# Antipathy to Disco **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [December 8, 2010, 6:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/antipathy-to-disco/563449 "2010-12-08T18:44:16Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![suranyi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e36b37/32.png) [@suranyi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/suranyi)\ **Post date:** [December 9, 2010, 7:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/antipathy-to-disco/563449/61 "2010-12-09T19:00:58Z")
> [@Ludovic](#): > > No, it’s just as good, but pretty much is a different genre. > > And anyway, I’m talking about the type of rock you could hear on the radio in the 70s, since my throwaway joke was in the context of why disco was so deeply hated by a large slice of the population. [ETA pretty much the only hugely popular mainstream rock stuff that’s just as good as the early 70s stuff is Pink Floyd] I was there as a child and didn’t hear any punk or new wave until 1982 at earliest. I don’t want to look at the charts to confirm this out of fear of depressing myself. It’s possible to like disco AND new wave. I did. ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [December 9, 2010, 7:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/antipathy-to-disco/563449/62 "2010-12-09T19:12:05Z")
> [@suranyi](#): > > It’s possible to like disco AND new wave. I did. I do, too (well, subject to Sturgeon’s Law, of course). I was joking that the thesis “one of the reasons for the anti-disco backlash was that disco was much worse than the rock music of the early 70s” should logically be false, because the _mainstream_ rock music of the 70s was [just as bad](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frampton_Comes_Alive!) [as disco](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double_Vision_(Foreigner_album)). New Wave didn’t hit the mainstream till the 80s, and at any rate would not have been appreciated by the people pining for the rock of the early 70s. Of course, just because something is logically false doesn’t make it false in the court of public opinion, as people are not always logical. Many people probably did blame disco for the perceived lack of good rock music in the late 70s. ---
**Author:** ![SirRay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/cc9497/32.png) [@SirRay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SirRay)\ **Post date:** [December 9, 2010, 7:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/antipathy-to-disco/563449/63 "2010-12-09T19:27:59Z")
I was in my early teens by the late 1970s, so the Disco wars didn’t much affect me - I did perfer rock, but wouldn’t freak when my friend’s older sisters would play Disco. Besides, I had lots of cassettes w/ classic rock (then called rock - Beatles/Stones/Who/Zep…classic rock was '50s stuff back then, boys & girls). Then I moved seemlessly into Punk & New Wave by the early 1980s, Disco was ‘dead’(heh), and the rest is history… …and history repeats - in the early/mid 1990s ‘Grunge/Alternative/Progressive’ which I loved (yes, Nirvana, Soundgarden, Alice In Chains, Smashing Pumpkins, STP and the rest - heck even Pearl Jam was considered Alternative/Grunge back then) was everywhere, on all stations - even on urban radio stations like WKTU (heh) - hell, we had 4, maybe 5 alternative stations in NY for a brief period of time, and I was loving it…and knew that it couldn’t last. Of course it didn’t, and for a time we went down to 0 alternative/progressive stations (including WLIR/WDRE - gone!). Now, I think we are back to .5 of a station - not sure what the college stations play now-adays, recently heard from some 20-somethings it’s 70s rock). BTW, Disco has served me well in the past decade, went to many dances and parties during that time (this was before all the 30/40-something single ladies disappeared from Long Island) - the ladies wanted to dance, they liked all kinds of Dance music (including Disco as well as 90s club music and 21st century contemporary R&B), and you didn’t have to be capable of the full SNF repertoire of dance moves, just needed some rhythm and a little bit of style. ---
**Author:** ![NDP](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ndp/32/55_2.png) [@NDP](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NDP)\ **Post date:** [December 9, 2010, 7:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/antipathy-to-disco/563449/64 "2010-12-09T19:58:32Z")
> [@Norse](#): > > \ > It depends on how you define “early seventies”. If you define it as 1970-71 (_i.e._ the very early 70s), at least some of the great artists and bands from the 60s were still making music, but quite a few of the greatest ones, like Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, The Doors and The Beatles had died or broken up. I define the “early seventies” as the first half of the 70s and the “late seventies” as the second half. IMNSHO, the early seventies brought less new and great music to the world that the 60s or the late 70s did (with a few exceptions, like David Bowie). Punk rock revitalized the music scene around 1975 and inspired the new wave, with artists and groups like the Stiff records catalog (think Elvis Costello, Ian Dury), Patti Smith, The Specials, Talking Heads, Blondie and Joy Division, and new wave again inspired the synth pop which took over for disco. So, in my mind, the late 70s were definitely not a step down from the early 70s. > > But this may just be because the late 70s was the time when I really discovered rock and pop music 😉 > \ Debating what year was better in terms of popular music is the subject of another thread but I picked 1971 for the number of especially notable albums albums put out that year like The Who’s “Who’s Next”, the Stone’s “Sticky Fingers”, Lennon’s “Imagine”, Led Zeppelin IV, Marvin Gaye’s “What’s Going On”, and many others I don’t have time and space to mention here. Also, apparently we both discovered pop music around the same time. However, my perspective was completely the opposite of yours. During the years of my adolescence, I was convinced that I was living the Dark Ages (or–more fittingly-- [Dork Ages](http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/DorkAge)) of Popular Music. It seemed like the stuff put out from the years 1964 to about 1972 was so much better but I had missed it because I was born too late. Getting back to the thread topic, there’s one reason why disco declined so rapidly that hasn’t been addressed: the economy. The years 1976 to 1979 were boom years for the recording industry with just about any album that made the Top 20 going at least platinum (one million sales) and any single that hit the Top 10 going gold. Then, the Iranian Revolution resulted in the price of oil spiking thereby driving up the cost of albums which were made with petroleum-derivatives. At the same time, the price of oil caused the price of gas and other items to increase causing people to cut back on other less-necessary items–like albums. It suddenly wasn’t worth it to buy an entire album only because you liked one single on it (especially if that one single was likely being played to death on the radio anyway). Thus, the recording industry went into a recession that didn’t really end until late 1982 with the release of Michael Jackson’s “Thriller”. ---
**Author:** ![suranyi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e36b37/32.png) [@suranyi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/suranyi)\ **Post date:** [December 9, 2010, 10:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/antipathy-to-disco/563449/65 "2010-12-09T22:20:07Z")
> [@Ludovic](#): > > I do, too (well, subject to Sturgeon’s Law, of course). I was joking that the thesis “one of the reasons for the anti-disco backlash was that disco was much worse than the rock music of the early 70s” should logically be false, because the _mainstream_ rock music of the 70s was [just as bad](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frampton_Comes_Alive!) [as disco](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double_Vision_(Foreigner_album)). New Wave didn’t hit the mainstream till the 80s, and at any rate would not have been appreciated by the people pining for the rock of the early 70s. > > Of course, just because something is logically false doesn’t make it false in the court of public opinion, as people are not always logical. Many people probably did blame disco for the perceived lack of good rock music in the late 70s. Thinking back to those years, my real musical secret was that I liked classical music. It was what my parents played all the time, what I listened to at home from the time I was a baby. They took me to classical concerts regularly. But in high school I could never admit it, because classical music was totally uncool. It wasn’t until I went to college that I met people my own age who also listened to classical. ---
**Author:** ![sisu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/df705f/32.png) [@sisu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sisu)\ **Post date:** [December 9, 2010, 11:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/antipathy-to-disco/563449/66 "2010-12-09T23:00:46Z")
Well I think that it was a big joke that some people took to the extreme. ---
**Author:** ![Slithy\_Tove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slithy_tove/32/18248_2.png) [@Slithy\_Tove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slithy_Tove)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2010, 12:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/antipathy-to-disco/563449/67 "2010-12-10T00:56:30Z")
Soft Rock(sometimes now called [“Yacht Rock”](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yacht_Rock#The_name)) came along about the same time as Disco. As antipathetic as Disco was held at the time, at worst it’s now largely remembered as a [silly annoyance](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yAWF2HtBRCU) (and I’m speaking as one who keenly remembers often having to drive cross-country alone all night with nothing available over the car radio besides Disco). Still, a third-century later, Soft Rock is seen as the greater sin against the spirit of Rock. Who bears more scorn after all this time: Donna Summer or Michael Bolton? ---
**Author:** ![Yookeroo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yookeroo/32/323_2.png) [@Yookeroo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yookeroo)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2010, 3:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/antipathy-to-disco/563449/68 "2010-12-10T03:46:31Z")
I was totally a “Disco Sucks” guy back in the day. I outgrew that silly attitude. ---
**Author:** ![Ellis\_Aponte\_Jr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@Ellis\_Aponte\_Jr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ellis_Aponte_Jr)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2010, 4:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/antipathy-to-disco/563449/69 "2010-12-10T16:09:14Z")
> [@Dogzilla](#): > > I don’t begrudge that now, but I think disco completely killed Rod Stewart’s career because it changed his image from being one of the blues-based British invasion artists tobeing that cheeseball, sexually ambiguous disco guy. I don’t think he ever really shook off the cheesy image until he started doing showtunes. I know what you mean here but it almost sounds like you’re saying he cleared up his sexual ambiguity and reestablished his macho image by singing showtunes. Which would be a new one. ---
**Author:** ![Dogzilla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e480ec/32.png) [@Dogzilla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dogzilla)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2010, 4:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/antipathy-to-disco/563449/70 "2010-12-10T16:39:00Z")
> [@Ellis\_Aponte\_Jr](#): > > I know what you mean here but it almost sounds like you’re saying he cleared up his sexual ambiguity and reestablished his macho image by singing showtunes. Which would be a new one. Ooo, thanks for pointing that out. Definitely did not want to convey that he cleared up any sexual ambiguity. (Maybe marrying Rachel Hunter helped him there a bit, but his musical stylings… eehhhh not so much.) ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2010, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/antipathy-to-disco/563449/71 "2010-12-10T17:15:04Z")
> [@Fotheringay-Phipps](#): > > But what accounted for this depth of feeling? It stank. And it went on a loooong time. ---
**Author:** ![suranyi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e36b37/32.png) [@suranyi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/suranyi)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2010, 6:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/antipathy-to-disco/563449/72 "2010-12-10T18:29:45Z")
> [@Slithy\_Tove](#): > > Soft Rock(sometimes now called [“Yacht Rock”](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yacht_Rock#The_name)) came along about the same time as Disco. As antipathetic as Disco was held at the time, at worst it’s now largely remembered as a [silly annoyance](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yAWF2HtBRCU) (and I’m speaking as one who keenly remembers often having to drive cross-country alone all night with nothing available over the car radio besides Disco). Still, a third-century later, Soft Rock is seen as the greater sin against the spirit of Rock. > > Who bears more scorn after all this time: Donna Summer or Michael Bolton? Or how about Barry Manilow, who was HUGE in the late 70s? ---
**Author:** ![WordMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e8c25b/32.png) [@WordMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WordMan)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2010, 7:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/antipathy-to-disco/563449/73 "2010-12-10T19:16:12Z")
> [@Slithy\_Tove](#): > > Who bears more scorn after all this time: Donna Summer or Michael Bolton? Please! Not even close: Donna Summer innovated in a music style that folks may not like (hence this thread) but was hugely popular and endures to this day. She’s already been revisited and offered respect-in-hindsight a number of times. Bolton is just a douchebag. ---
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2010, 8:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/antipathy-to-disco/563449/74 "2010-12-10T20:33:44Z")
Huh. I thought he was a no-talent assclown. ---
**Author:** ![WordMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e8c25b/32.png) [@WordMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WordMan)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2010, 8:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/antipathy-to-disco/563449/75 "2010-12-10T20:44:32Z")
> [@kaylasdad99](#): > > Huh. I thought he was a no-talent assclown. Crap - I can’t believe I let that reference go untapped :smack::smack: ---
**Author:** ![suranyi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e36b37/32.png) [@suranyi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/suranyi)\ **Post date:** [December 10, 2010, 9:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/antipathy-to-disco/563449/76 "2010-12-10T21:28:04Z")
> [@WordMan](#): > > Please! Not even close: Donna Summer innovated in a music style that folks may not like (hence this thread) but was hugely popular and endures to this day. She’s already been revisited and offered respect-in-hindsight a number of times. > > Bolton is just a douchebag. I absolutely agree. I have a few songs from Donna Summer on my iPod right now. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Peyote\_Coyote](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/5f8ce5/32.png) [@The\_Peyote\_Coyote](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Peyote_Coyote)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2010, 12:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/antipathy-to-disco/563449/77 "2010-12-11T00:43:48Z")
As other Dopers have said, the radio stations played disco songs until Hell wouldn’t have them. Disco was all right on the dance floor, but most songs, aside from a few gems like “The Last Dance” and “The Hustle” weren’t that good either. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Peyote\_Coyote](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/5f8ce5/32.png) [@The\_Peyote\_Coyote](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Peyote_Coyote)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2010, 12:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/antipathy-to-disco/563449/78 "2010-12-11T00:45:10Z")
I must also say that while I didn’t like most of her music in the '70’s, Donna Summer has one helluva voice. To compare her to a no-talent asshat like Michael Bolton is an insult to the lady. ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2010, 1:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/antipathy-to-disco/563449/79 "2010-12-11T01:08:35Z")
> [@WordMan](#): > > Donna Summer innovated in a music style that folks may not like (hence this thread) but was hugely popular and endures to this day. She’s already been revisited Hopefully after dark, by something with a pale complexion and extra-long incisors. I believe I had my first inkling that civilization was doomed when the Hues Corporation’s “Rock The Boat” became a hit. - rock the boat, don’t rock the boat baby rock the boat, don’t tip the boat over rock the boat, don’t rock the boat baby rock the boat-t-t-t-t Our love is like a ship on the o-cean spawning loathing and derision and re-vulsion\* I suppose if you were heavily into the dance scene some disco might have been bearable\*, but - _listening to it on the radio???_ \*Buried deep, deep within the recesses of my Ipod are a couple of songs by K.C. and the Sunshine Band. Uh-huh Uh-huh. ---
**Author:** ![Kent\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kent_clark/32/105_2.png) [@Kent\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kent_Clark)\ **Post date:** [December 11, 2010, 2:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/antipathy-to-disco/563449/80 "2010-12-11T02:15:44Z")
> [@suranyi](#): > > I absolutely agree. I have a few songs from Donna Summer on my iPod right now. I specifically exclude Donna Summer from my general distaste for disco. But the list of great singers that came out of (as opposed to simply passed through) disco pretty much starts and ends with her. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/antipathy-to-disco/563449.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/antipathy-to-disco/563449.md?page=5)