Disco Sucked.

[RandomKoolzip]

But country sucks even harder.

[dolo amber]

1. Well, you're half right...

:P

[1monster]

2. Disco was fun. It was all about feeling good and having a good time...

And it was a hell of a lot better than rap!

[NightTrain]

3. Did not!

:P

[Spider Jerusalem]

4. You've got the first half right.

And here's an all-in-one response to and refutation of the second half of your statement:

[RandomKoolzip]

6. And here's a stanza in refutation of YOUR statement:

"I like it/I love it/I need some more of it...."

[Spider Jerusalem]

7. THAT kind of country sucks, yeah.

But Johnny Cash, Willie Nelson, Hank Williams Sr...they do NOT suck. Of course, that was before country music was turned into redneck pop, too.

[RandomKoolzip]

8. There's good things in all genres.

Even disco. And even (gulp) country.

I certainly wouldn't want to go without my Carter Family albums for very long. And Hank Williams was pretty damn amazing.

And as far as disco is concerned, I was 3 when it was going on and I grew up working class; certainly there wasn't any racism or homophobia in my assesment of it back then ("This sucks, daddy!"). It was just not enjoyable to listen to, except for a handful of tunes ("Disco Inferno," "Bad Girls," "Supernature," a few others)...and it wasn't because we were all racists (hands up: who likes Jimi Hendrix? Chuck Berry? James Brown?), it's because it was so dominant a cultural force that inevitably a backlash had to ensue.....of course, nowadays we realize how spoiled we were back then. I'd KILL for radio pop to be as good now as it was in the late 70's. At least the older disco musicians were actually playing instruments when they recorded their tunes.

[AntiCoup2K4]

19. Except Brooks & Dunn didn't sing that song.

This guy did.....

Possible future Senate candidate from Tennesee, Tim McGraw

[Moloch]

10. Funny how that photo was used in a campaign against

"new country" music and the radio stations that wouldn't play Johnny Cash's music.

I must say, he is the only country artist I have ever cared for.

And now he's dead.

Country sucks.

[Skittles]

5. thank you RKZ

:thumbsup:

[UdoKier]

9. No whole genre of music "sucks".

There is just the bigotry of those who don't get some of them.

:P

[RandomKoolzip]

11. See my post above.

How can I be bigoted at three?! I was bigoted against potty training, maybe. But disco? No, I had no idea if blacks or whites or greens or purples made it; I just knew I didn't like it.

[UdoKier]

13. Bigotry isn't just about race or sexual orientation or gender.

Denouncing a genre of music that you dislike as "sucking" is by definition bigoted, IMO.

You're insulting anyone that likes it, implying that they lack the music appreciation abilities that you have.


"I can't stand XXX" is totally cool with me, but "XXX sucks." is pretty rude, IMO.

Please tell me your favorite type of music so I can tell you how much it, (and by extension, you) suck, and see how you like it!

[RandomKoolzip]

14. Dude, you know how often I get told the music I like sucks every week?

On average, three or four times.

You're insulting anyone that likes it, implying that they lack the music appreciation abilities that you have.

Sooooo not true. Not liking something, and expressing an opinion about it, is NOT THE SAME THING as saying a person or group of people are inferior. This whole bullshit about Disco-haters being racists and homophobes is just a figment of rock critics' polticized imaginations (I think it originated with Dave Marsh, the most sociology-infected rock critic of them all).

Has anyone considered that maybe the timbral or harmonic context of the music might just not be pleasing to some listener's ears?

Generalizing about white male's reactions to the music is just as prejudiced about theirability to appreciate music as the anti-disco-suckers were accused of being.

"And for all the blather we've heard over the years from black ideologues and music writers, and white liberal hard rock-hating rock crit weasels about the superior inherited African sensitivity to timbre, tone, and rythym, you would think that we would now hear a little commotion from them when the whole of African American music is paved over with synthetic percussion, leaving any drummer just a performance adjunct - a human triggering device for pre-programmed digitally-rendered sound-bytes....that's show biz."

-Joe Carducci, Rock and the Pop Narcotic.

Please tell me your favorite type of music so I can tell you how much it, (and by extension, you) suck, and see how you like it!

Why extend the thought unless you WANT to be offended? I've never decided I dislike a person just because I don't like their taste in music. That's fucking shallow. You should never, ever, take something as trivial as another person's opinions about music seriously. I say this as a former rock critic myself.

The accepted line that dislike of disco is racist or homophobic is a myth. Delve into most disco-haters' record collections at that time and you'd more than likely find Jimi Hendrix, Elton John, Chuck Berry, James Brown, Queen, Stevie Wonder, etc. Most people's dislike of disco was founded on the fact that it sounded synthetic, inhuman, the beat was metronomic and numbing, and there weren't many guitars or traditional rock timbres in it.People just didn't like the way disco sounded. The reaction was based on musical criteria (the mass audience wanted stuff that rocked, and disco didn't), it was not a product of racism, and if you're getting that, then you're injecting sociology into a realm where it has never belonged.

Now, I'm sure that there were some white assholes who WERE indeed racist or homophobic. That goes without saying. But to claim that ALL white people's distaste for disco was grounded in bigotry is simply knee-jerk PC of the worst kind.


On edit: I would also like to re-iterate something I posted above: There is good and bad in all genres. I genuinely LIKED some disco songs.

And it is interesting to go back and lisen to that stuff now, with the knowledge that these are actual musicians playing this music on real instruments....Chic, to name just one, didn't get much credit for the quality of their musicianship....after 1983 or so, all disco was made synthetically by hack producers. I think the demarcation line comes with the closing of the Paradise Garage.

But shit like "Disco Duck" and "I Will Survive" was just fuckin' lame.

[UdoKier]

17. "Rock Sucks", "Jazz Sucks", "the Blues Sucks", "Classical Sucks"...

"Heavy Metal Sucks".

I have never seen ANY of these phrases in print before. Could it be because these genres embody white and/or masculine/aggressive aspects?


"Disco Sucks", "Techno Sucks", "Rap Sucks"...


See them ALL THE TIME. And you think there's no connection?

I can totally understand if some people don't like synthetic or overproduced music, and prefer earthier, grittier music. I myself like BOTH.

I personally hate watered-down John Tesh-type stuff, but I would never dump on the folks that like it by saying "easy listening/adult contemporary SUCKS".

The ways in which people say things do matter, and "Disco Sucks" was a very ugly moment in music history, IMO. The blind defensiveness of it is beyond me.

[RandomKoolzip]

20. You're not reading the same magazines I am, then.

I see "Rock sucks" a lot of the time in The Wire, URB, Fader, etc. If I hear another tech-head gloat about how hiphop or electronica is the only music that matters and that rock is dead, I'll fart in a Yoo-Hoo bottle.

For all intents and purposes, what we're dealing with here is a lot of angry and confused rock fans and musicians who were/are upset that the music they loved and grew up with became something they no longer recognize(d). Record companies in the late 70's were pushing rock artists to incorporate disco rythyms into their music, with often hilariously bad results (The Grateful Dead, Warren Zevon, Kiss)....the rock fans were understandibly disappointed. The same is happening today, with record companies forcing bands to adopt turntables and rappers, their decisions based not on what the fans and the artists really want, but what their A&R departments say is cool this month. Thus, the bitterness among rockists toward electronica, and the bitterness to its 70's counterpart, disco.

The zeitgeist these days is that disco never died anyway, it just went underground, transmogrified into house, then techno, then drum 'n' bass, then jungle, and hiphop is only the most obvious descendent of the disco aesthetic (hiphop started when kids imitated the black, gay DJs like Larry Levan they saw spinning records in discos by holding street parties in the Bronx with their home stereos and a PA system.....apart from minor superficial changes here and there, it still remains identifiably disco-derived), and hiphop is now THEE dominant music in the marketplace. One cannot hope to get a record contract or even plan on playing music professionally without bowing to hiphop in some way (turntablists in concert, programmed beats in the studio). You could make a case that disco is still the dominant marketplace form. (BTW, this is not a value judgment on my part; I like a lot of underground hiphop, like El-P, The Coup, Anticon, Mr. Lif, etc.) History is on an endless loop, just like a disco 12".

So, what I'm trying to say is that disco won. What a bunch of racists did at Comiskey Park with a boxful of dynamite, in the end, did nothing but defer the rising tide anyways, so at this late a date, who gives a shit?

And all this is completely sidestepping what ought to be the central question anyways: is the music good? Sociological criteria shouldn't be one's yardstick in gauging whether an artist has merit; there are thousands of well-meaning bad records out there. Just because an artist is black or gay doesn't mean their work is worth a listen.

Lots of people in the late 70's did not think disco met their needs as music consumers.....did you really think that they'd cast aside their criticism of how disco sounded in order to maintain a patina of liberal respectability?

Anyways, nice discussing this with ya. I'm going to bed.

BTW, Jazz represents an almost wholly black American experience. Most of the major players today are still black.

[bobthedrummer]

16. Well some musical FORMULA'S suck regardless of genre

Disco proved that to my biased standards, plus it popularized drum machines-my nemesis!:argh:

[UdoKier]

18. THAT I agree with.

Like all the Eddie Vedder Clones singing overwrought angst rock?

[AuntiBush]

12. Did you ever that old joke...

What do you get when you play a country song backwards?

You get you're wife, car, and job back!

Oldie, but always a goodie at the DU Lounge!:hi:

[shesemsmom]

15. Some off it did

but not all. The Bee Gees were and still are awesome to listen to

[WCGreen]

21. I got laid a lot to the pounding beat of Disco....

After awhile, it was redundant and people started taking dancing lessons and John Travolta started to dance....

Well, then it went all to hell.....