Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
Disco's Gay History: Liberation, Gentrification and Death (1-8)
71 Plays1 year ago
In this special episode we take a poignant look at the final chapter of disco's story—the impact of gentrification on its vibrant, diverse community
As the '70s roared to a close, disco faced mounting pressures from mainstream America. What began as a subversive movement rooted in the LGBTQ+ and black and brown communities soon found itself co-opted by the mainstream, diluted of its radical origins.
Join us as we explore the role of gentrification in disco's demise. We unpack how predominantly white, affluent audiences flocked to discotheques, pushing out the very people who birthed the genre. The once-inclusive spaces that welcomed all races, sexualities, and genders became exclusive enclaves, shutting out those who had once found solace and liberation on the dance floor.We spotlight the resilience of queer, black, and brown communities who continue to keep the spirit of disco alive, reclaiming its roots and reshaping its future. As we bid farewell to disco's glittering heyday, we honor its legacy as a beacon of diversity, empowerment, and unapologetic self-expression.
Check out History 101 episode on the History of Disco for another great reference
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction and Co-host Absence
00:00:01
Speaker
Hi, this is John with the Fun with Sex podcast. I'm not here with my normal co-host Natalie. I'm here with.
The Gay Roots of Disco
00:00:08
Speaker
Hi, my name is Noah. She's going to be joining me as we're talking about the gay history of disco. So first question, what do you think of when you think of disco? Um, I have a relatively like rudimentary understanding of disco. So I think for me, just like disco balls, the seventies, ABBA, Donna Summer, Blondie, I love Blondie.
Disco's Diverse Beginnings
00:00:30
Speaker
That comes a little bit later. Yeah. Yeah. Do you think of like fancy clothing? Do you think of like a strap and get outfits? Yeah. The bedazzles, John Travolta, like Seven Night Theater. Like I think that's the stuff I was exposed to the most growing up. Oh, we're going to get really into Saturday Night Fever. Oh, I'm so excited. Let me ask you a different question. Yes. So when you think of country music, think of what demographic do you think country music is for? White people in the boonies. Okay. Uh, let's go genre like rap in the nineties. Who do you think has listened to rap in the nineties?
00:01:01
Speaker
Dude's in New York and LA. Black people in New York and LA. I'll put you in the awkward spot. Let's go Y2K party clubbing music. Girls who do too much cocaine. That's really fair. Now, disco. Who listens to disco? Typically, I imagine people in the 70s. I've always thought of disco as being relatively racially diverse.
00:01:31
Speaker
You're out on the weekend, you're trying to get loose. I know back then it was a more risque kind of thing that maybe you don't perceive in the same way now. But yeah, I guess I've never associated a specific demographic to disco. You're doing a lot better than most people.
00:01:48
Speaker
I think by the late 70s, people associate disco with white people who want to party. Okay. When in reality, disco was for everybody. Yeah. Disco was for gay people, it was for black people, it was for brown people. It later became for white straight people, which also led to its detriment. But originally disco was the genre for everyone who, I guess, rock and current mainstream pop culture didn't appear to appeal to when it first started.
Stonewall and Queer Spaces
00:02:17
Speaker
We can't talk about disco without setting the scene, the environment of why disco thrives so well. So what do you know about Stonewall, the Stonewall riots? I know it was a really popular nightclub for queer people back in the sixties. I'm going to feel so bad if I screw that up. I know for a lot of people that was kind of under the
00:02:39
Speaker
onto the radar meeting spot, you know, that they kind of had to keep away with it, be from some of their families, their employers, and that there was a famous police raid on it where people had to really, like, defend the club as, like, police were attacking it. You're doing really good. You're doing a lot better than I was actually expecting. I was so worried. You're doing my job for me. I was so worried I would fail the test. So what made Stonewall special was Stonewall was one of the few bars nightclubs in New York City that queer people could dance together.
00:03:07
Speaker
most gay bars in New York City were sit-down bars. They were ran by the mob. Even, yeah, the mob extorted gay bars because they were able to pay off cops and say like, hey, cops, don't raid these bars. Or when you do raid, give us a heads up. That sounds messed up, but that sounds accurate. Yeah. Yeah. And all the other gay bars were in New York City were predominantly
00:03:31
Speaker
Failed with white men who are a little bit wealthier who are a little bit more socially economically secure Okay, so Stonewall was different Stonewall was the gay bar for everyone who didn't go to those bars. So think black people Think more femme presenting people a lot of trans women a lot of lesbians. Yeah, think of brown people think of poor people and
00:03:54
Speaker
people who are already vulnerable within a community of people who are also vulnerable. The most marginalized out of a marginalized community. Yes. And that's what made Stonewall so special. I see. Was that when the cops raided other bars, one, the mafia had enough money to pay the cops to be nicer to people. But the mafia also gave people a lot more warning to prepare for it. And when the other gay bars in New York City got raided, normally what happens is
00:04:18
Speaker
These are wealthier men of status who have more to lose if their identities get exposed. So a lot of times they comply with police. They pay the fine. They do the walk of shame. They go quietly. They go quietly. Stonewall was a group of people who already lost everything. And the one place that they all had was this bar that they can dance in and they can form community. Yeah. Which is why they were willing to defend Stonewall because there have been other
00:04:48
Speaker
nightclubs across the country where there were riots slash uprisings against police brutality. Yeah, because like we can go into this in another episode, but historically, there's a long history from since the 50s of law enforcement breaking into surveilling and breaking into queer spaces and arresting gay people. Yes. And there was other uprisings around the country would make Stonewall different was
00:05:12
Speaker
After this spot, this spot for community and for dancing was protected, it lasted multiple days. And because it was in New York with the most marginalized communities, it kickstarted a movement. Yeah.
Regulation and Social Norms
00:05:24
Speaker
And what a lot of people got wrong, or gets wrong about Stonewall is, there was a lot of queer people who were against the Stonewall activists when it first started.
00:05:33
Speaker
That makes sense. Because they thought that they were hurting the reputation of being able to conform to society and they were causing too much havoc by fighting law enforcement. Another aspect that people get wrong about Stonewall is that a lot of the people who started the initial Stonewall riots were sex workers. Oh, okay. That makes lots of sense. I imagine their livelihoods would depend greatly on the bar being open and people being able to attend and have fun there. I mean, you have to think about
00:06:01
Speaker
Oh, why am I blanking on her name? Marsha P. Johnson. Yeah. What's the fact that like, if you're a trans woman in New York City, where else are you going to find work? Yeah, I could not imagine that makes so much more sense. And against the walls, one of the few places where people can dance. Do you know about
00:06:21
Speaker
the history of same-gender dancing in America. Trust me, this is all getting to disco. I need to set the political scene.
Underground to Mainstream
00:06:27
Speaker
I do not. Could you please inform me? So for most of U.S. history, going back to the wild, wild West and like colonial times, there were laws regulating what genders can dance with each other.
00:06:39
Speaker
because dancing out in nightlife is a form of intimacy. It's very physical, it's touching, it often leads to emotional and sexual relationships. I mean, even if you think about today when people go out dancing in nightclubs,
00:06:53
Speaker
And I'm not going to say it normally leads to a hookup. I'm not going to say it normally leads to a hookup. But you're more likely to hook up with somebody after a dance party than you are if you go meet them at a neighborhood watch meeting or like a political conference. I dance with people I'm not interested in. Here we go. And that's why dancing was so regulated in like early America.
00:07:11
Speaker
And why same gender dancing was so regulated was because sexual acts between people in the same gender were prohibited. And part of the way that you regulate that is by not allowing them to be physically intimate with each other. That makes sense. Which is why this is where disco comes in. Ah, okay. So disco started off as an underground movement.
00:07:30
Speaker
for people of the same gender and black and brown communities to be able to dance together. Did you know that? I did not. That's incredible. Disco started off closer to house parties than anything, than like the fancy disco parties that you think of like Studio 54 and like
00:07:48
Speaker
The ones in rural America where you see white guys in fancy collars and sparkling-link clothing.
Rise of the DJ Culture
00:07:55
Speaker
This was more gay men, a lot of gay men in colors, in shorts, T-shirts, sweating, partying together in the house. A real homegrown movement. Real homegrown movement. That's incredible. Do you know why records playing became really popular in disco instead of other types of music?
00:08:17
Speaker
What I've heard is that for one, the size of a 12-inch LP is conducive to having a longer track. I've heard it preserves the audio quality better too. I would imagine it would be more affordable at least at that time than cassette. 100%. So affordability, also you want longer tracks because if you're a queer person dealing with suppression. I'm on the floor. You want lights low, you want to dance, and you want the song to go as long as possible. You don't need long vocal tracks and long
00:08:47
Speaker
dialogues of lyrics because you just hear the dance, you want the music. You also don't want the awkward moments in between, say like a live music, when the music stops for three hours. And it becomes awkward because now I'm this queer person in a space where I'm not technically supposed to be dealing with self-oppression.
00:09:07
Speaker
I don't want these awkward moments, which is why you now have the turntable where you have one song that's ending, the other song is going, and we can have this timeless experience of dancing. Oh, okay. The other reason why records were turned to a set of live music was you have to remember, one, these were house parties. Two, there was a lot of regulation on same-gender dancing, so you couldn't have a live bed.
00:09:33
Speaker
Yeah, I'm sure a lot of house bands, that would be both probably very expensive and a liability to them. So yeah, you couldn't have live music. No live band worth their salt. We're going to perform at a gay party or a gay club.
Disco's Impact on Social Hierarchies
00:09:44
Speaker
So someone just said pass me the ox. So literally someone just said pass me the ox. And that's how you get the formation of basically DJs and disco tactics. Yeah. I'm talking about that word. Do you know where the word disco tactic comes from?
00:10:01
Speaker
No. Okay. So do you know the word biblioteca? Bookstore or library. Book. Book library. Now disco taco. Disco library. Disco library. Let's go. So this is the early movement of setting the scene of the early disco movement. Do you know, understand why dancing was so political? I mean, I guess just based on like the factors that you discussed, like
00:10:29
Speaker
It's this culturally recognized, I guess, practice of physical intimacy. Yeah. And I'm going to get into later, but there's also a long history of prohibiting black and brown people from dancing together. I mean, black and brown people from dancing with white people in America.
Mainstream Success and Loss of Essence
00:10:47
Speaker
Yeah. And that was a big complaint about the jazz and blues movement in the early 20th century.
00:10:54
Speaker
Interesting. Yeah, it was idea that you brought this interracial mix together you're dancing together It is hard to uphold views of racial gender or sexual hierarchies When I'm dancing with you when I'm hanging out with you when we're doing drugs together for lack of a better way Yeah as a friend and not somebody to subvert or be disgusted by I see So these house parties started and then slowly Straight women started to come and hang out with their gay friends
00:11:23
Speaker
and it became more open and accepting like places. And studio heads start hearing these different tracks that started charting. And before for the longest, they thought it was just a trend. But this was the music that people were listening to. When you think of like, let me ask you a question. When you think of 70s charting music, what do you think of? Apple would be the first thing that would come to my mind. I maybe would go like somewhere like a Pink Floyd, but
00:11:48
Speaker
I would think, what are people listening to every day? I would bet on Apple way quicker. You're a way better guest than I actually wanted.
00:11:56
Speaker
I want you to guess rock. Most people of you say, hey, what is popular 70s music and rock? I mean, what is popular 70s music? The answer would be rock. But in reality, popular 70s music was disco. Disco was the stuff that was topping the charts. It's fun. It's fun as danceable as what people was listening to. Absolutely. Record heads weren't so known at first. Interesting. Until.
00:12:23
Speaker
It started until straight culture started to get kind of picks it up. Yeah. And that brings us into Saturday Night Fever. Wonderful. Our good friend John Travolta and Studio 54. Yes. So in the mid 70s, both those things happen at the same time. Do you know Studio 54? I know Donald Trump likes hanging out there at least used to like hanging out there. Donald Trump used to love hanging out with Studio 54.
00:12:47
Speaker
So Studio 54 was the first, was one of the first clubs, the first disco tech that goes really mainstream in the United States. Okay. Uh, these two investors opened this club in New York city and it's a disco party. Yeah. The security is headed by all gay people. Uh, the club is ran by mostly the hostess. Most popular people in a club are drag queens and trans women.
00:13:13
Speaker
knowing that Donald Trump goes here paints this in such a different light now. Yeah, Donald Trump
Sexual Liberation and Political Messages
00:13:18
Speaker
loved this place. One of the big things about it was that a lot of times they didn't have a liquor license because people were doing everything else. Think of modern rave culture today. What type of things are people doing? People are doing Molly, they're doing Coke, they're
00:13:35
Speaker
going to K holes and Sykes and this and the other. Nobody's like, I'm sure nobody's getting drunk at Burning Man. So 70s is coke. Yeah. People are doing lots and lots of coke. Why? Because it allows you to party longer. Yeah. Whereas alcohol is
00:13:50
Speaker
Alcohol is good for a bit when you're going out. But it's a depressant. But it's a depressant at the end of the day. Yeah. If you want to party from 11 o'clock at night, took six o'clock in the morning. You're going to take uppers. You're doing uppers. Yeah. So there was a lot of drugs going on. There was a lot of sex going on, which brings me back to like dancing and hookups. Okay. Which is one of the big things that like originally disco was known for. And a reason why a lot of heteronormative culture was against it. Disco was very sexual.
00:14:18
Speaker
Yeah. Because you have this community where people, these people can't be sexual anywhere else where they're known and identified by their sexual behavior and disco parties and these house parties are the only places where they can be sexually free. Yeah.
00:14:35
Speaker
So what they would do is the hookup culture was very prevalent inside disco or these disco house parties. That makes sense. There was this party called The Loft. It wasn't a, it wasn't a sanctioned nightclub in the same way that Studio 54 was, but it was one of the first big house disco parties in New York. And one of the big things it was known for was the prevalence of sex acts there.
00:14:57
Speaker
Oh, okay. Even Studio 54 was nicknamed the sex club because you would go upstairs into a VIP area. And I think it was latex or rubber. They coated all their furniture with to clean up body fluids. Classy. Very classy. And that also shows you the history of like hookup culture in nightlife goes hand in hand.
00:15:19
Speaker
Yeah, that makes it's like a cultural custom for three for all this other like taboo interests and practice. And before a country that we're so repressed about our sexuality, it gives us a space where we can like, allow that side of us to be unrepressed, unleashing in a way that normally doesn't hurt us in the rest of our everyday lives. Yeah. You can be ultra sexual at a nightclub in a way that you can't be in the office at your job or walking down the street, right? Or even at the beach.
00:15:49
Speaker
Which gets me to another place is a lot of people look at disco and they claim the disco is... Let me ask you this. Would you describe disco as political? Knowing you, you probably would. I wouldn't have thought so on its face. I guess I would have dissociated the politics, political music from dance music. I typically would think like... Because at least nowadays, I don't look at...
00:16:11
Speaker
EDM is being political, right? That conversation later. EDM is very political. Oh, look at this so much. I'm so excited. House and techno music is very political. House is the birth child of disco. Or House is the child of disco. Right. Yeah. Please explain. Could you please explain more like how politically this functions? Gotcha. Yeah. So again, painting the time of the 70s, what all is happening in the 70s?
00:16:40
Speaker
Watergate Vietnam, Vietnam, hippies, OPEC, OPEC. Yeah. Uh, I would, yeah, like first like real like sense of the climate change concerns. I was like, cause like, wasn't the EPA just a big one climate change. No, what happened in the, would it just ended in the sixties? That's still going on in the seventies. No, you have nom. What am I? Oh, civil rights, civil rights movement. I've done civil rights movement going on. So you have the civil rights movement going on. You have the gay liberation movement going on.
Symbolism in Music and Messages
00:17:10
Speaker
You have the country losing faith in the economy, because you have the OPEC crisis. You have the country losing faith in our democracy, because you have Watergate and Reagan. Yeah. So on the surface, disco music is, we're going to let free. We're just going to dance. We're going to ignore the politics. I'm going to give you a space to be yourself. There's something kind of blue pill on its face. Something kind of blue pill on its face. But have you ever heard of the song, I Will Survive? Yes. What do you think that's about?
00:17:41
Speaker
I would have never thought it would have been more than maybe a song about personal struggle. I've never looked into it more than that. And who do you think will resonate with a song about personal struggle in the mid and early 1970s? People from marginalized communities. People from marginalized communities. Disco was very fucking political. That makes so much more sense. Let me ask you another question. Please. Killist people. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Because that's kind of historically been understood to be a queer group, right? With the YMCA and all that.
00:18:10
Speaker
What do you know about the YMCA in queer culture? I don't know a lot. I know the connection with the village people. I know the rumor that people in the village people are all gay, but I would imagine that would make sense that that would become a space for queer communities because it is a third space. So the YMCA, in its inception,
00:18:31
Speaker
was originally a British group that came to America. Oh. British foundation that came to America. Interesting. And basically it provided housing for men who were kind of down on their luck. Oh. So a lot of these times what attracted were men who were fleeing their own home because they were queer coming into major cities. And now you have this space that is an all men atmosphere where a lot of them are queer
00:18:55
Speaker
It's another co-kid. Yeah. Yeah. Young men, they're telling the most people is speaking in cold to queer men in America and saying like, Hey, there's this location where you can find other people like yourself. Okay. In the Navy. Not familiar, actually. In the Navy. In the Navy. Okay.
00:19:20
Speaker
It's a song telling about like Navy sailors. Navy sailors. Yeah. Yeah. In World War II, we can do an episode on that later. Yeah. World War II, arguably, kick started the Marvin Korowites movement. Oh. And a big part of that was like, you have the spaces that were all men, spaces where these people left their rural homes out in the middle of nowhere. Yeah. They're getting to see the world together. They're free from a lot of the
00:19:47
Speaker
social consequences of breaking normative behavior that they would have back home. Yes. And you stick all these guys on a ship together. What happens at sea stays at sea. What happens at sea stays at sea. They're away from home and they sort of spawn a little bit of their sexuality. Yeah. And a lot of queer men end up in a Navy because they find out that this is a spot for them to, how do I say this?
00:20:08
Speaker
connect and cruise for all the queer men. Yeah, it makes sense how that kind of that trope comes to be. In the Navy was a very vocal song. Okay. Have you heard of the song Macho Man by the Village People? No, I have not. Macho, Macho Man. I'm going to be real, like YMCA is like my experience. That's what most people know. And it's also so funny when you see like all these like Christian groups listening to YMCA, which is like, I'm getting to a point that's getting to, I'm foreshadowing an appointment. That later is what kills disco.
00:20:37
Speaker
The fact that it's been co-opted too much by straight capitalist culture, that makes sense. Yeah, that'll do it. But Macho Man was a critique of masculinity. Yeah. They're talking about how gay men have to over-perform masculinity to be able to fit into society. They talk about working on your body and preparing and looking tough.
00:20:57
Speaker
because if you're a queer man, you can't be, quote unquote, weak because then you're vulnerable. No twinks in the 70s. Yeah. Let me ask you another question. Have you heard of I Feel Love by Donna Summer? Yeah. It's a song about love and acceptance. Yeah. A black woman singing about love and acceptance post Civil Rights movement. Yeah. This makes so much more sense. Singing to queer people. Yeah. So in a sense, it's like the political messaging there has always been direct. It's just never been
00:21:27
Speaker
I guess like the main focus of the popular culture examining it after the fact. Yes. So the problem with disco was that to the ear that wasn't trained to hear the messages that was singing. Yes. If you don't know about cruising culture at the YMCA, you hear the YMCA as a fun little dancing song. But if you know about cruise culture, this is a very political message. Yes. Same thing about in the Navy. If I'm singing in the Navy to a group of like
00:21:57
Speaker
suburban Christian white rural people. They think this is a patriotic song. Talk about how cool the US Navy is. Everybody wanted born in the USA on the 4th of July. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. If you're not listening to the Masters of Born in the USA, you think it's a patriotic song. Right. If you think if you're not listening to the Masters of in the Navy, you think it's a patriotic song, singing about the power of the US naval force, not a song about hey queer people, you can find community as a sailor. Yeah. Same thing with Macho Man.
00:22:26
Speaker
You think it's just about some buff guy who's like goes to the gym and works out on that a lot. But if you're a queer person who has to perpetually perform hyper masculinity, you read that much. Yeah. Same thing with I Will Survive. Disco was very political. Have you heard of Sylvester? No. So Sylvester was a sign mill and birth. Okay. Gender nonconforming. They didn't refer to themselves as a trans person because like
00:22:53
Speaker
That language is still developing at the time. Yes. But like today we will call that person a trans person.
Decline Due to Commercialization
00:22:58
Speaker
Interesting. Even though a side mill at birth, you know what some investor called themselves? No. The queen of disco. Oh. Disco is very political. This is blowing my mind. Yeah. This is awesome. And like people don't know this. And that's the problem with one of the big critiques of disco is that, well, it's so vapid. Yeah. It's so on the face. And on one hand, that's the beauty of disco is that
00:23:22
Speaker
It's a music to dance to. It's accessible. It's accessible. Yeah. It's not Bob Dylan where you have to write out all the lyrics and interpret all the meanings of all the political messages he's saying. All the OG Kendrick fans. If you want to turn off and just dance the disco, you can do that. But it's also when you want to listen, it's a message about finding community in the Navy. It's a message about surviving through hard times. I will survive. Yeah. It's a message about
00:23:52
Speaker
extreme love. Yeah. I feel loved by Donna Summers. It also was like one of the first time that black women were allowed to express sexuality in a music genre. Yeah. Yeah. It didn't even occur to me, especially when you hear like old like, um, soul R and B. Yeah. Like, like the rockets and stuff like that. The fact that like that, those are all very framed, like black women in those roles are like very clearly delegated to like a supporting like vocal role.
00:24:22
Speaker
That's interesting. But even when you look at black women groups like the sixties, they were told to not have any form of sexuality because you have to be callable to white audiences. And imagining if they did have any sexuality, it was purely to appeal to the male gaze. I mean, no, no, they were like almost pulled from like they were told to be as religious as Christian as possible because you need to be callable to white people. Yeah. Disco change that. Yeah. Because the audience is not your white conservative that you want to win over so that black people are okay.
00:24:52
Speaker
your audiences, gay people who have been sexually repressed for decades. Now they're in a space where they can perform hypersexuality. It's not even with the music that reflects it. So when you have a black woman basically moaning on a track for four minutes on a dance floor, it fits into the environment. That's for the audience. Yeah. Yeah. So going back to Studio 54 and Saturday Night Fever, that's ultimately what made disco the most popular.
00:25:20
Speaker
that has ever will be and ever was in America and ultimately what kills it's skull. Do you know why? I think the image of it, I was painted it as a kid is just like, oh, because it's so vapid or it kind of bubble gum on its face. The wave it ran on just kind of ran out and then the 80s came around and people just had the pop of the 80s that kind of took its place.
00:25:51
Speaker
Capitalism. Yeah. And white guys. Yeah. Capitalism and white guys kill disco. Yeah, that makes, yeah. So what happened basically was after Saturday Night Fever, after the success of Studio 54 and celebrities are partying to disco music, disco became cool. It got gentrified. It got gentrified. It got so gentrified. Yeah. And that's one of the big problems is when, think of like rave culture in the early 2000s and 90s rave culture was underground. It wasn't cool.
00:26:19
Speaker
early 2000s, people are listening to dance music again. Yeah. Now all these record labels are just pushing out the same exact sounding music that kind of turns people off because we're early disco was very political. This mass produced disco that was supposed to be palatable to this new white audience, specifically new white men audience. Yeah. Loses all of his meaning. Then the other thing that happens is that disco attack is before
00:26:50
Speaker
It was very hard for discotacas to have established brick and mortar locations. That makes sense. Basically, how do a normativity culture would use any force possible to set it down? Yeah. They would use noise complaints. They'll pull their liquor license. They'll use, I forgot the complaint when people would say that, just like a hindrance of the community zoning laws, anything to stop these queer and black and brown spaces from ending up
00:27:19
Speaker
After Studio 54's success, after the success of Saturday Night Fever, discotaka started popping up everywhere in America. They started popping up in rural shopping malls and which are called Kansas and like Minnesota. But they lose what makes them special, which is the black, brown, and queerness, the marginalized communities. Who made that art what it is. Yeah. And it became just over
00:27:47
Speaker
saturated. Oversaturated white people with like the same sounding disco music. And even in like the disco places that historically were black and brown community or were from marginalized communities, you started seeing white people come into those spaces, straight white people come into those spaces. Yeah. And they started policing queer people's sexuality because they were uncomfortable in the 70s seeing two gay men kissing each other or getting very handsy with each other on the dance floor.
00:28:16
Speaker
Straightway people are incredible. Yeah. People are coming into their space. Stop doing this thing that this space is clearly meant for. A space that was inspired for hypersexuality. Yeah. That's so bad. Yeah. And that kind of kills disco. Yeah. That makes tons of sense. Now we have this new audience who wants to consume what made it great, but record labels are pushing out all these tracks to just sound the exact same, copy and paste it. Yeah. And now they're like, wait, this music is not that good. This sucks. Why are people listening to it?
00:28:46
Speaker
It's not Donna Summers. Right. It's not Gloria Gaynor. Yeah. So by the time, by the time it gets popular, like everybody, the entire like white heteronormative capitalist push that was there purely was there for short-term game.
Policing of Queer Expressions
00:29:01
Speaker
Short-term game. Yeah. And you have to remember that I think Saturday Night Fever came on a 77. Yeah, I was about to say, yeah. Disco dies in 79. Are we, are we getting to the event? I think we're getting to. Actually we can like go right there. Let me finish this first. Okay. Okay.
00:29:15
Speaker
Do you understand, do you know why white men hated disco? Um, I mean, I guess just based on like the things you say, like if I'm thinking just like, I'm just thinking of like Jerry Orbach, you know, um, and what is that? Like, don't put baby in a corner. Why can't I think of what the movie's called? I don't know. But you know what I mean? Like just kind of old, snooty white guy, like you shouldn't be dancing like that. You should be at home praying. Exactly. It was the first space that Dennis sent her white man. Yes. And then they came in.
00:29:44
Speaker
They didn't know the outfits or they didn't want to wear the outfits because they thought it threatened the masculinity. Yeah. They didn't know how to do the dances. Cause like a big part of disco was dancing. Yeah. And there was a lot of squeaky, there was a lot of practice cultural dance that happened in disco that again, burst things like Vulcan in the queer community now. Yeah. White men didn't know how to do it.
00:30:10
Speaker
they didn't want to learn how to do it. So they're just in their feelings about it. They're just in their feelings. But also now their girlfriends are going out to these cool pop-up disco bars, dancing with queer people and people of color. And they're sitting at home because they're either not welcomed or because they don't want to be in these spaces. So now their fragile masculinity is all threatened. Capitalism is also a big thing that helps kill a disco. And not because of the reason we were just talking about radio talk.
00:30:37
Speaker
Yeah, that makes sense because you would need to make a lot of radio edits for these songs to be like... No, because radio space, a lot of those guys were rock. These were rock stations before. And now they don't want to have to compete. And now a lot of them are losing their job and they're hiring on new disco DJs. Oh. The guy who, I forgot his name, who orchestrated Disco Demolition Night was a rock DJ. Yeah, I do remember hearing that story. I don't remember the guy who did it. And I also don't remember the owner of the White Socks at the time. Yeah.
00:31:06
Speaker
but it was Vic something, but he was a crazy person. And I remember, I remember that story quite vividly as a child because I grew up a diehard white Sox fan and we don't have championships very often to celebrate. So we celebrate tragedies like he's instead. Yeah. So like the thing that happened with disco was you had white people coming in policing queer people's faces at the end of disco. You had a lot of disco owners who were popping up since we're serving mostly now white straight basis. Yeah. They started Curt telling,
00:31:36
Speaker
LGBTQ expression and sexuality inside their spaces. There was even like a couple of discos that started regulating same gender sex in prohibiting that. And they're, and they're just contact us that were founded by queer people. That is nice. Wow. That's rough. So basically discos dying queer people are now being pushed on the space that they're created. And the music is being oversaturated with copy and paste sounds.
Backlash and Racial Tensions
00:32:01
Speaker
White people who came into, who colonized the space are now saying, wait,
00:32:05
Speaker
This music isn't that good because we're listening to the copy and paste oversight training music and that brings us into Disco Demolition Night. Okay. Do you know about Disco Demolition Night? Yeah, so what I remember is that the story goes is that like people were supposed to bring their old disco records and I think like the seventh inning stretch they were gonna like blow them up but like I just remember it got way out of hand and then it turned into this like
00:32:29
Speaker
huge riot that like the cops had a breakup. I think the game ended. Yeah. So it was a doubleheader between the white Sox and Detroit target Tigers. Okay. And basically at halftime, the guy we're talking about before, uh, told everybody to bring their own disco records and in between the games, they're going to blow them up.
00:32:46
Speaker
Yep. Because you want a bunch of record shards all over the field right before you're about to play it on an Indian game. Yeah, any common sense would tell you not to do that. There was White Sox and a lot of wild things in the 70s. So basically, a lot of angsty conservative white people who are already disgusted by disco because historically, it was a genre of music for queer people and black and brown communities. Intersectionally, for queer black and brown people, they come with all these disco tracks. They've
00:33:12
Speaker
A lot of them on their face claimed that this was about the music, when in reality, this was about their hatred of black people, brown people, and gay people. More people show up than can fit in a stadium. There's people outside. Why is this the only thing that draws people to a White Sox game? This is sad. At halftime, they blow up the tracks. People are just throwing restaurant tracks on the film. I've never seen the video of it. Yeah. They do the explosion.
00:33:42
Speaker
where it was like, oh, they do the explosion, a riot starts. Black people who are there working at the White Sox field says that people are saying racist things to them, proving that this is more than just about disco. I mean, I remember in the video, I remember saying it was white people causing problems. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, even the idea of disco sucks. Yeah. That's rooted in homophobia. Think about it. Disco sucks.
00:34:08
Speaker
There's a little bit of innuendo there. Yeah, it's not a little bit of innuendo. Yeah, it's pretty out of space. People are mean. I can't be able to be nice. So basically, Disco went from before that game in June, Disco was charting. By September of 79, there was no Disco tracks on the charts. Wow, I had no idea it was that fast.
00:34:34
Speaker
But leading into a future episode, do you know what comes to take place? Because gay people go back, gay, black and brown communities go back underground. Do you know what takes place? Is it house music? It is house
Conclusion and Future Topics
00:34:44
Speaker
music. I love me house music. This is the Fun with Sex podcast. Thank you for listening. Thank you for listening to our conversation on the history of disco.