become a Trump thread. Oh well. I will survive. I guess.

There were people who just didn’t like Disco because it wasn’t their taste but then there were people who truly HATED Disco with this deep passion. It felt scary almost, and you just knew why they had such a strong hatred for it (it was popularized through black and gay clubs). Those people were almost always white, and it wasn’t just in Middle America or the south. I remember the hatred for it here in Queens back in the 70s. My father would call it “fa**ot” music or “ni**er” music.

Raci$t le$bian troll alert @R5.

R6 hope you showed him and sucked some big “ni**er” dick

R7 get a life, you fat ugly loser

What fascinated me about the assassination of disco was this underlying promise that something radical and metal would emerge from its absence. Instead, we had a tsunami of MOR light, urban cowboy pop that pretty much lulled the bulk of the Billboard top 40 charts until the intermittent squalls of UK techno pop finally stormed through the gates in 1983.

R6 I recently saw that someone I know refers to r&b music as Ni**er music. He messaged a female mutual asking why she’s always listening to Ni**er music (she loves hip hop and R&B music) and she put him on blast on Instagram for it. It’s been years since I’ve heard anyone say that but it made me realize there are probably a lot of quiet racists who think it to themselves but just don’t say it out loud because these days you can’t.

Ironically he’s also born and raised in Queens, NY.

The death of Disco birthed House music.

R11 then he’s experienced 1st-hand the atrocious behavior

R11 funny how blasting music at 3am might make other people hate it

R14 who said anything about blasting music at 3am? Grow up.

Shannon's "Let the Music Play" and Madonna's "Holiday" are credited with reviving dance music after the decline of disco.

Straight white dudes who can't dance get upset about a lot of shit for no good reason.

But it doesn't end there. There's a huge amount of white-washing when it comes to early and mid-80's music, particularly what was on MTV. There was not a lot of new wave/college rock/punk/alternative music on MTV - but you'd never know it based on their revisionist history.

It's infuriating.

There were also some R&B purists who resented disco as they saw it as less soulful, but, yeah, they didn't have the visceral hatred for it that rock fans did.

R16 no. They weren’t. They were hits but the genre of disco wasn’t revived. Dance music changed.

R18 they didn’t cause a riot. They just didn’t care for Disco. It ended there. Not the same situation.

Black Queers invented everything on earth and evil white cis men stole it all.

Thread closed.

If you watch the first 2 hours of MTV some of the music you claim that wasn’t played was played in just those first two hours r17.

But MTV played more and more music of certain genres as they became more and more popular. Funk wasn’t popular in 1982.

R21: Donald Trump or one of his MAGAT acolytes.

You can just tell by the perpetually whiny, I-am-the-real-victim-here mentality.

R21 disco started in underground gay clubs AND underground black clubs. It doesn’t say “gay black clubs”. It started in black clubs and found its way to gay clubs and eventually became mainstream and started to dominate the charts.

R24 oh, sorry…

Black women invented everything on earth and evil white gays stole it all.

R25 your odd desperation to be a victim is alarming and sad.

They hated disco because it was associated with black people and gay people.

The documentary is not treading on new ground here. Many have noted the racism and homophobia in the "Disco Sucks" attitudes before.

R27 your point? No one said this is something we didn’t know… it’s still ok to explore the topic again and introduce it to people who may not know that. It did happen 44 years ago after all.

I loved disco music when I was a kid and never understood the “disco sucks” crap or what happened to the fun music.

But I also loved (and still love) funk. Man, the teasing I got for that as a white kid in flyover land. I had to listen to it in secret.

I always laugh at people like r29. “I liked Disco BUT I also liked…” as if you have to like one or the other. Some people have very specific tastes when it comes to music while others like variety. Just because you liked disco doesn’t mean you were not supposed to like other genres. I listen to a little of everything. Not everyone does.

r19 I said those songs helped to revive dance music. Not that they were disco songs.

I really like the HiNRG and Italo Disco stuff that was around in the disco dark ages gap between the popularity of 70s disco and later 80s house/electronic music, mostly 81-86.

I really don't remember there being a brouhaha about it. It was certainly celebrated on TV and movies.

R33 mmhmmm. But in real life there were many who hated it. Youre the perfect example of someone who believes everything the media feeds to them and doesn’t stop to see what’s happening outside of his own little bubble.

Whatever white men can’t dominate and easily do well is seen as less than or trivial. Back then white people didn’t have rhythm like they do.

SOME white people. Not all. And there were white people with rhythm.

Gay men were really the driving force behind disco. Donna Summer found that out the hard way when she went all Jesusy.

R36 Not the very talented white brothas with guitars. That’s why they resented Disco. True visionaries and more talented people like Elton John and the Beegees got it and adapted.

[quote]Youre the perfect example of someone who believes everything the media feeds to them and doesn’t stop to see what’s happening outside of his own little bubble.

That "bubble" you refer to includes frequenting gay discos in the 70's, r34.

Btw PBS produces the best documentaries. I know so many non liberals are cynical about PBS but they really do it well, in depth, with perfect narrative flow.

R40 pretty much stating what OP said

R39 you just said it. GAY Discos. Yes. That was a major minority in the country in the 70s.

R38 you are the retard.

The white artists of the time weren’t the ones out rioting against Disco. It was normal everyday people. Not musicians. Idiot.

R43 Did I say they were rioting. There was a very anti Disco sentiment voiced by white musicians. Similar to the popular white celebs who support Trump without really ever supporting trump or backtracking. I know what the fuck I am talking about. It was a passive co-sign. Don’t ever disrespect me again.

[quote] So do I, [R1]. And you can rest assured that 95% of the participants in that circle jerk are now loud and proud MAGAts.

It was 1979, many of them are dead and gone 44 years later. However, your point is well-taken. Whenever purposefully marginalized communities experience any measure of contentment, freedom or self-sufficiency the dregs of the majority culture are motivated by hatred to rise up in acts of protest and violence. It is repeated over and over again in U.S. culture. The most disenfranchised among the majority culture are the foot soldiers in any reactionary war to oppress all non-white, non-hetero, non-Christians. Hate and ignorance are only the intergenerational legacy of the poorest, least educated factions of the majority culture.

R45 you don’t think many of those mostly men in their 20s-30s in 1979 are still alive? Are you stupid?!? They weren’t 60 year olds doing it. It was mostly young men. Idiot.

Some news coverage from 1979

[quote][R39] you just said it. GAY Discos. Yes. That was a major minority in the country in the 70s.

Lol, so, r42? Disco music was played in those clubs that was recorded by major recording artists of its time. I don't remember any "war" on the music or the dance style. Again, it was popular beyond the gay scene...Saturday Night Fever anybody? Dance music is about the beat. Disco ran its course. The beat evolved. Sorry, I lived through it and I don't remember a "war".

Every POC Yaasss Kween I’ve ever met that rants on and on about evil whitey and Crackers, funny enough can never seem to get enough white cock up in their undouched bungholes.

R46 you must have never been to universities like Harvard, where homophones abound.

The idea only the least educated people are homophobic and racist is stupid because it’s false. Most of our government is racist and homophobic and all of them have degrees.

R48 you proved my point. You lived in a tiny bubble of gayness and thought that was what the whole country was like. Welcome to real life, 44 years later.

I’m sure no members of the black community ever called it “faggot shit” or something like that. We all know how accepting and non-homophobic the black community is…

I watched a Bee Gees documentary recently and there was a bit about Disco Demolition Night. A black guy who had been an usher at the event was interviewed. He said he had noticed records by artists such as Stevie Wonder and Marvin Gaye turning up - definitely not disco, just black.

R52 is desperate. It’s all over this thread trying to be a victim.

Of course the disco backlash was about racism and homophobia.

[quote] [R45] you don’t think many of those mostly men in their 20s-30s in 1979 are still alive? Are you stupid?!? They weren’t 60 year olds doing it. It was mostly young men. Idiot.

Did I hit too close to home?! I wasn't trying to insult anyone here. I assumed we were of the same mind about this occurrence. Are you familiar with kind of young white men in Chicago who would have been part of this protest in 1979? You think drugs, alcohol, diabetes, liver disease, renal failure, reckless behavior and suicide hasn't significantly thinned their ranks in the last 44 years? If not, who's the idiot?

R53 the hardcore anti-disco organizations (yes they started legit groups) were all white and straight and their motivation was that disco was very black and gay. It was all racism and homophobia.

Ad stated upthread, there were people who just didn’t like disco because it wasn’t their taste but they just disliked it and didn’t listen to it. These people were extremists who hated that this music was dominating the scene and had tons of gay visibility and POC visibility.

R56 yes, because everyone in Chicago was doing nothing but drugs etc. PS it wasn’t even the drug capital of the country. NYC was much worse in every way in 1979 than Chicago and many of us are still here too.

[quote] Every POC Yaasss Kween I’ve ever met that rants on and on about evil whitey and Crackers, funny enough can never seem to get enough white cock up in their undouched bungholes.

I would venture you've never met any such "kween." You're a lying, hateful undouched asshole.

[quote]You lived in a tiny bubble of gayness and thought that was what the whole country was like

Hardly, r51. I don't know why you're so insistent. Did *you* grow up gay in the Midwest in the '60s and '70s? We were *not* living in a bubble.

R59 LOL you know it’s true

R60 no. But neither did you. And it shows.

The first 3 artists the leader of the Anti-Disco movement mentioned that night were The Village People, Donna Summer and Bee Gees. The crowd all let it be known they hated them.

[quote] [R56] yes, because everyone in Chicago was doing nothing but drugs etc. PS it wasn’t even the drug capital of the country. NYC was much worse in every way in 1979 than Chicago and many of us are still here too.

Watch the documentary, or read a book. What do you know of Chicago? "Everyone" in Chicago was not a participant in this riot, it was primarily a subculture of young white men from the south side of Chicago -- who, if they were still alive, would be wearing MAGA hats to Walmart.

[quote][R60] no. But neither did you. And it shows.

How, r62?

it wasn't so much the disco music as it was low education, low wage straight, white guys pissed off at feeling threatened by unapologetic black and gay voices. "How dare they" and " Who the fuck do they think they are" was the mindset of that crowd. The same deplorables that we now recognize as maga trash.

[quote] The first 3 artists the leader of the Anti-Disco movement mentioned that night were The Village People, Donna Summer and Bee Gees. The crowd all let it be known they hated them.

At Disco Demolition night they burned the records of non-disco Black artists like Curtis Mayfield, Aretha Franklin, Stevie Wonder and Marvin Gaye. I sincerely hope this is covered in the documentary -- it was basically an anti-Black riot.

R65 you didn’t even go to college. You aren’t educated. Just sit this one out and STFU. It’s been embarrassing

R67 lmao no. It was an anti anything not white and straight riot. They also burned white artists. You’re reaching now. Their main target was always The Village People

Local news coverage (in Chicago) from that night

[quote][R65] you didn’t even go to college. You aren’t educated. Just sit this one out and STFU. It’s been embarrassing

You're easily embarrassed, r68,

R71 no. Im easily over your bullshit. Go get a job or take some classes. You’re on here all day every day. That isn’t normal.

The same white racists who hate rap today also listen to modern country that copies hip-hop.

Hip hop and country music have always had ties to each other.

[quote] Whatever white men can’t dominate and easily do well is seen as less than or trivial. Back then white people didn’t have rhythm like they do.

Culturally, it was an affront to have a Black woman (Donna Summer) ruling the charts and the airwaves and selling multi-platinum. Prior to Disco, Blacks were genre artists, not commercial juggernauts with wide cross-cultural appeal. When mainstream white rock artists like Rod Stewart, the Rolling Stones, Elton John and Bowie started incorporating rhythmic dance elements in their music, the (white) rock crowd went nuts and that sparked the disco backlash.

As an aside, many Black artists hated disco as well because it overtook traditional Black music at radio and in sales. All of the sudden Gloria Gaynor, Amii Stewart and Anita Ward were getting the platinum No. 1 hits on the pop chart that had been denied Aretha, Gladys, Dionne, Natalie Cole and other traditional R&B artists. Even Diana Ross hated disco, Berry Gordy forced her to record "Love Hangover." She thought the song was ridiculous but it went on to be one of her biggest hits. Despite all those fantastic Bacharach /David recordings, Dionne Warwick's first No. 1 pop hit was a disco duet with the Spinners "Then Came You" that she didn't want to record and hardly ever sang in her concerts.

R75 Diana Ross would like a word with you.

Billboard magazine didn't remove the word, "disco" from it's dance chart until 1987.

[quote] [R67] lmao no. It was an anti anything not white and straight riot. They also burned white artists. You’re reaching now. Their main target was always The Village People.

Tell yourself that if you like. They weren't burning David Bowie, Queen or The Runaways albums -- or the "Xanadu" soundtrack.

Because disco was still being produced in the 80s. It just died a painful death and wasn’t a success anymore. But it still existed.

^^^ Gay stuff

Xanadu was not even out yet.

David Bowie was never considered Disco….

R78 you’re a retard. I told you to get off here and go take some classes.

[quote] David Bowie was never considered Disco….

Bowie was openly "bisexual." The Disco Demolition didn't target non-hetero artists like it did Black artists

No. He was openly believed to be bi. He never once stated he was bi in the states.

R84 tell me what mainstream artists were openly gay in 1979…

[quote] [R78] you’re a retard. I told you to get off here and go take some classes.

You didn't direct that comment at me. However, I am happy to join the multitudes that ignore you here and ITRW.

R87 go. Get. A. Job. Or take some classes. Do something. Years later and you still don’t know that I know when you post. How retarded does one have to be to not get it?

I was in the 8th grade and we all went to the roller disco rink I had just hectored my Dad into buying me a pair of skin-tight cherry-colored satin pants and a silver lamé dress shirt by telling him that all the guys on the high-school football team were wearing the same thing ... Suddenly it wasn't cool and they renamed it 'roller rink' rather than roller disco... and you could only go on Saturdays when it was 'Rock Night'.

[quote] [R84] tell me what mainstream artists were openly gay in 1979…

That isn't the point. Bobby Womack was not a disco artist and never made disco recordings, so why were his records burned that night?!

[quote] [R87] go. Get. A. Job. Or take some classes. Do something. Years later and you still don’t know that I know when you post. How retarded does one have to be to not get it?

You're a FAN?! Well, bitch, why didn't you just say so! Thank you for following me and for all your support throughout the years!

David Bowie was never openly bi in the USA like some poster here is claiming. Might I add that Bowie wasn’t very big in the 70s either. He had two songs that made the top 10 for the entire decade, both in 1975. After 1975 none of his songs in state even cracked the Hot 100 until 1980, when Fashion came out. His 70s music wasn’t selling for most of the 70s and he wasn’t a mainstream radio fixture until the 80s.

Xanadu came out in August of 1980, over a year after this happened. How would they be burning an album that hadn’t been released?

Their hatred started with The Village People, and yes, because they were perceived the be gay, something still spoken about to this day.

They were very much against many black artists who were very successful but it wasn’t exclusive to them like that poster is desperately claiming.

There were no mainstream out and proud artists in 1979 because they couldn’t be that. Wake up.

[quote][R71] no. Im easily over your bullshit. Go get a job or take some classes. You’re on here all day every day. That isn’t normal.

Lol, r72, how you project. You do know that we can all check out *your* posting frequency.

[quote] They were very much against many black artists who were very successful but it wasn’t exclusive to them like that poster is desperately claiming.

Oh, gurl...y'all are so tedious. The Disco Demolition was an anti-Black music riot. On that night in 1979 in Chicago, those nuts did not attempt to distinguish who was gay or who was disco, it was bring an album with a Black face on the cover and let's blow it up. Yes, the overall disco backlash was homophobic as well as racist. The Disco Demolition at Comiskey Park was not anti-gay, it was an anti-Black music.

R93 yeah. And you’ll see how little I post throughout the week because I work. Meanwhile you post on here every single day all day. Posts from hours in the early morning to late at night, on more than one account too. It’s too much. Get a job.

R94 but that isn’t true! Wtf. The way you’re desperately rewriting history after all your attempts at playing victim failed upthread is so pathetic.

How wrong you are, r95/OP. I have a lot of time on my hands because I'm retired and this is the only account I've ever posted from. I don't have any idea why my posting that I didn't remember a war on disco would send you into such a defensive mode. I'm only here to discuss, not antagonize.

The navel gazing around Disco Demolition night makes no sense. But it's legend-as-fact, similar to what folks say about the Stonewall Riots.

The next year, the top song in the US was Blondie's disco hit "Call Me". The rest of the top 20 for the whole year included disco hits from Michael Jackson, Diana Ross, KC and the Sunshine Band and the execrable "Funkytown". The only war on disco was the always-changing tastes of the American consumer.

R96 your attempts to cast me as someone "playing victim" are desperate. I think you've confused yourself. I guess we'll just have to stay tuned for the PBS documentary since you think you know everything (but obviously do not).

R97 you aren’t retired. Not to mention you claim you’re a working movie critic in your posting history. You also recently claimed you were born in 1980 and 2005 on another thread.

R99 only I know about this. Im the one who posted about it.

But since you’re claiming so much, give everyone here a link that backs up your claims.

R49 What exactly is your point. Slave masters raped slaves.

Everyone can check and see that you're making things up, r100/OP. You do know that, don't you?

[quote] But since you’re claiming so much, give everyone here a link that backs up your claims.

??? What?!!!

Gurl, this happens everytime you mix your Zoloft with wine spritzers.

Disco SUCKS! - That's what all the straight dudes in high school said.

Some even had bumper stickers at the time. I don't know where that started but that phrase caught on like wildfire among heteros.

It wasn’t only black artists. The people who were at that game were all there to protest and part of the movement. They were informed to bring albums they wanted blown up. They weren’t told which artists to bring. The poster who keeps saying it was only black artists is lying through his teeth.

PS my father said this made news back in the UK when it happened

[quote]The navel gazing around Disco Demolition night makes no sense. But it's legend-as-fact, similar to what folks say about the Stonewall Riots.

Was it Marsha or Sylvia who lit the first 12" single afire on the night of July 12, 1979?

Footage of some of the speech from that day. The crowd gives the loudest disapproval to The Bee Gees, who were huge. Here is some visual from that night. I encourage the poster who is desperate to claim it was just an anti-black movement to post his footage or article that can support his claim now.

R73 That’s the thing. They don’t hate rap today. But they and they pappies hated rap a generation ago. Conservatives ALWAYS lose a cultural war.

Thanks R108, that was interesting. So the breeders booing The Village People too hu? 20 years later they could not get enough of it.

God I hated growing up in that era.

Can we please stop the tedious and pedantic discussion about on the War on Disco just long enough to savor and enjoy this little ditty from when disco was in its infancy.

Sorry, here is the correct link.

What bothered me primarily about Demolition Night wasn't about a group of people who didn't care for dance music. It was blatantly and inherently racist and homophobic. What I couldn't understand back then was why people would go through the trouble of planning and attending such an event. If you didn't care for a certain genre of music, then don't buy their records and don't listen to radio stations that play that music. I was never much of a fan of the hair metal rock bands of the 1980s, but if there was a local rally to protest and burn their records, I would shrug at such an absurd concept.

I remember people hating on Blonde back then too. Dont think it was a race thing. She's as white as can be.

"It was blatantly and inherently racist and homophobic."

It sure as hell was. And now that they've aged into elderly MAGAts, they're still insisting they are not racist and homophobic.

R113 see r105. It was to make a big scene and bring awareness to the movement on a national level (they succeeded). This would hopefully encourage others all over the country to want to see Disco die, and it slowly worked. Not even that slowly. Within the next two years Disco would die. People turned on it.

R114 yup. Blondie had a lot of haters when they took off in 1979.

What did you do in the Disco War, daddy?

It was about homophobia mostly, it just happened that a lot of artist were black. The BeeGees were not black, Blondie was not black. The lead singer of KC and The Sunshine Band not black. My theory is that straight guys didn't want to learn to dance and move their hips like that. It was "GAY". So any music that sounded like Disco put them in an awkward position they were homophobic about. That's why they just didnt ignore it, they wanted to kill it.

To be fair, Disco Duck really did suck.

"What did you do in the Disco War, daddy?"

Same thing I did during the Cola Wars of the 1980s, son: get high.

How about the War on Christmas?

R120 to be fair, A LOT of Disco sucked. The good stuff was really good but a lot of it was shit.

R123 Touché.

r123 Hey! Be nice!

R123, but that true about almost every type of music. Are all Rap songs hits? Was all Metal hits? Were all synthpop hits?

"The good stuff was really good but a lot of it was shit."

It was shit because it was rushed into production so it could be aired quickly to cash in on the craze, with no regard for artistry or longevity or posterity. It was the hula hoop of the mid to late 70s.

R119 is right about the dancing. The reason the dancing was so “gay” is because most of it was started and created by gay men in gay clubs. It eventually moved its way to mainstream and many of the straights saw this and were not having it. They found it all “gay” and they were onto it without even realizing they were onto it, because fact is it all started in black and gay clubs. A lot of the music created by black artists and a lot of the dancing popularized by gays.

Looks good

R129 agreed. I’m looking forward to watching.

Hope this is as good as it looks.

R94 is the type who would try to rewrite the murder of Matthew Shepard as an attack on trans women of color.

I was just a 13 year old disco queer kid in Naperville, Illinois when Disco Demolition happened. (Am also both a lifelong White Sox fan and Steve Dahl fan, but that's another can of idiosyncratic worms I don't wanna get into right now). You had to seek it out, but there was some awesome dance music to be found 80-83; Holiday & Let The Music Play may now be regarded as the return of mainstream Top 40 dance (equal props to KC's Give It Up, also of that era and holds up better) but Kool & The Gang The Gap Band, The Whispers, Shalamar, and The Jacksons were also still cranking dance hits that broke through too.

I am eager for this though! Thanks PBS.

The Jacksons without Michael you mean? MJ had massive #1 hits that were very much dance hits as well.

[quote] [R75] Diana Ross would like a word with you.

And1980's "Diana" was her first platinum album. She had chart hits that got lots of airplay but her album sales in the 70s were nowhere near Donna Summer's.

R133, fellow Chicagoan Peter Brown was one of those artists who kept the disco beat going. His big hit was "Do You Wanna Get Funky With Me" in the mid-70s. By the early 80s, "Disco" was no longer commercial but it continued and the artists who did it well continued to innovate and make great music.

Peter Brown also co-wrote Material Girl.

As someone who was a teenager at the time, I can tell you that one of the issues was that disco was ubiquitous and part of the over-30 adult establishment. Our parents were taking 'Disco Dancing' classes at the local community center and even freakin' Ethel Merman released a disco album! I can say that in my circles where 'Disco Sucks' was the common slogan. We didn't associate disco with black people or have any conscious ant-black sentiment (for us at least) but disco was DEFINITELY associated with gays (we called people who listened to it 'disco fags') but the main objection for us was that it was music our parents liked.

I will definitely be watching.

Not related per se, but theoretically adjacent?

Why isn’t this on the PBS app on Amazon prime.

Because it isn't out until October 30th.

I want Taylor Swift Demolition Night in the same style of Disco. I am so sick of her.

R142 O.

Disco and funk were and are the most fun and energetic types of music and the disco sucks rock rules crowd should probably also try to remember that rock n roll was also invented by black people so what were they protesting?

R146, they thought it was music to sodomize by, which it sometimes was, but not always.

also, urges must be shamed and repressed.

"I want Taylor Swift Demolition Night in the same style of Disco. I am so sick of her."

Here's a tip.....if you don't like a type of music, don't listen to it. No need for a demolition night.

Keen on disco, when I go go. 🪩

I am with R138, my circle of friends didn't associate it with ant-black sentiment. It was really an anti-gay thing. Keep in mind, music videos were not really out yet so most people had no clue what the artists looked like unless they were really audio heads. The average person listed to the radio. Maybe a record album or two but they were expensive for the time so it really was rare that people could afford a big collection.

I remember paying around 12 dollars for a good album back then, adjusted for inflation in today's money it would be about 45 dollar. That's a lot for a young person to spend on one or two songs. Yes, I know albums had more songs on it than that but the reality is, most records only had a couple of good songs on the album worth listing to. And in most cases you could not just buy a single.

I think Ethel Merman and Disco Duck were also partially to blame for people getting tired of disco music. It wasn't all about race and sex and class and intersections.

Disco Duck was freakin' novelty song. It's just a goof, not something people should consider a proper representation of disco music.

It airs tonight.

Disco Duck was a spoof sure, but when you spoof something, it's the first cut to take something down. Then others join the mob and start throwing stones.

I think it’s on at 9pm not 8pm

[quote]As someone who was a teenager at the time, I can tell you that one of the issues was that disco was ubiquitous and part of the over-30 adult establishment.

[quote]We didn't associate disco with black people or have any conscious ant-black sentiment

This is so true.

Disco had become tired. It had run its course. It was becoming cringe worthy. It had become the stuff of older people.The real nail in the coffin was AIDS. Even the closing of Studio 54 in 1980 signaled the end of an era.

But this is the year 2023....history must be rewritten to make it about racism.

What joke.

It’s ironically the anti-woke troll making it about race and not some liberal.

R155. Wrong. I saw the obvious racist and homophobic component of Disco Demolition when in happened back in 1979.

R157 ENOUGH

[quote]But this is the year 2023....history must be rewritten to make it about racism.

Wrong! I was 13 and at the time and the homophobia was obvious. Looking back on it, I can see the racism too. We didn't distinguish disco from R&B and funk or other forms of African-American musical expression. Unless it was Rock, :Punk or New Wave it was all disco to us.

R159 what? I didn’t know anyone who thought R&B was Disco. PS you claimed to be born in 2005. You must have forgotten.

[quote]Wrong. I saw the obvious racist and homophobic component of Disco Demolition when in happened back in 1979.

No. It did not.

First of all, black artists had been well represented in the top 10 hit classifications for decades. Where was the racist out-cry over it? Did anyone care? Did anyone try to eliminate MoTown? No.

Secondly: among the biggest selling disco recordings were by the BeeGees and other white performers from Streisand to ABBA. It just wasn't some exclusively black genre.

Racism had NOTHING to do with the death of disco.

According to Nile Rodgers, disco sprung from the melding of the black, Latin, and gay club scenes, and was supposedly a legendary good time before the record companies got involved. So it's fair to say the backlash had both a racial and homophobic undertone. Rodgers said in his autobiography that he and his band Chic went from the number one music act in the US to persona non grata literally overnight after the demolition stunt.

Anyone interested in this subject would enjoy his book, not just for the disco history but also for all the legendary artists he worked with in subsequent years.

I don't think it was so much the music that was disliked but the white polyester clad gold chained unbuttoned shirt douchebags who were loathed.

Ultimately even the Bee Gees publicly burned their plastic disco suits

[quote]Wrong! I was 13 and at the time and the homophobia was obvious.

What homophobia? Where? EVERYONE was dancing to disco. Everyone was adopting a Disco style. Straight men were wearing pink and lavender leisure suits, gold necklaces with pendants. . Even senior citizens. Everyone was into it. That was the era.

But guess what? Times change.

LOL R163 even proved my point.

R162 dude. It was an act against all of Disco. Not just black artists. You’re fucking desperate. Get a grip on real life. Seriously you need to get off the internet.

[quote]PS you claimed to be born in 2005. You must have forgotten.

Show me where and I promise to e-transfer you $50 (Canadian, so about $12.75 USD)

[quote]Rodgers said in his autobiography that he and his band Chic went from the number one music act in the US to persona non grata literally overnight after the demolition stunt.

Ridiculous.

That demolition stunt was in the summer of 1979. Yet in 1980 the 8th biggest selling song was Funkytown ...pure disco. So maybe Chic just didn't come up with anything the public wanted.

Oha, noa! We’re gettin’ two hours of “Anticaques Roadshow”, pushing the disco expose to the ten o’clock hour complete with a viewer discretion advised warning!

R169 it started at 9

It's also available on PBS Passport streaming service, under American Experience.

Meh. It projected a lot of post-modern economic and social analysis on to differing tastes in popular music.

Sooo, r169...anything good on Antiques Roadshow?

Veneer !

r168, 'funky town' is widely considered the last truly classic 'disco' song to chart on American radio.

I remember way back when Doo-Wop was a thing. Then the girl groups. Then folk music. Then the California sound. Then the British Invasion. Soul. Baroque and Sunshine pop. The crunchy granola stuff from James Taylor, John Denver and that ilk ...and so on and on and everything in-between. Styles come and go.

Disco had its time.

[quote] I remember way back when Doo-Wop was a thing. Then the girl groups. Then folk music......

And each era had merit. Until the dead end of rap

R157 Thank you enlightened elder gay. I live my elders who correct those who try to lie.

The HBO doc on the Bee Gees also covered the Disco backlash and how racist and homophobic it was. There were interviews with people who were at the Disco Demolition night.

That night was full of bigotry, yes.

That’s not to say a shift in musical taste, against disco, was also based on bigotry.

Disco died and Ciccone crawled out of its desiccated corpse

Madonna really did a lot to revive dance music in the mainstream.

R182 you keep saying that as if dance music vanished. Lmao. Dance music has never ever been out of style and never will be. DISCO died. Not dance music.

r183 Dance music lost popularity in mainstream culture after the decline of Disco. Madonna was a big part of its revival in the early 80s.

[quote]The HBO doc on the Bee Gees also covered the Disco backlash and how racist and homophobic it was. There were interviews with people who were at the Disco Demolition night.

This "Demolition night" thing was in 1979. Long before the internet and social media and 24 hour cable news with nothing better to do. Few nationally even fucking knew about this...it had zero inspect on anything.

This AE episode was meh

^ Impact (not inspect)

R185 ummm this made national news.

I thought the documentary was excellent.

R189 I liked it too.

R188 It really didn't. And BTW were you around back then? In 1979 national news was 30 minutes a night. It wasn't 24 hours with segments repeated over and over again.

Find me one national news broadcast ABC, NBC, CBS that reported this. There were local Chicago TV reports during the sports segments.

R191 back then almost everyone only had basic tv channels. The nightly news used to bring in millions of viewers. Adults kept up with the news back then. And yes, it made news all over the country. YOU weren’t there though.

R192 Find me one national news report about the event from that evening or the day after.

Thanks in advance.

I knew about Disco Demolition at the time it was happening. I didn't watch much television then, though. I must have read about it in the Seattle Gay News.

R193 go read some articles stupid.

Fucking dumbasses

Don't bother trying to have a rational discussion with r192/OP, r193. She gets fussy and foot stompy.

It absolutely was national news.

That's nice.

Yes, of course it made national news. I was 12 and I knew about it at the time.

I was in Canada and I was 13. It wasn't 'Breaking News!' but it was one of those 'in other news...' oddball stories that played nationally a day or so after the event

R201 Great. Find me one national TV news report about the event from that evening or the day after.

Thanks in advance.

It made the national news at the time. My parents remember seeing reports on it.

I remember seeing it on my local news in NYC. I also read about it in the newspapers, and I think afterwards in Rolling Stone .

I remember the cousin of one of my best friends aunt saw it on the news.

I felt so sorry for Linda Clifford. I loved her -

Yes. It was on the news. Whether someone recorded it and uploaded it to the internet I don’t know. Millions of news segments aren’t uploaded online. What a retard. Always exposing how stupid he is.

[quote]Yes. It was on the news.

Not on any national news TV broadcast.

If it were such a big deal, such a culture changing event we would see recorded evidence of that. Local Chicago sports news segments of the event do exist on YouTube ...but outside of that, nada. Why? Because it was not mainstream national news.

Disco was awful--simplistic, repetitive music. I got interested in jazz because so much popular music of that era wasn't worth the listening.

R92: Bowie was very popular and got plenty of coverage in the rock music press. He made for good copy as did his wife. He didn't back away from his bisexuality as rapidly as Sir Elton, who never entirely recovered--certainly his music didn't. Bowie was truly outrageous and norm breaking where as Sir Elton was mostly just theatrical. Of course, Bowie was a bit of a poseur---he began as a folkie but wanted fame.

Me too r206.

[quote] This "Demolition night" thing was in 1979.

Thinking on it there was a much bigger "demolition" event against the Beatles. It likewise had zero effect.

[quote]Disco was awful--simplistic, repetitive music

It never claimed to be anything but dance music, r209.

Well all of those talking heads in the program sure kept yelling that is more than just dance music.

It is weak. Sauce. The interview subjects are unremarkable. They seemingly spend as much time on the anti Disco movement, as covering the actual focus of the show. No new footage.

Once over lightly.

r208 aka Aspie Alice, it was news all over the US. It wasn't a major story but it did get coverage in newspapers. Now take your Ritalin and go to bed.

r214 they gave a good overview of the origins of disco, and of course the focus was mostly on the anti-disco movement as that was what the doc was about.

[quote]it was news all over the US.

[quote]It wasn't a major story

Oh. That makes sense.

Reported nationally—It was a considered a minor news story in most places….does that help?

[quote]Reported nationally—It was a considered a minor news story in most places….does that help?

The White Sox had to forfeit the second game of the double header because of this. That made it newsworthy.

In Chicago…

r220 take it from people who were there, it did get news coverage in newspapers all over the US. It was such a bizarre event.

No shit Shirley—I was there.

News coverage nationally—newsWORTHY in Chicago.

JHC

Funny, I guess they destroyed all the national news articles......."in newspapers all over the US".....and national TV news coverage reporting about the event.

the Mitz

Did she ever cut a duet with Steve Martin?

Any newspaper with a sports page.

July 13th 1979 Ottawa Canada

I think the documentary was good - although it definitely over-reached with the Disco Demolition. Yes it was symbolic of a bigger trend and backlash.

But we also have to remember how much of the 60s, 70s, and 80's were driven by trends. You can look at a pic from that era and get the year within 1-2 years just by what they are wearing. Can't do that too much before the 60's and not much past 2000's.

This was the baby boomer generation - lots of young people who are fickle and moving from one thing to the next.

The tones of racism and homophobia were real though - although not necessarily behind disco hate. It was glommed on to by Republicans in the early 80's to get votes - and to destroy American progress and the middle class in the process.

[quote]Funny, I guess they destroyed all the national news articles......."in newspapers all over the US".....and national TV news coverage reporting about the event.

JFC will you just STFU?

Oakland Tribune

Marshfield News Herald, in Wisconsin

Detroit Free Press

New York Times: Anti-Disco Rally Halts White Sox

July 13, 1979

Okay motherfucker NOW can you shut the FUCK UP?

It it single handedly changed the music business. Oh please.

LOL. The articles are all on the sports pages. So much for "national news".

And in the NYTImes sports page, it's basically a blurb.

Sports is news.

Did the Disco Demolition teenagers become the MAGA idiots in the January 6th “Capital Insurrection”?

[quote]LOL. The articles are all on the sports pages. So much for "national news".

Sports pages are news, dear. Nobody said it was a major story, but it did make the news.

Who gives a fuck if the story made the national news?

[quote] [R183] Dance music lost popularity in mainstream culture after the decline of Disco. Madonna was a big part of its revival in the early 80s.

Bitch, what?! I carried disco into the 1980s on my lonesome broad shoulders.

In case this article from 2019 wasn't already posted somewhere in this mess.