Entertainment For Lively Minds
Disco sucketh not
Yes, it's hard to believe now from our enlightened 21st Century perspective, but there was once a time when cloth-eared Americans gathered together in a football stadium and burnt disco records. "Disco Demolition Night" (Thursday July 12 1979, Comiskey Park, Chicago, Illinois, fact fans) must surely rank as one of the more moronic episodes in the history of popular culture, and also one of the most misjudged.
For amongst those smouldering 45s were undoubtedly many records by Chic and Sister Sledge, who made music so utterly glorious that when I hear it I can't understand why I bother listening to anything else. I've spent the last couple of hours trying to work out exactly what makes those records so special, and I'm going to throw out a few ideas.
The first thing that always strikes me is the wonders worked by Nile Rodgers and Bernard Edwards in the studio. They somehow managed to create a lush, warm sound that was simultaneously light and airy. Helping enormously in this regard was the fact that behind the drumkit was one Tony Thompson, a man for whom creating rhythm was as natural as breathing is for the rest of us. There was no excess flab on his beats... they were as lean and taut as you like and provided a rock solid base for Edwards' bass and Rodgers' guitar.
The bass... blimey. I played Thinking of You earlier and actually burst out laughing when Edwards entered the funky fray at 0.38. My god, what a musician he was. In his hands a bass guitar was a vehicle for expressing joy. Such was his musical ear that he never allowed his unparalleled virtuosity to swamp his innate good taste. He played a lot of notes, but never too many and always the right ones. Bass players the world over fumbled along to Good Times: the majority wept out of sheer frustration; a few succeeded in copying him and now teach "Advanced Funk Bass" courses at Berklee College of Music.
Over this majestic bedrock Nile Rodgers layered his languid, snaking rhythm guitar. He is one of the few musicians whose playing has reduced me to tears on more than one occasion (I Want Your Love, if anyone's interested). He was so damn musical, always leaving space where space was required and playing something exquisite the rest of the time. His name doesn't often feature in 'great guitarists' polls, but that's only because he didn't wear spandex and play tedious rock guitar solos.
A neglected part of the Chic sound was the beautifully uplifting piano parts. Typically the drums, bass and guitar would establish a groove before sparse, stately piano chords would enter floating over the top. They created dynamic tension and served the added purpose of linking the backing tracks with the vocals. Those muppets in Comiskey Park were either deaf or they wouldn't have recognized musical brilliance if it had bells on.
The naysayers gathered there in a frenzy of vinyl destruction would probably have shouted something about how disco records are "dumbass" and don't say anything meaningful whilst caressing their Lynyrd Skynyrd albums. And yet this is yet another thing that they spectacularly failed to understand - Chic's lyrics were expressing that most basic of human needs, having fun. "He had the kind of body / That would shame Adonis" - it takes a special kind of genius to write that and especially to sing it with conviction. The good ladies who fronted Rodgers and Edwards' productions get short thrift in the band biographies, but they were absolutely essential in being the approachable, human face in front of the musicians' studied perfection. They sang the words that expressed the thrill of losing yourself on the dancefloor whilst the drums and bass made sure that you did just that.
I love Chic and Sister Sledge. Their great records are as vital and moving as anything in the received rock canon of greatness. Only Bob Dylan never wrote the bass part to Good Times...
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Love Rodgers & Edwards
Always have, together with their work for others
Just occasionally the fact that just about every tune starts with the statement of intention chorus before going into the verse gets just slightly wearing but I'll let them off.
I kept buying the albums when everybody else gave up. Lets hear it for
Firstly, 26 - prime example of the Chic verse introduction
Then, the funk groove of Chic Mystique from 1992
First things first
Tim, I must send you your prize for the World Cup sweep. Sorry, brain like a sieve, Best Of Earth Wind and Fire ok?
Thanks for remembering Dave
Much appreciated
I'll send you my email
Argh! Me too!
Really sorry, Tim. The sweepstake completely slipped my mind. I'll get on it.
Cheers Joe
Much appreciated
Joy Patrick,
sheer unadulterated joy in what they were doing. In fact you could say they were "Lost In Music"
As baseball promotions go
(and thinketh not this was anything but) it's about as significant and was not quite as successful as 10 Cent Beer Night in Cleveland. However if it makes you feel better, think of it as yet another deeply embarrassing moment in amerikun kulture and we'll hang our collective heads in shame for you.
Yes, it wasn't exactly a spontaneous event...
but it was still a low point of American culture, of which Chic were one of the many, many highs.
And ain't that just
what makes it such a darned interesting place?
It wasn't much better in England
Punk/New Wave/Indie was overwhelmingly white & middle class - not the bands, the audience. There was definitely some unconscious - which I stress - racism there. Ska chipped away at that and over the years it has just seemed to become less of an issue.
I remember Danny Baker and a very small number of other journalists who were going on about the joys of disco, the NME Thought Police in the 6th Form at my school weren't having any of it. They lost thank god.
MAM - wind your neck in for god's sake
I was listening to this today :
Diana Ross - I'm Coming Out
Hard to resist "air drumming" on the intro
Kick drumming too
(Can you 'air kick drum'?)
Disco sucketh a bit
I'd love to hear Chic stripped to drums, bass and guitar. The strings, the bells and the gloopy piano which drenched every track of that era (along with every video that started with a close up of a mirror ball, and a slow pull back to reveal a dancefloor covered in dry ice) have permanently damaged disco for me.
A couple of
slightly more obscure Chic connections:
Nile Rodgers - The Land Of The Good Groove
Norma Jean - I Like Love - Top 10 if Sister Sledge had done it in 1979. Nile's guitar playing is pure joy here.
Great to hear "26" again by the way Tim.
Hello Patrick.
What Niles Rogers and Bernard Edwards did was extremely simple. They did the sad lyrics and happy music thing better than anyone. That to me is the finest pop combination, anyone who can do that well, deserves riches beyond my imagination. Think Help! Think Tears Of A Clown. Think Good Times, Think Dance Dance Dance (Yowsa Yowsa Yowsa).
The sophistication of the music needs more skill than I possess to describe. Ian McDonald in The people's Music comes close.
My God I love Chic.
I once interviewed Niles Rogers *drops name.* It was a rubbish interview, I was too star struck. But it was a joy.
Hmmm
I agree with much of what you say, though I also agree with the good Captain, much of this stuff is horribly over orchestrated. But I wonder why you feel the need to define your affection in terms of dissing the splendid Skynyrd, or, for that matter, spandex clad guitar heros. Especially since we know from posts passim that you love a good guitar wig out. Maybe a teeeeny bit of you knows it's also a bit naff? Tish.
Interesting points, Patrick..
But the compulsive polyrythmic virtuosity of the two men perhaps created something a little too damn complicated for the white folks to dance to and was actually one of the nails in the coffin for classic disco, resulting in the rise of house music, the ashes from the disco inferno in Chicago seemingly acting as a potent fertilizer.
Simon Napier-Bell makes this point at great length in his book Black Vinyl, White Powder. I think there's a fair few holes in his argument but his basic premise is worthy of consideration.
Thank you Patrick
I did a gig on Saturday night, and played "Thinking Of You" on an acoustic guitar. People loved it, and I got a nice warm feeling from being able to play it. The point is, those songs do work stripped down, which reinforces your OP. These guys were pure class, and I agree that it is impossible to listen to them without being moved.
Genius.
I've loved them from the beginning
This was always one of my favourite productions of theirs
And Tony Thompson was peerless.
Brilliant Patrick
I'm not a fan of disco music particuarly but your post is so good I can see some major re-evaluation in the post.
In fact, your passion and erudition are akin to what Ian McDonald did for the HJH's in Revolution In The Head. You've taken something which has turned into aural wallpaper and injected it with such love and enthusiasm I'm desperate to hear it again.
Thats what good writing about music is for.
Thanks again.
Depends what Disco you're talking about..
..you're examples are top end stuff, coming as they do from the soul/funk area, but much Disco was over-egged garbage assembled by opportunistic producers (a lot of it from Europe..especially Germany)
That did (and still does) suck.
Like Donna Summer
????
Donna Summer
i think "I feel love" is the absolute best disco single ever.
Love to love you baby isnt so shabby either.
Not particularly...
..(thoughs she's not very funky, is she?)
I mean crap like Lady Bump and Boney M.
Lost In Music
If the Word Massive had a theme tune, what would it be? I nominate this:
The massive theme choon?
"W-O-R-D!"
(although I heart this version as well)
Wot?
No Mel B version?!
what a wonderful post
*fires up iTunes*
I didn't realise "Disco Sucks" was 1979
not only was it moronic and misjudged, it was about 4 years too late. 6 Years after "The Love I lost". 2 Years after Saturday Night Fever.
(Dons Simon Bates voice): It was also the year The Beach Boys got on a Disco Tip and gave us this (which probably encapsulates everything that isn't good about Disco but is still quite good)
As I recall
At one point in time I owned the 14 minute version of this song on vinyl. Oh those heady days of youth.
Can I just add
that the photo adorning Patrick's original post is one of my favourite rock-related pictures ever. To me, it captures perfectly the sheer joy and exuberance of Chic...
I didn't ASK to be born!
You don't want your bedroom records to be joyful, particularly as a teenager. I went through a stage of buying such records but found that I didn't enjoy them as much in my home. They are made to be enjoyed on the dancefloor. As much as "Good Times" is a floor-filler, it is just as much a bedroom-emptier.
The Johnny Mathis / Chic collaboration album
has famously been sitting in the vaults for 30+ years and highlights may supposedly at last be coming out as part of a Chic box set this year or next. Anyroad here's the first track, as previewed in May on of all things, Jazz FM.
About time too. Sounds fresh as fuck. Go Mathis!
Sounds terrific
- can't understand why this was never given a release. Of course, Mathis already made one great disco record in "Gone, Gone, Gone".
Thanks Patrick
I've been Spotifying this lot over breakfast and am now feel much better about today. A couple of points
1. In terms of the production, it sounds to me like Nile Rodgers always plugs his guitar straight into the mixing desk. Guitars always sound much tighter when this happens.
2. Mrs Elliott has quite rightly pointed out that the intros are SO great that often the rest of the song doesn't quite pay off.
Slash
In the interests of thoroughness I checked the iPod this morning to discover I have a version of "Le Freak" featuring Slash on lead guitar! He plays a great (not tedious) blast of wah wah'd Les Paul mayhem.
I heartily
concur Patrick with all you've written. At the height of Madchester I really got into Chic and the production work of Nile Rogers and Bernard Edwards. This interest was triggered by The Happy Mondays who, at the time of Bummed, seemed to be throwing everything into the liquidiser: PIL meets Parliament was one description I remember. Anyway Wrote For Luck was part of my DJ set and often segued into Good Times.
Your comments about how to rate Rogers as a guitarist in a world of revered spandex-clad fret wank (which I too enjoy now and then to be frank, or indeed fwank) made me laugh. One of my all time favourite guitar breaks is the closing solo of Diana Ross' Upside Down which is so happy a sound it's ridiculous. By which I mean it's ridiculous that it renders me a grinning idiot such is its infectiousness and sheer joy.
I like the story that having been denied entry to Club 54 Rogers and Edwards returned home to jam, laying down the music for the track Le Freak, venting their anger and frustration at not gaining entry to the club by shouting "Ahhh, Fuck Off" at the point where the classic "Freak Out" would later become the ear-catching exclamation.
Soup For One
Nile and BerNARD did a movie soundtrack that yielded these two beauties:
I Want Your Love
Agree with so much of what you say Mr C. Especially regarding the sublime "I Want Your Love"
So - as I don't think it has been posted earlier - may I?
I think
she wants his love. There is no doubt about this at all. Good groove.
Nice post, sir
Re. the "Disco Sucks" phase, what most don't seem to remember is that Disco (in it's myriad forms) was everywhere at the time, and absolutely impossible to avoid. Having just gone through punk & new wave, clubs, radio & TV producers were delighted (post Saturday Night Fever) to have music they liked to play rather than all that raucous noise, and filled the air with it (I remember Radio Luxembourg switching to an "all-disco" format at the time). All seems rather quaint now, but tribalism was still all the rage then, and nailing one's colours to whatever musical mast was a serious business...
As a 14-15 year old budding punk at the time this seemed like the worst thing in the world, though I've since grown to love the majesty of Chic's world of music, especially "Everybody Dance" and "Spacer", and I'm on record in these very forums as believing "1, 2, awwwwww, FREAK OUT" as the best intro in popular song... BTW, Nile Rodgers in some interview said one of their production tricks was to record the drums in the vocal booth and vice-versa.
Proof Positive
The Mighty Arthur Russell. Wasn't it Ta;king Heads who first realized disco was the street black music of its day, ala Motown? I think we can hear what David Byrne heard here. Excellent cello solo, sir!
Disco Demolition
Just done some YouTube trawling of the 'Disco Demolition' in Chicago.
How very strange.
I'm trying to think what a British equivalent might (have) look(ed) like.
Some local radio DJ blowing up a box of New Romantic records between innings in a one day cricket match at Edgbaston in 1983?
James May deleting 20TB of X-Factor MP3's at half-time between Saracens and London Irish?
It shouldn't do, but the image of some poor old baseball player almost getting decapitated by a Beach Boys lp in the outfield, makes me smile.
Disco is ace though.
Anyroad, here you go: