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S01E08 - Sensational Glue: The Loft & Pre-Disco Nightlife in Downtown New York (1970-75)
81 Plays1 month ago
In the period between 1970-1975 the LGBT population of New York City were at the forefront of claiming new territory in re-purposing the abandoned post-industrial lofts of SoHo and the other neglected parts of Downtown Manhattan. The network of Gay underground clubs established during this period, the characteristics that distinguished them from public dancehalls and discotheques of the previous decades, and the innate brilliance of their operators (people like Michael Fesco, David Mancuso, and Nicky Siano) set the foundation for Disco’s conquest of radio and the recording industry, and its cultural domination in the latter half of the decade.
This episode tells some of the story of those nightclubs in the pre-Disco era (The Loft, The Gallery, The Sanctuary, The Flamingo, and the Tenth Floor among them) that would have a crucial influence on Disco’s success, places that music writer Andrew Kopkind refers to as the “sensational glue” for Gay congregation in New York City. The beating heart of this scene was 'musical host' David Mancuso. The Loft parties in his home at 647 Broadway then 99 Prince Street in the heart of SoHo, and his message that 'Love Saves The Day', synthesized so much of what was special about this period of New York in the early 1970s, and the best dance music experience of any time.
Tracks:
'I'll Be Holding On' - Al Dowling
‘Drums of Passion’ - Babatunde Olatunji
‘Empty Bed Blues’ - Bette Midler
‘Sweet Sixteen’ - Diga Rhythm Band
'Girl, You Need A Change of Mind' - Eddie Kendricks
‘Soul Makossa’ - Manu Dibango
'Law of the Land' - The Temptations
'Just Look What You’ve Done' - Brenda Holloway
‘Aint No Stoppin’ Us Now (12" Dub Version) - Risco Connection
Books:
'Love Saves The Day: A History of American Dance Music’ by Tim Lawrence
'Turn The Beat Around' by Peter Shapiro
'Hot Stuff: Disco and The Remaking of American Culture' by Alice Echols
'Last Night A DJ Saved My Life' by Bill Brewster & Frank Broughton
'Discotheque Archives' by Greg Wilson
EMCK
Recommended
Transcript
Roots of Disco: From Gay Rights Movement to Dance Parties
00:00:00
Speaker
Welcome to Reel Gone. In the previous two episodes we discussed how Gennide Life developed in America during the period from the repeal of Prohibition in 1933 up to the Stonewall Riots in 1969 in the face of aggressive governmental opposition by the police and other local authorities, the acceleration of the gay rights movement during the late 1960s,
00:00:19
Speaker
enabled the dance parties organized by the Gay Activist Alliance at the Soho Firehouse on Worcester Street and the Gay Liberation Front at Alternative University in Greenwich Village. These parties were early indicators of the unprecedented expansion of dance music into the lofts and nightclubs of downtown New York.
00:00:34
Speaker
In the period between 1970 to 1975, the LGBT population of the city were at the forefront of claiming new territory and repurposing the abandoned, post-industrial lofts of Soho and the other neglected parts of downtown Manhattan, the network of gay underground clubs established during this period, the characteristics that distinguished them from public dance halls and discotheques of the previous decades, and the innate brilliance of their operators, people like Michael Fesco, David Mancuso and Nikki Siano,
00:01:02
Speaker
set the foundation for disco's conquest of radio and the recording industry and its cultural domination in the latter half of the decade. What's also curious about these pre-disco venues so is the way in which the characteristics of their successes and their challenges and their failures mirrored that of the New York Jazz Lofts, the experimental electronic dance music venues and the early hip-hop parties in the Bronx that we discussed in earlier episodes of our first season.
00:01:26
Speaker
dealing with the early 1970s in New York. Common features of these different scenes included the manner in which the vacant, sometimes derelict space of post-industrial New York was repurposed for cultural exploration, the multi-ethnic and sexually inclusive character of the participants, the eclectic musical tastes, the strength of vision for musicians, DJs and club operators, and the prevailing DIY community aesthetic. The collective spirit of independence was fostered by a combination of neglect,
00:01:53
Speaker
defiance, love, faith, and cultural celebration that disregarded the traditional models for commercial success.
Challenges and Cultural Impact of LGBT Clubs in NYC
00:02:00
Speaker
All of these groups experienced to a greater or lesser degree the oppressiveness of the local police, state liquor agencies, and municipal authorities which threatened the sustainability of their operations. It's barely believable that such a massive and long-lasting cultural impact was made by so few people working with such limited means.
00:02:17
Speaker
pick up any modern dance music magazine and you'll find a reference to the loft, the Paradise Garage, the gallery or long-standing nights inspired by them like Danny Crivett's Body and Soul or London's Ministry of Sound. There are parallels to be drawn with the efforts of jazz musicians like Ornette Coleman, Sam Rivers, Rashid Ali, who operated jazz lofts in this very same period in downtown New York. Audio Survive is a unique private, live and evolving cultural event when external factors seem to be constantly working against you.
00:02:48
Speaker
The content of this episode borrows heavily from a number of excellent books on the subject, primarily Tim Lawrence's book Love Saves the Day, A History of American Dance Music, which remains the definitive chronicle of the history of disco in New York City, along with The Riveting, Turn the Beat Around by Peter Shapiro, and Hot Stuff, Disco and the Remaking of American Culture by Alice Eccles.
00:03:07
Speaker
We'll hopefully expand on the many strands to the story of disco in later episodes, but this episode tells some of the story of those Gennai clubs in the pre-disco era that would have a significant influence on disco success, places that music writer Andrew Copend refers to as the sensational glue for gay congregation in New York City.
Romanticizing Disco's Origins and Mainstream Transition
00:03:26
Speaker
The end of the 70s hardly marked the end of disco or dance music in America, but there is a kind of romantic feel about this period before the onset of the AIDS crisis and before rapid development and gentrification in downtown Manhattan, together with regulatory pressures, forced many of these important dance venues to close.
00:03:43
Speaker
Documentaries about this period of which there are plenty tend to overplay the story of Disco as a tragedy with its underground gay identity and musical inventiveness effectively diluted by the rapid progression to mainstream acceptance. The exclusiveness of larger venues like Studio 54 and the emphasis on celebrity status is usually juxtaposed against the warmth and openness of earlier foundational venues like David Mancuso's house parties in his loft at 647 Broadway.
00:04:10
Speaker
There is, of course, some truth to this, but any proper telling in the history of dance music is a story of constant transition and subtle shifts in both musical styles and demographics. Over-simplifying the narrative tends to allow for nostalgia to creep in too easily. I always like the quote from remixer Tom Moulton about Disco's supposed death at the end of the 1970s when he said, the death of Disco.
Influence of the Sanctuary Club and DJ Culture Evolution
00:04:30
Speaker
I must have missed that.
00:04:56
Speaker
The 1969 opening of the sanctuary, eventually run by gay entrepreneurs Seymour and Shelley, and home to resident DJ Francis Grasso, and the intensity of the physical experience on offer therein, served as an indicator of the intense energy that would be unleashed across venues like The Loft, The Gallery, Continental Baths, Galaxy 21, Better Days, Le Jardin, The Flamingo, Paradise Garage, and The Saint throughout the 1970s.
00:05:20
Speaker
This was also the point that DJs began to beat mix, sonically overlapping the rhythm of two records simultaneously, enhancing and prolonging the dancing experience, allowing for continuous music but no breaks over the course of an entire night. This was a monumental moment of transference, where the physical experience of listeners dancing to the music was fed back to alter the nature of the music itself. New York was the new frontier where the evolution of dance music and American culture would accelerate through the 1970s. The sanctuary was located in a former German Baptist church on 407 West 43rd Street in Hell's Kitchen. Its original owner, Arnie Lord, had renamed the venue The Church, decorating the venues of witches Sabbath with a gigantic mural of Satan opposite the altar surrounded by an army of angels engaged in virtually every kind of sexual intercourse.
00:06:07
Speaker
Such was the controversy that Lorde opted to change its name again after injunction proceedings were issued by the city's Roman Catholic Church days after its opening. The downstairs catacombs were whoever converted into a lounge area and the upstairs church pews were rearranged to line the perimeter of its huge dance floor. Symbolically, the altar was converted into a DJ booth.
00:06:29
Speaker
The reserved midweek crowd prompted Lorde to hire a DJ. Francis Grasso attended his audition, a fashion show being held at the sanctuary's dance floor, and Lorde was convinced by the dancing models that he had found his man. Grasso who had an unusual entry into a dance music and his career as a DJ.
00:06:46
Speaker
After being knocked off his motorcycle in a road traffic accident and seriously injured, his doctor encouraged him to go dancing as part of his rehabilitation. He attended the New York discotheque Arthur, where he was left distinctly unimpressed by its resident DJ Terry Noel. This was at a point where DJs pled records in the style it was more concerned with, maximising revenue from the sale of alcohol at the bar, three upbeat tracks, then a ballad or slow dance for the dancing straight partners.
00:07:13
Speaker
Grasso had been more impressed by DJ Bradley Pierce at Salvation, located at one Sheridan Square in Greenwich Village, the former home of the legendary jazz venue Cafe Society. The crowd was of a more bohemian character, with actors, models, writers and rock and roll bands in attendance, and with more attendees experimenting in drugs. Eventually, at a relaunched Salvation, Grasso was installed as the club's DJ after its owner had dispensed with former author DJ Terry Noel,
00:07:40
Speaker
who had gone AWOL after one of his frequent acid trips. Salvation closed amidst financial scandal, not unusual for the time, and Grasso then found work at Tarat in the summer of 1969. He was doubtful whether a career as a DJ was viable, his anxiety compounded by the absence of most of the city's party-going population in the weeks where many had to camp to the Woodstock Festival in upstate New York. His concerns were alleviated somewhat when Arnie Lord invited him to audition for the role of DJ at the sanctuary.
00:08:10
Speaker
Arnie Lord eventually sold the sanctuary to promoters known as Seymour and Shelley, a middle-aged gay Jewish couple who operated a series of gay bars in the West Village. Having established themselves within the gay nightlife scene, Seymour and Shelley began publicising the sanctuary in their West Village bars soon after the handover from Lorde. They employed a well-known major deed among the door of the club and to spread the word about its reopening. 500 dancers showed up on opening night in February 1970 with a mixed composition of white, black and Spanish dancers. The crowd was also a mixture of straight and gay men and women, with women making up approximately 25% of the crowd.
00:08:50
Speaker
The restrictions in New York City or around same-sex dancing made the attendance of women essential to ensure the viability of any particular venue. New York state law required one woman present for every three men dancing. However, it was the manner in which the sanctuary's owners facilitated the large-scale attendance of its gay contingent that made the venue a success. Towards 1972, the venue was regularly attended by up to 1,000 people in any given night, this despite the venue having a legal capacity of only 346.
00:09:20
Speaker
It's not technically accurate to describe the sanctuary as a gay club, but many point to how the venue created a sense of representation for gay people in the city. The fact that its owners, doorman, bar staff, and so many dancers were gay was hugely significant in making gay people feel welcome when, as we have discussed, the institutions of the state, including Vice Patrol and the State Liquor Authority, had been intent for the previous 50 years on denigrating and humiliating gay people and dismantling any semblance of gay nightlife in America.
00:09:49
Speaker
It's worthwhile noting that the sanctuary and the disco period of the 1970s marks a period in time where gay people began to be treated as consumers. Gay people would underwrite the financial success of discotheque culture, injecting a currency and sustainability into what had been a flagging form of commercial entertainment until then.
00:10:09
Speaker
DJ Francis Grasso was the only one of Orney Lorde's employees to survive the transition to new ownership under Seymour and Shelley. His knowledge of music was deep and eclectic, and he brought his wisdom to his selection of records at the sanctuary. He played the powerful polyrhythmic Drums of Passion by Babatunde Olatunji.
00:10:56
Speaker
Also on offer was a heavy dose of Motown Records, James Brown, Sly and the Family Stone. But more strikingly, a strong emphasis on psychedelic rock that carried with it a strong percussive element like Santana and Brian Auger's jazz rock. Grasso's focus on achieving seamless transition between tracks meant that he increasingly lent towards songs with a powerful rhythmic element. In doing so, Grasso was establishing the fundamental sonic hallmark of disco that would distinguish it from Funkin' Soul.
00:11:25
Speaker
Grasso mixed records seamlessly, creating the effect of one's continuous flow of interlocking rhythms to match the sustained intensity of the dancefloor, this intensity amplified by the club's powerful strobe lighting system. He's credited as the first DJ to properly beat mix, a talent that would be artfully expanded on by Grandmaster Flash.
00:11:43
Speaker
and the early hip-hop DJs in the Bronx only a few years later. Grasso remarked on how the energy of the gay dancers at the sanctuary impressed him and influenced the way in which he approached playing records at the club, pushing him to develop his skills as a DJ and to elevate the physicality of his performance. It's worth pointing out that the intense physicality of the dancers was almost certainly compounded by the abundance of quaaludes and second all being consumed at the club, these new body-high drugs set to, by and large, replace LSD and other drugs of the psychedelic 60s.
00:12:14
Speaker
The sanctuary facilitated a change in social dancing and marked a move away from partnered dancing to allow for something closer to individual expression. That freedom facilitated the form of communal hedonism. Consequently, dancers stayed on the dance floor for longer and Grasso reacted by playing longer mixes. Soon enough, longer sets that served as a unified whole as opposed to simply a great collection of individual tracks.
00:12:39
Speaker
The sanctuary had encouraged a kind of symbiotic relationship between the DJ and his dancers that would become central to how disco was developed as the 70s progressed. Notwithstanding the emphasis on dance for euphoria, the sanctuary's gay crowd had managed to turn the former church into what music writer Peter Shapiro describes as a bacchanalian pleasure palace.
00:12:57
Speaker
to the extent that the abundant drug use and open sex at the club and in the hallways of neighboring buildings played a major part in the venue being closed in 1972 by order of the State Supreme Court. This was only three weeks after the grisly murder of its operator Shelly Bloom, who had been shot in his own apartment in what appeared to be a mob hit. His partner Seymour Sidon's alleged ties to the Genovese crime family served as the explanation for the stolen car and credit card operation and the counterfeit money discovered at the sanctuary by the and NYPD following its closure.
Police Harassment of Gay Venues in the 70s
00:13:30
Speaker
The Continental Baths were located on 74th Street and Broadway in the basement of the Ansonia Hotel. The Baths were opened by owner Steve Austro on 16th September 1968 and functioned as a private venue for gay men in the city to have sex openly within its private pools, saunas and dressing rooms. Unsurprisingly, it quickly attracted the attention of the local police and was first raided in March 1969.
00:13:54
Speaker
After one of the customers had propositioned a decoy police officer, the vice patrol were radioed in to raid the premises, and everyone on site was arrested. The baths continued to be raided on a weekly basis, with the police using the decades-old bogus tactics of enticement and entrapment to justify their arrests, something we discussed in detail in episode 6. As we've mentioned, the judicial system in New York always had a problematic relationship with the cynical tactics of the city's vice patrols. More so as the 1960s progressed,
00:14:22
Speaker
and greater emphasis was being placed on the protection of individual liberties, including sexual freedom for consenting adults. Charges against the gay clientele of the baths were often dismissed, leaving many to draw the resigned conclusion that police attention was simply a degrading form of harassment for the sport and financial self-interest of the arresting officers. Raids became less frequent when Steve Austro agreed to pay the local precinct the protection money they demanded. The police asked Austro if he wished to purchase $4,100 tickets to the policeman's ball, which took place on a weekly basis. This was the amount the police had estimated as 10% of the weekly revenue at the baths.
00:14:59
Speaker
Austro duly complied. Staged raids were still conducted to keep up appearances, but usually the baths were notified in advance. In 1970, business at the Continental Baths improved significantly when Austro began to expand on the musical entertainment at the venue's Cabaret Lounge. The new Saturday night slot for up-and-coming performers was a huge success, with Bette Midler and LaBelle, later famous for Lady Marmalade, among the acts whose careers were founded on early performances at the Baths. This is Bette Midler singing Empty Bed Blues live at the Continental Baths in 1971, a classic track made famous by blues legend Bessie Smith in 1928.
00:15:39
Speaker
the best one I could find.
00:16:05
Speaker
Soon after the expansion of live music, a new discotheque was installed with space for around 300 dancers, mostly gay men who remained at the venue when the musical entertainment was finished for the evening. DJ Bobby Gudodaro helped establish the baths as a trendy night spot for dancing, and Austro's disco would unintentionally become a kind of training academy for local DJs, with Frankie Knuckles, Larry LaVanne, and a number of other prominent figures in the coming years, given the chance to cut their teeth as DJs during the quieter nights at the venue.
00:16:34
Speaker
Although the credit the sanctuary was mixed and admitted women, the Baths, at least initially, was an exclusively gay male venue. By 1972, the Baths had become a focal point for the city's gay male population. The relaxation of restrictions around men dancing together at the end of 1971 had encouraged a more ambitious approach to social congregation for gay men in the city, once police interference had eased off. In his book, Turn the Beat Around, writer Peter Shapiro speaks of how the quote, wild unbridled energy that characterized the baths buzzed throughout New York nightlife and lit up the discos that followed in the baths wake. Disco surging baselines and pulsating rhythms carried this sexual dynamism out of the back room onto the dance floor and into the streets where it filtered into style, community action and protest.
00:17:20
Speaker
Austro's financial investment in the Baths and his commercial strategy was part of a genuine effort to establish this gay venue as a legitimate business, something that was novel for the time in New York. Austro was openly bisexual but was married to a woman. His wife and daughter even worked at the Continental Baths and helped him manage business operations, bizarrely giving the venue the veneer of a respectable family business.
00:17:43
Speaker
A preference for expanding his business may explain why Austro decided to allow straight men and women into the baths on Saturday nights in 1972. This was on the condition women remained fully clothed, supposedly because there was no female locker room at the venue.
00:17:57
Speaker
By 1975, the Continental Baths had lost a large proportion of its gay male clientele. The admission of straight male and female customers had changed the tone of the venue. Furthermore, a growing acceptance of what were seen as exclusively gay venues had resulted in a number of larger clubs opening that stripped Austro of his main and customer base.
00:18:16
Speaker
The preceding years had also seen the introduction of a more intense style of dance music of the type that could be heard at the sanctuary and other venues that made the more Broadway musical style of performances on offer at the Baths seem quaint and archaic in comparison. The Continental Baths officially closed its doors in 1976.
David Mancuso's Vision: From Loft Parties to 'Love Saves the Day'
00:18:37
Speaker
David Mancuso was born in October 1944 into a troubled family home. He was raised in an orphanage in Utica, upstate New York, with a supervising nun, Sister Alicia, organised dance parties for the children. The music and the diverse social backgrounds of the children living in the orphanage left a lasting impression on Mancuso.
00:18:55
Speaker
He moved in New York City in 1962, after spending years as a teenage runaway with brief stints in report reform school. My queso met audiophile Richard Long soon after and the pair remained friends for decades to come.
00:19:09
Speaker
A trip to Trinidad in the mid-60s would expand Mancuso's musical consciousness after he witnessed the polyrhythmic music of the steel bands rehearsing for Carnival. This joyous cacophony of sound was something he sought to replicate when he began hosting parties at his home on 647 Broadway, just north of Houston Street, which he rented in 1965 at the monthly rent of $175.
00:19:30
Speaker
Noho, the area just north of House and Street, like Soho to the south, had historically been a manufacturing district, but the migration of industry out of the city, which started in the post-war period, had left abundant vacant loft space in these disused industrial buildings, which were seized on by nightclub operators in the pre-disco period.
00:19:49
Speaker
Mancuso had attended concerts at venues like the Electric Circus on St Mark's Place and the Fillmore East, but favoured the community spirit of the rent party scene in Greenwich Village and Harlem, where residents of an apartment block would host parties and invite attendees to make contributions to support neighbours and financial hardship. The humanistic aspect of these rent parties was the basis for Mancuso's approach at 647 Broadway,
00:20:12
Speaker
He was also heavily influenced by the counter-cultural teachings of Timothy Leary, who had lectured at the Fillmore East soon after Mancuso had his first LSD experience. He attended private parties at Leary's West Village apartment and referred to Leary's book the Psychedelic Experience Based on the Tibetan Book of the Dead as his Bible.
00:20:31
Speaker
Mancuso began hosting acid parties for a small group of fans at his home on 647 Broadway. He removed an internal wall to host a larger dance party in 1966, creating a new dance floor approximately 19 feet by 43 feet in size, lying room for 400 dancers. He added high-tech clip-shorn speakers to repurpose the form of his parties, from a psychedelic trip to a more dance-orientated experience. His decision to shed his material possessions in January 1969, including his audio equipment,
00:21:01
Speaker
and to embark on a monastic lifestyle, landed him in Bellevue Psychiatric Hospital, where doctors initially diagnosed him as catatonic. Eventually he absconded on a day trip and sought refuge at a friend's house on St. Mark's Place on the Lower East Side. After finding his feet again and little help from his friends, he was able to regain an occupation of his loft at 647 Broadway and recover his audio equipment. He began holding regular rent parties at his home. These parties differed from the usual rent party fare, Mancuso owned high quality sound equipment.
00:21:31
Speaker
and was able to utilise a spacious post-industrial loft. His bedroom and kitchen were hidden from view to ins ensure any visiting building inspector would be unable to discern that the industrial property was being put to illegal residential use.
00:21:47
Speaker
The significant period for Mancuso's house parties commenced on Valentine's Day in 1970, when he issued homemade invitations to his friends with the title, Love Saves the Day, printed on the invite. He was initially reluctant to perform the role of DJ at the party, as this would have limited the time available for conversing with his friends. However, when the crowd began reacting to his musical selections, he discovered a new way of communicating with the dancers at his party that would lead him onward into his role as a self-described musical host.
00:22:17
Speaker
His home became to be known as the Loft for New York's underground night world. Mancuso engaged sound system specialist Alex Rosner who had survived detention at Auschwitz during the Holocaust. Rosner had played a accordion along to his father's violin which resulted in their lives being spared for the sake of entertaining the Nazi soldiers who were overseeing their detention. Rosner and his family survived the Holocaust after being recruited for factory work on Schindler's List and emigrated to America in 1946. He studied electrical engineering in the US. A sideline in installing Hi-Fi systems led him to building stereophonic disco techs for the Canada Go-Go and the Carnival of Go-Go stands at the World's Fair, held in New York in 1964.
00:23:02
Speaker
Rosner sold Mancuso the Cornwall speakers that coincided with the conversion of the loft into a dedicated dance floor space. He was overwhelmed by the joy of his experience at Mancuso's home, and soon became the premier discotheque sound specialist in New York City, installing sophisticated sound systems at Directoire, Ginza, Limelight, Maxis Kansas City, Tambourine, Tamberlain and The Haven, all reputable clubs.
00:23:27
Speaker
The loft was an after-hours venue, usually starting at midnight running to 6 or 7am. Personal invitations were required to attend, and Macuso did not pursue advertising of any kind to attract attendees. He was determined to avoid the classification of cabaret that would have placed him within the regulatory framework of the city's cabaret licensing authorities.
00:23:48
Speaker
However, he was also genuinely concerned with negating the imposition of more commercial nightlife business practices that would have taken control of his party out of his hands to some extent. Mikuso was emphatic about the centrality of the music he played and the quality of his sound system. He wanted these to be the main reasons people attended the loft, and he was focused on screening out any interference that would compromise the purity of his vision. He was focused on creating a unique sensory experience for dancers at the loft with minimum distraction.
00:24:18
Speaker
There was no alcohol for sale on the premises, but health food and fruit punch, albeit frequently laced with LSD, were provided free of charge once dancers entered his home. This was part of the aim to create a welcoming atmosphere, but these features were also crucial in Mancuso being able to defend himself legally against action by the licensing authorities to shut down the loft when its success made him a well-known figure in New York City nightlife as the seventies progressed.
00:24:44
Speaker
The streamers and balloons that covered the ceiling of the venue were intended to create a disarming, almost childlike atmosphere. The absence of clocks and mirrors was a deliberate choice by Mancuso to minimize distractions for those in attendance.
00:24:57
Speaker
Future invitations to the loft were marked with the print of Salvador Dali's The Persistence of Memory, Dali's melting clocks hanging over the sun-drenched landscape, consistent with the temporal distortion of all-night parties at Mancuso's home. The huge mirror ball that hung from the ceiling was intended to reflect the fluid movement of those on the dance floor, with Mancuso's music fueling a sense of collective spiritual communion.
00:25:20
Speaker
The composition of the dance floor reflected Mancuso's open and welcoming personality. In contrast to how many of the discos in the later part of the 70s would develop, the crowd at the loft was racially integrated, and Mancuso was unconcerned with monitoring the sexual orientation of those in attendance. Mancuso himself was gay, but his focus was on creating an inclusive space free from any standard definitions or policies of exclusion. He had never even named the party.
00:25:46
Speaker
The loft was a name ascribed to 647 Broadway by those visiting Mancuso's home by mid 1971. Much of the crowd at the loft were comprised of gay men, but a large section of the dancers were straight, and there was a significant female presence, which also set the venue apart from other emerging disco nights.
00:26:04
Speaker
David Mancuso would take steps to ensure that even the financially destitute invitees could attend. They were not turned away, but instead asked to write an IOU. The openness of the crowd, and the sheer eclecticism in the music Mancuso played, including jazz, rock, funk, and even classical and more ethereal spiritual music during the introductory prelude section. Maybe the enduring defining characteristic of the loft, especially when contrasted against some of the venues that would soon emerge in what became New York's more exclusively gay nightlife scene.
00:26:36
Speaker
His anti-commercial stance meant that he was free to select the most eclectic range of music without any pressure to adhere to chart trends or unsolicited outside influence. He definitely had a globalist outlook on music in general, as reflected in the range of music played at the loft, including the frequency of African, Caribbean, Latin and other non-Western tracks. This was something that gave the loft its vitality.
00:26:58
Speaker
Interestingly, this was also a central feature of the jazz lofts and other experimental artists in the city at the time, whether that be Ornek, Coleman, Don Cherry, Lamont Young or Kool Herc in the Bronx. New York as a cultural melting pot was definitely reflected in the music being produced in the city, and this was certainly celebrated at the loft.
00:27:17
Speaker
Nights at the Loft would typically last for 68 hours in terms of the music played, with Mancuso carefully structured in the evening as separate bardos, representative of a psychedelic trip. This is Suite 16 by the Diego Rhythm Band, led by the Grateful Dead drummer Mickey Hart. A track David Mancuso was reportedly fond of playing at the Loft, a sign that he would never really abandon his psychedelic travelling.
00:27:45
Speaker
are are
00:28:04
Speaker
are
00:28:12
Speaker
David Mancuso's version of what would become known as disco, to many, was a lush, spiritual and positive experience that differed from the intense, rhythmic drive of Francis Grasso's high-energy approach at the sanctuary. Mancuso was also less focused on beat mixing, or any kind of seamless transition between songs, preferring to let each track run in its entirety, an indicator of his unhurried methodology. There was no shortage of funk and soul, but he favoured an immersive, soulful and genre-spanning music.
00:28:40
Speaker
Melting Pot by Booker T and the MG's, Bra by Samande, and Astral Weeks by Van Morrison, all given space to breathe on the Loft's expansive sound system. He approached his selections for each night as a narrative experience, representative of his willingness to take dancers on a physical and spiritual journey.
Innovations in Disco Music and Sound Systems
00:28:58
Speaker
This approach was taken to heart by DJ Larry LaVanne, a self-described Loft baby. His work of the legendary Paradise Garage was very much inspired by Mancuso's devotional approach to the music he played and the people who danced to it.
00:29:12
Speaker
A significant point to make about many of the songs that are famous for being played at the loft is that these were tracks that stretched beyond the standard length of time, usually attributed to rock, soul or funk records. The environments of the sanctuary in the loft demonstrated that dancers were suddenly willing to stay on the dance floor for tracks running up to seven minutes or longer.
00:29:30
Speaker
You can point to Francis Grasso's mixing skills and David Mancuso's extensive record collection as part of the reason for this, but the reality was that production and popular music was steadily becoming more sophisticated and symphonic. It may have been that some of the early disco DJs were the first to properly seize on this. Definitely had a radio broadcasters, as there was an opportunity to enhance the sensory experience at their nightclubs by doing so.
00:29:53
Speaker
Marvin Gez, What's Going On, released in May 1971, and tracks produced by Norman Whitfield, like The Temptations, Papa Was Rolling Stone in 1972, are perfect examples of the kind of atmospheric and cinematic soul that almost needed the whole side of an album to properly breathe. These were ambitious tracks deserving of, and best served by, the kind of sophisticated sound systems that were really only available at the discos.
00:30:16
Speaker
This expansion in both length and sonic artistry would lead to the creation of the 12-inch single, favoured by DJs for the deeper grooves that lent themselves so well to the disco sound systems, and would evolve into the remix culture spearheaded by the likes of Tom Moulton and Walter Gibbons that would revolutionise dance music by the mid-1970s.
00:30:34
Speaker
The sound system at the loft was revised over time to maximise sound quality. Additional tweeter arrays and the shape of flowers were added to accentuate high-end frequencies above the organic buzz of the party. Mancusa would engage the help of his friend Richard Long to acquire Vega bass bottom speakers to boost the bass of his system to balance out the increased high-end facilitated by the tweeter arrays, in turn setting the benchmark for sound quality that other venues would try to achieve for the rest of the decade and beyond.
00:31:00
Speaker
Mikuso was unconcerned with achieving maximum volume, and instead aimed for a more sophisticated sonic environment that brought out the best in the music he was playing, and allowed his visitors to converse without the need to scream in each other's ears. This approach was perfectly exemplified by the Japanese Katsu record cartridges that Mikuso used to play records at the loft. These cartridges, which contained the needle that pressed against the record's grooves, were carefully crafted by a Japanese painter who also specialised in making samurai swords. As the 70s and 80s progressed, katsu cartridges became highly sought after by aspiring DJs all over the world.
00:31:36
Speaker
The sumptuous sound of the best music that would eventually be classified as disco early on is best exemplified by Eddie Kendrick's brilliant 1972 track Girl You Need a Change of Mind, produced by Motown legend Frank Wilson. The slow-burning groove builds and recedes over the course of eight joyous minutes, with the gospel break halfway through the song, where all the lead instruments drop out.
00:31:57
Speaker
only serving to heighten the drama before the piano, horns, congas and the isolated, then overdubbed vocals, elevate the music to an ecstatic level. This technique would become so ubiquitous as to become known as the disco break.
00:32:41
Speaker
And this song, forever associated with The Loft and Mancuso, would serve as a kind of blueprint for the best disco music to come, even if the rhythms were to accelerate and become more mechanical as the decade progressed. It's worth pointing out that Girl You Need A Change In Mind was never a commercial hit,
00:32:57
Speaker
At eight minutes long it would never get played on the radio, but it found its natural home at the loft, and the discos would facilitate the success of more expansive and adventurous dance music to come. Likewise, David Mancuso's championing of Soma Casu by Manu Dabango was another sign of his excellent taste, but served as a powerful example of how disco DJs, historically given little credibility by the music industry, were able to manifest a hit record without the support of radio broadcasting.
00:33:53
Speaker
go, go, go now. Like other unlicensed clubs in cabaret as operating in grey illegal territory, the loft was subject to regular raids by the police beginning in 1972 when Mancusa was first arrested based on the allegations that he had been operating an unlicensed cabaret. He was successful in denying these allegations, his defense being that all the attendees at the loft were invited, 647 Broadway was not open to the public, and alcohol was not for sale. The judge hearing the case accepted that this was a private party, not a cabaret.
00:34:25
Speaker
Mancuso travelled to Europe in the summer of 1973 to address the growing numbers of attendees at the loft, which was regularly packed to capacity. He acquired the lease in his neighbour's vacant space. He set about expanding his apartment to 3,500 square feet by removing internal walls and opening up the original archways of the building to allow for an additional 150 guests.
00:34:45
Speaker
While in London, he read about the collapse of the Broadway Hotel on 3rd August 1973, this building adjacent to 647 Broadway, which housed the Mercer Arts Centre, home of the Electronic Kitchen, which we discussed in Episode 3. The collapse triggered inspections of all pre-1901 buildings by the New York City Buildings Department. This policy brought Mancuso's home into clear visibility of the city's authorities in a way that it had not been before.
00:35:11
Speaker
Although Mancuso successfully recommenced operations at the loft once renovations had been completed, the and NYPD were aware he was occupying the premises without a certificate of occupancy. The fire department had until then overlooked his failure to register for a certificate of public assembly on the basis that he had installed sprinklers and emergency lighting.
00:35:29
Speaker
However, the inspections that resulted from the Broadway Hotel collapse resulted in the loft becoming front page news in the New York Times on 21st May 1974, where an upset neighbour was reported as saying that Mancuso's reconfiguration of the loft had compromised the safety of the former industrial warehouse and put the building at risk of collapse. Mancuso is adamant that his renovation works had not compromised the structure of the building, but deficiencies in the required legal approvals had put him in a difficult position.
00:35:58
Speaker
The building's department impressed upon Mancuso the sensitivity of the situation, given the deaths and injuries at the former Broadway hotel. He was ordered to vacate and to close down operations at the loft. Reportedly, the last record Mancuso played at 647 Broadway was the ambitious and cinematic Norman Whitfell production Law of the Land by the Temptations, the Motown classic that would become known as one of the great hits that ushered in the age of disco.
Interconnection of Disco and Hip-Hop
00:36:22
Speaker
It's worth mentioning that King Harrison, the congo drum player in Law of the Land, also manned the congos on a pache by the incredible bongo band. The centerpiece of DJ Cool hurts merry-go-round breakbeat sequences during his sets in the Bronx. This is a useful reminder, as pointed out by Will Hermes in Love Goes to Buildings on Fire, of how hip-hop and disco were derived from, quote, the same Gene Poole.
00:37:17
Speaker
The closure of 647 Broadway would not be the end of the loft, um and Mancusa would soon restart operations at 99 Prince Street in the heart of Soho, the artist enclave south of Houston Street that would become the center of the American art world from the 1970s onwards.
00:37:33
Speaker
Nicky Siano and Robin Lord were friends and lovers who had attended the firehouse dance parties hosted by the Gay Activists Alliance. Visiting the nightclubs Tambourine and Tambourine with Nicky's older brother Joe, they eventually made their way to the loft where they were enchanted by David Mancuso and his stellar sound system.
00:37:50
Speaker
Robin Lord had arranged for her musically obsessed friend Nicky to DJ at the Round Table in mid-1972, a club where she worked. His impressive record collection had been collated partly through funds dealing drugs, mostly quaaludes at various spots, including the Dancer of the Loft,
00:38:06
Speaker
which provoked the anger of his close friend David Mancuso, who ejected Nicky from his party after three warnings to cease and desist. This prompted Nicky and Robin to set up their own venue, an ill-fated attempt to create a purely heterosexual version of the loft, funded by Joe Ciano. In the 3,000 square feet space on 22nd Street between 6th and 7th Avenues, the gallery opened in 1973.
00:38:30
Speaker
Nicky Siano was only 18 years old at this point.
Evolving Dynamics of NYC's Club Scene
00:38:32
Speaker
Unlike Mancuso, Nicky made almost no effort whatsoever to comply with the requirements of the nightclub licensing system. Sound engineer Alex Rosner was hired to replicate, to the fullest extent possible, the sound system at the loft, and the gallery also adhered to the loft's invitation-only knee system. The straight crowd at the venue's opening night gradually dwindled over successive events, prompting a change in approach. Nicky Siano cites how, I didn't feel these breeders appreciated the game music I was playing.
00:39:01
Speaker
DJ Frankie Knuckles and his young friend Larry Levan began hanging out at the gallery, helping Nicky blow up balloons and set up streamers for his events. David Mancuso's departure for Europe in the summer of 1973, while renovations weren't going at the loft on 647 Broadway, was a timely boost for the gallery. Nicky made sure to distribute flyers at the last loft party, redirecting Mancuso's crowd towards his like-minded new venue.
00:39:25
Speaker
After the loft closed for the summer, 500 people attended the next gallery event. By this point, the gallery had developed into a mixed crowd in terms of sexuality, reportedly 60% gay and 40% straight. Like the loft, the gallery was mixed race and sexually inclusive. The venue also began to attract reputable DJs like Michael Capello and David Rodriguez, who were close friends and professional advisors to the kind and energetic Nicki Ciano, who'd become a well-loved and popular figure.
00:39:52
Speaker
Siano had developed a distinctly progressive style of DJing, with a frenetic and intense style that focused on maximizing the intensity of the dance floor experience, even to a greater degree than Francis Grasso. Some of the subtlety of David Mancuso's approach might have been absent, but the gallery was the proper start of a new kind of innovation for dance music.
00:40:11
Speaker
Nicky Siano worked the breaks of records more than any DJ before to extend the peaks of the tracks he was playing and to stretch out the high point of the night's dance floor activity. After watching future Studio 54 DJ Richie Kazur at the Club Hollywood, Siano asked Alex Rosner to find him turntables with alternate speeds, allowing him to blend tracks beat for beat, developing the technique that DJs Francis Grasso and Michael Cappello had utilized at the Sanctuary and Le Jardin respectively.
00:40:37
Speaker
Siano was eroding on the breaks and the records he played more than any previous DJ, looping and extending the breaks to intensify the dance floor experience, creating what music writer Peter Shapiro describes as a vortex of tribal drums and propulsive bass.
00:40:52
Speaker
Nicky added a third turntable to his DJ booth, purely for sound effects and a foot pedal to control the lighting in the gallery. He manipulated the output of his Twitter arrays and bass horns, adjusting the treble and bass on his mixer to maximise the sonic impact of the tracks he played in a way that David Mancuso never concerned himself with. In doing so, Siena was putting himself, the DJ, centre stage as a performer, reacting to and manipulating his audience of dancers like a magician. And he loved it.
00:41:21
Speaker
Have a look at the photos of Nicky Siano DJing well dressed as the Statue of Liberty during America's 1976 bicentennial celebrations to see someone completely in their element. Nicky the Streetwise manic extrovert was a different creature than the Zen like David Mancuso, although Mancuso was always willing to admit that the gallery more than any other venue in the disco era came closest to the spirit of what he had been trying to achieve at the loft in terms of the music played but also the sense of community spirit
00:41:49
Speaker
Nicky Sienna was a musical bridge between the early underground days of disco and its later emergence into mainstream culture. Nicky would even DJ at Studio 54 for a brief stint later in the decade. He's also largely credited for consolidating the central role of the diva in disco music. His love of dramatic soulful female vocalists like Diana Ross and Gloria Gaynor brought the diva to the dance floor and modernized the soul music that he so deeply loved. This is Brenda Holloway's Just Look What You've Done, a northern soul classic that would have been played frequently at the gallery.
00:42:54
Speaker
The loft in the gallery had produced distinct crowds with some overlap, but Siano's high energy approach would make him an attractive commodity for the operators of more commercial venues so like John Addison at Le Jardin. Siano was installed as a DJ at this larger venue on Wednesdays, Thursdays and Sundays and paid $50 a night.
00:43:14
Speaker
Again, Nicky's friend Robin Lord, who ran the code room at Le Jardin, was instrumental in finding work for her friend. Despite him pressing as boss, Nicky was soon replaced by the skillful Michael Cappello, who had been DJing at Limelight.
00:43:27
Speaker
loft at 647 Broadway was shut down, the buildings department focused their energy on the gallery. Without warning, the authorities stormed Siano's Club in the later months of 1974 and announced its immediate closure, citing inadequate fire exits as the main reason for doing so. While being kicked out over the trickster, Nikki Siano brought a box of strawberries laced with LSD to the numerous policemen securing the scene.
00:43:51
Speaker
He then stole back into the venue to blast Love Is The Message by the sound of Philadelphia at full volume, opening the windows of the gallery to ensure everyone on the street's outside could hear the venue's swan song. The gallery reopened in Soho on Mercer and Houston Street in November 1974, with a new high-tech sound and lighting system designed by Nicky and his friend Robert De Silva. There were 1,600 dancers on the opening night. Labels, what can I do for you, a quintessential Nicky Siano favorite, the track that made the biggest impact
00:44:49
Speaker
Not very exit. In the late 60s, there were a limited number of spaces available for gay black men in the city to congregate socially. There was an area in East Harlem between 6th and 7th Avenues and 116th to 125th Street, where abandoned loft spaces were used to put on parties. The spaces were rented from landlords on a short-term basis to allow for the installation of sound systems and their prompt removal once the parties had concluded. This practice echoed the tradition of rent parties, which dated back to the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s.
00:45:20
Speaker
when gay black men and women during the prohibition era congregated in cabaret as speakeasies, dragballs and private apartments to allow for greater privacy attendees at rent parties would make a financial contribution to the owners of the apartments on their way in ostensibly to help the owners with the rent during times of financial strife Rending party spaces to stage events became common practice for the city's gay ballroom scene, which began to coalesce around close-knit groups of black drag queens and transvestites. They would stage competitions to outperform each other in dance, dress and mimicking the strut of catwalk models, throwing shade at their competitors to demonstrate their superior style and prowess.
00:45:59
Speaker
This subculture shared commonalities with break dancers in the Bronx who would show off their skills in competitive dance-offs to the backdrop of DJs like Kool Herc playing break beats during the emergence of early hip-hop culture. Rival factions would create their own houses, the most famous being the House of Dupree led by drag queen Paris Dupree.
00:46:19
Speaker
During one competition at the After Hours Club footsteps on 2nd Avenue and 14th Street, Paris Dupree began striking poses on the dance floor to mimic the models in a Vogue magazine she carried with her and held up to the audience as she did so. These poses were countered by her competitor and the process repeated, creating a bodily version of call and response, reminiscing the blues and jazz music stylings.
00:46:40
Speaker
What was initially called posing became known as voguing, echoing the statement by the famous black American poet Langston Hughes, a hero of Gil Scott Herron, that the 1920s of the Harlem Renaissance was, quote, the period when the Negro was in vogue.
00:46:55
Speaker
Born in the Bronx, Francis Warren Nichols Jr, better known as Frankie Knuckles, had been introduced by his childhood friend in Brooklyn, Larry Levan, to the gay black scene in Manhattan, which revolved around a small number of clubs such as Table Tops, Fosco, ah Andres, Jays and the Crystal Ballroom.
00:47:12
Speaker
Larry was close with Duchess, head of the House of Wong ballroom, whose gowns would be beaded by Paris Dupree before she departed to form the House of Dupree. Frankie was studying textile design at the Fashion Institute of Technology, a public college in New York with a close connection to the fashion industry, when he was drawn into the ballroom scene, designing his own outfits when he attended in drag. Although still teenagers, Frankie and Larry arrived downtown in New York at the perfect time in terms of the new venue's opening. Sanctuary and the continental baths were both mixed race,
00:47:42
Speaker
but a number of venues began catering specifically to gay black men in the city. These included Planetarium and Jungle both on 2nd Avenue and Shaft operated by sound engineer Richard Long on 11th and 12th Street. It was however the loft that proved most inspirational to Larry and Frankie. The black crowd at Mancuso's home made them feel comfortable, but Frankie would point out that it was the inclusive nature of the mixed crowd of the loft that set it apart, the absence of a fixed identity that allowed for attendees to find their own.
00:48:12
Speaker
Larry Levan had persuaded his friend Nicky Ciano to tutor him on spinning records while the gallery was closed. Eventually, Larry used his new skills and winning personality to persuade Jorge Latorre, manager of the Continental Baths, to allow him and Frankie to play records during the day when the venue was quieter. When the resident DJs, David Rodriguez and Joey Bonfiglio, were dismissed by the owner, Steve Ostrow, Larry seized this opportunity and, around May 1974, was installed as DJs for Wednesdays to Sunday.
00:48:42
Speaker
Larry's friend Frankie was hired to spin records on Mondays and Tuesdays after a short spell at Better Days, the club operated by another gay black DJ, T. Scott. Larry's style was similar to David Mancuso with a focus on the quality of the musical selections, while Frankie's style developed into something closer to Nicki Ciano's, more focus on breaks and mixing to create a more intense dancing experience.
00:49:06
Speaker
Larry Levan had not at this point developed into the legendary DJ that would become synonymous with the unassailable Paradise Garage, but he was sufficiently skillful enough to impress Richard Long, who invited him to DJ at his new loft party Soho Palace in October 1974, another venue that was heavily influenced by his friend David Mancuso.
00:49:24
Speaker
The opening of the venue became especially significant in light of the closures of the loft at 647 Broadway and the gallery. However, Soho Place closed at the end of 1975, with Long unable to appease the protests of the neighbouring Bohemian residents in the downtown art district. This was a challenge that would have to be overcome for David Mancuso to reopen the loft in his new home at 99 Prince Street in Soho.
Fire Island and the Changing Gay Nightlife Culture
00:49:50
Speaker
Fire Island was an idyllic coastal location off the south shore of Long Island, east of New York, accessible only by ferry. It had become a bohemian enclave during the 1920s, when writers and musicians would travel there for the summer to escape the restrictions of the prohibition era. The area known as Cherry Grove became a popular resort for gay men and lesbian women due to the presence of its artistic community and its relaxed policing.
00:50:14
Speaker
These are some of the reasons that Fire Island holds a very special, almost u utopian place in LGBT culture. By the 1940s, writers Christopher Isherwood, W.H. Auden, Tennessee Williams and Carson Cullors were all regular visitors. A dance hall was added to the popular Sea Shack Hotel social venue when electricity was finally supplied to the island in the 1960s.
00:50:35
Speaker
The new owners enlisted Michael Fesco, a former Broadway dancer, to run the dance hall, then known as the Boom Boom Room. He renamed the venue the Ice Palace, which reopened on 30th May 1970, coinciding with the more significant relaxation of police surveillance in the area, which significantly enhanced the commercial success of the venue. DJ Bobby Cudadero, who had spun records at the Continental Baths, helping the success of the new venue.
00:51:01
Speaker
Within a few months, the format of the Ice Palace was copied by Ron Malcolm and Gene Smith, who operated the Sandpiper restaurant in the Pines, a more affluent area on Fire Island across the sand dunes from Cherry Grove. The Sandpiper turned into a disco after 11pm.
00:51:17
Speaker
Tom Moulton, who would go on to become perhaps the most famous disco remixer and is credited with creating the 12-inch single, recorded mixes that would play at the Sandpiper in lieu of an actual DJ. Moulton had a background in male modelling, at one point appearing regularly in advertising as the Marlboro Man. Although he had previously worked in sales and promotion at RCA and United Artists and was obsessed with music, he preferred to avoid nightclubs.
00:51:43
Speaker
In 1971, DJ Barry Lederer, who had played records at the Firehouse Dance parties hosted by the Gay Activist Alliance in Soho, was enlisted as the resident DJ for the Botel and other disco in the Pines. The character of the music played by Lederer, Gudodaro, and in Tom Moulton's mixes,
00:52:01
Speaker
helped define a sound that became closely associated with Fire Island. This white disco aesthetic, leaning towards more lush orchestral arrangements, would sweep back into the city and into the charts during the mid-1970s. Its meshing with the sound of records produced by Philadelphia International would go some way as towards birthing the style of music that people would define as classic disco, the type of music eventually produced by Sal Sol Records.
00:52:26
Speaker
As an example, both Lederer and Cudadero played acetates of 1973's Love's Theme from Barry White's Love Unlimited Orchestra, months before it was played on radio.
00:53:07
Speaker
David Broughy, Jim Jessup and David Sokoloff were designers and friends who had gained a reputation for throwing extravagant parties at Fire Island. They were regulars at the Continental Baths but had formulated plans to open a new club that would service a strictly white male crowd, similar to the white primarily middle class composition of Fire Island venues like the Sandpiper. The extent to which the group had been inspired by the private members' model of the Loft and their respect for its operator,
00:53:33
Speaker
It was evident when Jessa personally asked David Mancuso if they had his permission to open a new club of their own. Mancuso had no reservations about granting his blessing to allow for what he saw as the pollination of his vision of dance music across the city.
00:53:48
Speaker
The long waiting list for membership invitations to the loft meant that Jessup and his friends were able to capitalise on the demand. The party then started in a disused sewing factory at 151 West 25th Street on 5th Avenue on 6th December 1972, was named the 10th Floor. This was a relatively small space of approximately 1,000 square feet with room for about 100 on the dance floor, and the space was furnished sparsely. Seemingly unconcerned with achieving any high level of aesthetic quality,
00:54:17
Speaker
The appeal of the 10th floor for its attendees was based on its privacy and its exclusivity. This was, however, in stark contrast to Mancuso's warm embrace of people who visited his home at the loft. The operators of the 10th floor were more emphatically selective about who was admitted. The focus on permitting entry for wealthy and socially superior clientele meant the venue gained and has retained its reputation as a gentleman's club for the gay elite. Notwithstanding that its DJ, Ray Yates, was black and the venue was attended by some black dancers, provided their social status sufficiently qualified them for admission
00:54:54
Speaker
The 10th floor became known as an almost exclusively white venue. The 10th floor was closely associated with the pines in Fire Island and drew its membership from that pool. There was a strong emphasis placed on social posturing and sex at the 10th floor to be contrasted with the centrality of the music and the sonic and emotional experience championed by the loft in the gallery.
00:55:13
Speaker
the venues run by music fanatics David Mancuso and Nikki Ciano. Even at the sanctuary notorious for its sexual debauchery, the crowd were all these most intensely focused on dancing to Francis Grasso's frenetic musical performances.
00:55:27
Speaker
It was apparent that David Mancuso's private party model, a necessity in order to remain underground and beyond the reach of the local authorities to the fullest extent possible, was capable of being reformed into something more cynical, elitist and arguably superficial. However, for many that attended the 10th floor this was exactly the point, and this tension between inclusiveness and exclusiveness, community versus celebrity, would remain a constant in the story of disco.
00:55:53
Speaker
For a more favorable treatment of the 10th floor than you're likely to hear from devotees of the loft read Andrew Holleran's classic 1978 novel Dancer from the Dance. The book is a fictional memoir about young gay men in New York City in the early 1970s who spend their nights attending sexually charged parties on Fire Island and a decadent New York disco named The Twelfth Floor, a thinly veiled reference to the tenth floor. While not shying away from the hedonism of the scene and despite some clunky racial stereotyping that may at best be described as of its time, Horan, the nom de plume for writer Eric Garber, writes with the lyrical tone that recalls the great Gatsby. The narrator conveys the fleeting joy of its characters along with their dislocation and sadness.
00:56:35
Speaker
and watching the scene of the early 70s gay disco text they are participating in, seemingly fading away before their very eyes. Law of the Land by The Temptations, another Norman Whitville production, is referencing numerous times throughout the novel as the song gets everyone on the dance floor. It's four-to-the-floor drum patterns, proceeding the all-conquering disco beat that would arrive soon afterwards, catalyzed by Earl Young's drum pattern and hissing hi-hats on 1973's The Love I Lost by Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes.
00:57:33
Speaker
It seems that the latest reputation of the 10th floor was something its operators had not actually fully intended. According to Tim Lawrence, after a few years of its opening, Jim Jessop and David Sokoloff were lucky to set foot in the venue, tired of its pretentiousness and forever concerned about overcrowding and the lack of proper fire exits. Their eventual decision to close the club made it easier when larger venues opened, serving the same crowd was voluntary.
00:57:58
Speaker
The character and atmosphere of the 10th floor created a competitiveness among many of its gay patrons in terms of presentation. Newly determined to shed the effeminate association with being gay, muscularity and physical fitness became prerequisites for gay men attending the larger discos that would open in the mid-70s. These described as gymnasium discos because of the physical characteristics of those in attendance, many being tagged as having adopted the clone look because of their uniformity in style and physical presentation.
00:58:27
Speaker
These discos, primarily the Flamingo and the Saint, would mark a divergence from the more gallatorian attitude of people like David Mancuso and Nikki Ciano. If the dancers at the loft in the gallery would ultimately find themselves loyal to Larry LaVanne at the Paradise Garage, the in-crowded Fire Island that populated the 10th floor would eventually bolster the membership of the Flamingo and the Saint.
00:58:48
Speaker
After resigning from the Ice Palace during a difficult summer in 1973, where competition from new clubs, the Botel and the Sandpiper thinned the crowd at his club, Michael Fesco implemented plans to open a new club in downtown Manhattan. The Flamingo at 599 Broadway and Houston Street, directly above the new location of the gallery, opened in December 1974.
00:59:10
Speaker
The Flamingo was a huge space, 50ft wide and 200ft long. The opening, boosted by the recent closure of the 10th floor, it was a huge success, overseen by DJ Armando Galvez. Eventually, Howard Merritt and Richie Rivera, another regular from the GES Firehouse in Soho, would become the house DJs.
00:59:30
Speaker
Flamingo membership cards, which cost $35, soon traded for up to $600 in the black market. As with the 10th floor, the crowd was overwhelmingly gay and white, with few black people. However, Vesco was adamant there was never a deliberate attempt to drive away the black crowd.
00:59:47
Speaker
More than a club before Flamingo consolidated gay night life in New York and introduced a new sexually charged atmosphere into the still formative culture of the gay disco tech. As with the 10th floor, the members only model borrowed from the loft belied the fact that the Flamingo was an exclusive space where admission was often dependent on the applicant's physical attractiveness and connections to affluent social cliques.
01:00:12
Speaker
The atmosphere at Flamingo has been described as an intense, drug-fueled and sexually charged gay male space. Referred to as the first gymnasium disco, Michael Fesco's venue can be credited or blamed for creating the stereotype of the gay club dancer as sexually attractive, muscular and athletic, these being supposedly mandatory requirements for all-night dancing and seeking sexual partners in this more intense, physical, high-energy environment.
01:00:37
Speaker
This was in stark contrast to the perceived femininity that had traditionally been ascribed to gay men in the years leading up to Stonewall, an indicator of how quickly the outward expression of gay male identity had developed in a relatively short space of time.
01:00:50
Speaker
This group of more exclusively gay discos implemented policies that excluded certain classes of men, whether that was in terms of class, race or sexuality, but also women who had played such an important part in building the membership of the earliest discos. As an exclusive gay male scene consolidated, women found themselves deliberately excluded from the parties.
01:01:11
Speaker
Even with the sanctuary, when the takeover by Seymour and Shelley was completed, the new owners fired all the female employees who had no place in their plans to attract an exclusively gay male crowd to the venue. During the filming of the nightclub scenes in the Jane Fonda movie Clute set on the dance floor of the sanctuary,
01:01:28
Speaker
The actress was drawn into an argument with the owners when they refused to admit lesbians to the venue, even to take part as extras in the film. The manner in which disco and dance music generally over the next few decades discriminated against women despite outward representations of openness and equality is something we intend to discuss in more detail in future episodes.
01:01:50
Speaker
The exclusiveness of Flamingo prompted Alan Harris and his partner Carrie Finkelstein to open 12 West under the Westside Highway on West Street adjacent to the abandoned piers of the Hudson River, a notorious cruising spot for gay men in the city.
Inclusivity vs. Exclusivity in Disco's Growth
01:02:04
Speaker
Seeing a gap in the newly vibrant market, they envisaged a more accessible party space for gay men and women, a safe and non-elitist environment for a large group of people.
01:02:14
Speaker
Membership was a requirement to attend, but members of 12 West would be entitled to bring a guest. As with the loft, the venue, which opened in March 1975, would not serve alcohol, and instead high-energy foods would be provided free of charge after admission. The owners achieved their goal with attendees representing a broad mix of young, old, slim, heavy men and women from a broad range of ethnicities.
01:02:39
Speaker
At this point, the commercial opportunities in discotheque culture were evident from the success of venues like Flamingo and 12 West. It was also apparent that disco, as it would come to be known, was poised to move beyond its underground roots and beyond any strict identification with the LGBT community.
01:02:55
Speaker
Morris Brahms was a cousin of John Addison, who had operated Le Jardin, one of the first mainstream discos that would serve as a precursor to larger venues, so such as the renowned Studio 54. Brahms invested $50,000 in opening his new club, Infinity, on 5th November 1975, determined to exploit the commercial potential of the downtown gay party network. This was a huge factory space off Lower Broadway, and its membership replicated Michael Fesco's approach at Flamingo.
01:03:24
Speaker
Infinity's elaborate lighting system included 54 spinning laser beams and 70 neon sculpture lights with a 100 foot long dancefloor enclosed by huge mirrors on both sides, the visual effect of the reflective panels lending the club its name.
01:03:40
Speaker
2,000 people attended Infinity on its opening night with Bobby Guddero, aka Bobby DJ, formerly of Le Jardin, the Ice Palace and the Continental Baths, spinning records, and Brahms made back his initial investment within seven weeks. There was a mixed crowd of gay and straight dancers, and the venue had its fair share of celebrities.
01:03:59
Speaker
um Unlike the loft, the composition of the crowd was not a result of any deliberate attempt by Brahms to create an inclusive venue. It simply marketed the club as broadly as possible to expand its commercial appeal. His attitude was a broad brush, everybody pay his approach. Reportedly, many of the city's other club operators and DJs treated infinity with a less than serious level of recognition. Many deemed the design too tacky, and the numbers and attendance featured a comparatively low proportion of actual New Yorkers.
01:04:27
Speaker
The evident willingness of straight suburbanites, the bridge and tunnel crowd to travel to Manhattan for these emergent large-scale disco texts was demonstrative of the demographic shift in New York's dancing population and the imminent transition of disco into the mainstream.
Legal Protections and Industry Influence of Disco DJs
01:04:42
Speaker
David Mancuso had plans to open his new loft venue at 99 Prince Street in Soho. He met opposition from local residents but had been working to gain in their trust and approval. He was also taking active steps to ensure that he was legally compliant with the regulatory authorities, seeking to ensure that there was no justification for further raids or threats to terminate his party.
01:05:02
Speaker
He obtained certificates of occupancy and public assembly for 99 Prince Street. He also bit the bullet and applied to the Department of Consumer Affairs for registration of the Loft as a cabaret, an application which he was desperately hopeful would fail.
01:05:19
Speaker
As we discussed in Episode 1, registration as a cabaret would have effectively regularised the loft and made it subject to the regulations of the city's 1926 cabaret laws, including a requirement that the venue close at 3am. By registering as an entertainment association, 99 Prince Street Gallery Incorporated, and applying for the cabaret licence, Mancuso was essentially calling the bluff of the licensing authority, this being the Department of Consumer Affairs, who had agitated continuously to put him out of business.
01:05:47
Speaker
In addition to the licensing authority, a number of Soho residents, including Michael Goldstein, editor of the Soho weekly news, had spearheaded a campaign against Mancuso to prevent the opening of the loft at Prince Street, arguing that Mancuso's presence in the area represented a threat to the quality of life of those who had settled in the post-industrial buildings of the newly Bohemian area.
01:06:09
Speaker
Mancuso had used the downtime before this new incarnation of the Loft opened to rally his troops and to put his legal affairs in order. He opened up the venue at Prince Street to his fellow DJs as a meeting place for the newly formed Record Pool of New York, which, by July 1975, counted over 160 DJs among its membership, effectively operating as a kind of DJs union.
01:06:30
Speaker
By this point, the growing influence of DJs in breaking records commercially was being recognised by the record labels. Free records were given to certain DJs who had effectively lobbied their record company contacts, impressing upon them that servicing the DJs in this way would be to the benefit of the record labels and the artists on their roster.
01:06:48
Speaker
The holistic approach of the record pool was to share this pool of records throughout its membership, benefiting those members without the commercial means or without sufficient knowledge of the music industry to obtain the requisite number of records to stay in their clubs or their own employment venue operators. The record pool only served to strengthen Mancuso's reputation as a serious businessman and a highly respected local cultural leader.
01:07:12
Speaker
Up to this point, the pre-disco period of 1970-1974 was largely unnoticed by the record industry, seemingly unconcerned with marketing to its predominantly gay and mixed-race crowds, as pointed out by music writer Alice Echols. This invisibility kept the disco scene underground, albeit for a short period of time. The fact that most of the DJs played a healthy dose of well-known soul in R and&B gave record execs the impression there was nothing new going on.
01:07:38
Speaker
In this way, early disco's reliance on popular music gave the emerging scene a kind of camouflage against intrusion by the mainstream, enabling its defining characteristics to develop organically. This would not last long, and record labels soon realised the potential of the disco market, leading to dramatic cultural changes.
01:07:58
Speaker
Details are soon afforded greater credibility by the music industry, and their influence in record production resulted in the widening of the gap between traditional soul, pop, R and&B, and what would become a very new form of dance music. Tom Moulton, who had created mixes for the Sandpiper on Far Island, would become extremely influential as a remixer. He pressured record labels to create extended versions of their three-minute records that were more suitable to the dance floor.
01:08:23
Speaker
Mel Sheeran of Scepter Records and the eventual owner of West End Records was the first to hire Tom Moulton as a remixer. Moulton's remix of Do It Till You're Satisfied by PT Express set the template for the disco remix and for an absolute stone cold classic disco album Listen to Gloria Gaynor's 1975 debut album Never Can Say Goodbye mixed by Tom Moulton. The first three tracks Honey Bee, Never Can Say Goodbye and Reach Out I'll Be There are mixed as a continuous flow with seamless transition between each track like a disco mix the accentuation of the dramatic parts of each track a quintessential hallmark of disco
01:09:28
Speaker
Soon enough, as remix culture took hold, vocalists and band members would often become enraged at the extent to which their vocals or musicianship was sidelined in favour of the reworked driving rhythm, a feature that was partly derived from James Brown's mechanised funk, where all instruments were utilised to percussive effect, even Brown's vocals.
01:09:47
Speaker
After listening to Tom Moulton's mix of her debut album, Gloria Gaynor told Moulton I don't sing much and asked what she was supposed to do on stage. Moulton responded pithily that she should learn to dance, something that James Bryan had obviously been aware of from the get-go. In seeking to consolidate it his position at his new Soho venue, David Mancuso also found support from Yves Saint Laurent, who hired 99 Prince Street to launch his 1975 Spring menswear collection.
01:10:14
Speaker
The limousine is full of models wearing diamonds, mink coats and high-end fashion, impressed as artsy neighbours, and undermined any argument that Mancusa was some form of shady interloper.
01:10:26
Speaker
In 2 September 1975, the Department of Consumer Affairs wrote to David Mancuso to confirm, much to his jubilation, that his application for a cabaret licence had been denied. The reason for doing so was that, in their judgement, the loft could not be defined as a cabaret under the prevailing regulations. Mancuso did not sell food or drink to the public, either directly or indirectly. This set a precedent, then used the chose not to sell alcohol and operated on an invitation-only basis.
01:10:54
Speaker
were to a large extent beyond the risk of interference from the city authorities. The Loft reopened on 20th October 1975 and 1,000 people attended its opening night. Macuso had inspired and was now back operating among an independent private party network in downtown Manhattan that counted among its flagship venues The Loft, The Gallery, Reed Street, Flamingo and 12 West.
01:11:18
Speaker
By staying true to the spirit of his original party, he was able to keep the loft in operation for decades, despite a few more physical relocations, eventually ending up in Alphabet City in the Lower East Side.
01:11:31
Speaker
Drummer and producer Joe Isaacs, who was formerly the house drummer for the famous Studio One in Jamaica, put together a project named Risco Connection in 1979 to record reggae versions of some of the most famous disco hits of the 1970s, like Good Times by Chic,
01:11:47
Speaker
While that may seem cynically commercial on the surface, the results were simply incredible, and I would highly recommend the Risco version compilation recently released on Strut Records in 2022. This last track is the Risco Connection dub version of The Internet Was Stopping Us Now by McFadden and Whitehead, a song that David Mancuso would play at The Loft in its later iterations. I personally think this track is one of the most beautiful records ever made, and for whatever reason, in my head,
01:12:13
Speaker
It works as a sonic representation of the loft and the positive life force of David Mancuso.
01:12:49
Speaker
As with the early 70s in New York, 2025 is certainly a challenging time for dance music nightlife. There's a concerning trend of successful nightclubs closing at a rapid rate since the pandemic. 480 UK clubs since June 2020. A problem exacerbated by the austerity measures of the previous decade and, in many cases, the ever-present challenge of gentrification in major cities. In Europe, even long-standing institutions like Watergate and Berlin have recently made the decision to shut their doors, while corporate-controlled music festivals and industrial-sized venues like the Drum Sheds in London
01:13:23
Speaker
still seem to pack in the crowds, albeit at ever-increasingly expensive ticket prices for the customers. There does seem to be a parallel expansion in the number of grassroots venues, with that channel the spirit of 70s New York venues like The Loft or Simon B. Rivers Jazz Loft at Studio Rivbe, and the growth of local boutique music festivals that cater for more eclectic tastes. There are obvious economic benefits to keeping things minimal,
01:13:45
Speaker
but the growth of these types of venues conveys the sense that people are seeking a more concentrated musical experience, away from the impersonal treatment that is inherent in large clubs with overwhelming sound systems or heavily policed music festivals. As an example, the incredible resurgence in UK jazz music, producing bands like Sons of Kemet and artists like Nabiya Garcia, has been fostered by independent spaces like the Total Refreshment Centre and Cafe Odo and Hackney, and the We Out Here Festival endorse it In terms of disco and my own recent experience, the Lucky Clouds sound system started by Tim Lawrence, Colleen Murphy and Gem Gilbert in London, all close friends of David Mancuso, the Curry Dune parties at Civic House in Glasgow, the Knight Institute and David Holmes' Gotz waiting room parties in Belfast are all great examples of a more low-key approach in terms of dance music. like
01:14:33
Speaker
Passionate DJs and nightclub operators with insanely deep musical knowledge and devotion focused on prioritizing an incredible sensory and emotional musical experience for dancers and audiences ahead of profit and celebrity status. It's this notion that underwrites so much of what was special about this period in New York in the early 1970s and the best dance music of any time.