|
|
 |
|
The Story of Disco Saturday Night Forever: The Story of Disco; by Alan Jones and Jussi Kantonen; A Cappella Books; 276 pages; $16.95. 
In 1980 disco died; the victim of a backlash against the music and all it represented. Of course, high energy dance music played in clubs by deejays never "died". Instead, it
continued to be popular among the groups that created it in the first place:
African-Americans, Latinos and urban gay men.
Twenty years after the "death of disco" the music is as popular as ever: clubs hold regular "retro" nights; music companies like Rhino continue to produce best-selling disco compilations; and urban radio stations play "jammin' 80's and 70's" music. It was only a matter of time before disco got the scholarly treatment already given to jazz, rock, R&B and country music. Saturday Night Forever: The Story of Disco is the first book that I know of that covers urban dance music from its beginnings in the urban black, Hispanic and queer ghettos to its manifestations around the world. It goes beyond Donna Summer, Studio 54 and Saturday Night Fever to cover obscure and unheralded disco cuts from England, the Continent ("Eurodisco") and beyond.
Several chapters of Saturday Night Forever detail the gay contributions to disco. In a sense, disco was an offshoot of Stonewall: "When gay men won the right to dance intimately together without worrying about police interference, the disco boom really couldn't be too far behind. The two cultures were waiting for each other to propel both lifestyles into the spotlight." The disco lifestyle, its clothes, clubs, dances, drugs and careless sex were largely derived from urban gay men. By the same token, the anti-disco backlash was brought about by straight white men who resented the power and influence of gay men (not to mention ethnic and racial minorities): "Only by killing disco could rock music reaffirm its threatened masculinity and could straight men . . . get their balls back with some pride intact. The 'disco sucks' division . . . wasn't so much an assembly against mindless plastic music as about putting gay liberation back in its nocturnal niche." Music writing is mostly the province of straight white male baby boomers. To them, disco music is a minor nuisance on the road between Led Zeppelin and the Sex Pistols. Saturday Night Forever benefits from the fact that the authors are European and, if not gay, have a "gay sensibility". Having said that, I found Saturday Night Forever to be a disappointment. Instead of a single smooth narrative, the book is a series of loosely-connected chapters (some written by one author and some by the other) that deal with various facets of the disco phenomenon. Though Donna Summer is on the cover, she is dismissed early in the book, and Gloria Gaynor's "I Will Survive" (the greatest song of the disco era, IMHO) is referred to in passing. Still, any book about disco can't be all bad, even one that has a whole chapter about Studio 54 but doesn't mention the Monster (Fire Island or Key West). There are lot of goodies in this book, from "A Guide to Disco Drugs" (don't try this at home) to a list of celebrities who embarrassed themselves by cutting disco albums. There's also a list of "Essential Disco Records" and reproductions of some of the campiest, most outrageous disco album covers (Roller Boogie, anyone?). All that's missing is the music; and if you're like me Saturday Night Forever is sure to propel you to your nearest CD player. Jesse Monteagudo is a freelance writer who lives in South Florida with his domestic partner. He may be reached at jessemonteagudo@aol.com |
© 1997-2002 BEI