The Resuscitation of Disco

Today I want to stray away for a second from vinyls and talk about a genre of music that always puts me in a good mood… disco. Now once again I probably lost a few of you but that I okay, if not, glad you stayed around. Now why do I want to talk about disco? Well it is because of the resurgence it has had in the past few years. There's a few artists that have at least one song that has some sort of disco influence. Some, like Dua Lipa, have more than one. Growing up disco was very present in my life. My mom grew up listening to ABBA and loving their music. One of the vinyl records in my collection is actually one of her old copies. It is ABBA Greatest Hits from 1976. I have fond memories of seeing Agnetha shocked as Benny and Anny kiss passionately next to her and a very uninterested Björn reading a newspaper. I am also guilty (but not apologetic) of loving the Mamma Mia movies, I am a sucker for a medley movie. Another disco band that I truly enjoy is very very unknown. Like, if I tell you their name you would definitely not know them at all. Their name is The Bee Gees… I know I find myself very funny. But all jokes aside, The Bee Gees have some really catchy songs. That also includes More than a Woman which sadly due to TikTok, has drained any affinity I had for this song for the next 5 years or so. By the way, I highly recommend the HBO documentary on their lives, it is very interesting. Disco is catchy, I think it is wonderful, and I would dare say it is back from the dead.

Now, in case you are wondering why I said disco is back from the dead, I'll allow myself to indulge in a slight tangent. So disco died. This is a very big part of American history, particularly because of the visceral reactions disco was causing in certain individuals during the late 1970s. One particular event happened in Chicago in 1979. Quick summary, a radio host Steve Dahl created a bonfire consisting of Disco Records, there was a certain race and homophobic aspect in this event as well since a lot of the views of destroying disco was due to conservative views, it being “gay” or “non-white”. This wasn’t the cause for the death of disco but for sure was the nail in the coffin, as well as showing the ugly side to society.

Okay, so let's get out of the bleak ideas of systematic racism and people hating, and look into the present. I genuinely have been enjoying the return of disco. Seeing so many versions of ABBA raves popping up around Chicago, looks like so much fun. I was talking with someone today about this topic and we kind of found it funny how disco coming back shows we are in a recession cause people need to be happy. And who doesn’t like to be happy, no?