Here Comes The Night - Greatest Disco recording of all time

[LostArt]

How many others have traveled down the disco road? How many more can you come up with?

Don't forget Kiss and "I Was Made For Loving You", the ultimate fusion of disco and rock!

Hot Stuff by The Stones.  The Dead's version of Dancin' In The Streets might qualify as disco.

[ontor pertawst]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O_ASnFmOV4Q

Actually, Rudy Ray Moore hitched himself to the disco bandwagon too late as well, lost everything and ended up working as a waiter in Dallas for a while as a result of this film, I think.

[rn57]

Most extravagant topic title ever, or close to it. Not only is HCTN, disco style, not on a par with Disco Inferno - it's not on a par with at least a hundred disco records from that time. For one thing - it didn't have producers with much of a background in disco. Had Bruce produced a disco record before it that got much play in the clubs? Or Boettcher?

Now, if Dan Hartman had been the producer - a guy who knew both disco and California rock'n'roll - it might have worked.

And HCTN wasn't exactly the most promising material for this treatment, either. To my ears, some of the BBLY songs - say, "Honkin' Down The Highway" - could have made the transition to disco. But that's just my op-ed.

[LostArt]

And HCTN wasn't exactly the most promising material for this treatment, either. To my ears, some of the BBLY songs - say, "Honkin' Down The Highway" - could have made the transition to disco. But that's just my op-ed.

Good choice.  I can hear it in my head. 

[JanBerryFarm]

 The Dead's version of Dancin' In The Streets might qualify as disco

Then again, it might not. What brand cans are you using?   Of course you are completely welcome to your opinion.

Shake it out, and turn on, baby!

 

[SMiLE Brian]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O_ASnFmOV4Q

Actually, Rudy Ray Moore hitched himself to the disco bandwagon too late as well, lost everything and ended up working as a waiter in Dallas for a while as a result of this film, I think.

Actually saw a RRM stand-up comedy album at the vinyl store the other day....  

[LostArt]

 The Dead's version of Dancin' In The Streets might qualify as disco

Then again, it might not. What brand cans are you using?   Of course you are completely welcome to your opinion.

Shake it out, and turn on, baby!

 

Cans?  I don't use no stinkin' cans.    

Of course I'm welcome to my opinions.  And so are you.

[hypehat]

But disco is fucking brilliant! If you cannot dance to Chic I don't think I want to know you tbh.

[Awesoman]

Do you hate disco? Sure you do, that's why you hate the Beach Boys reworking of the beloved track 'Here Comes The Night'.

And of course, you also buy into the myth that they created this monstrosity in an ill-conceived effort to 'cash in' on the disco scene.

I have a different interpretation of that event.

The Beach Boys hated disco just as much as the rest of us. Their motivation in reworking 'Here Comes the Night' was to prove to the world that the Beach Boys could do it better.

Sort of a 'Let's show'em how it's done' thing.

Did disco suck? Sure it did. But, as in any rogue music trend, there's always some glimmer of brilliance. In this case, it's the Beach Boys.

There's really only one song that might possibly not have been outstripped by 'Here Comes The Night' and that's 'Disco Inferno'.

If you disagree, say so... I don't mind. I expect it. I encourage it.

Sorry to say but I don't think the Beach Boys are savvy enough to mock pop culture.  At that point in their career, they were pretty desperate for any kind of relevance.  The disco-fied "Here Comes The Night" was Bruce's idea.  It was one of his many lame attempts at trying to be hip.  But Bruce wouldn't know what "hip" was even if he was having his replaced.  Later on he thought it would be pretty cool to record a "Britney Spears" version of "Surfin'".     Anywho, I recall Jardine once said in an interview that the recording session for that disasterpiece was one of the worst experiences of his career.  And that's saying a lot for a guy who almost traded his fame to be a dentist. 

And yes, disco did indeed suck, but not simply because racist homophobes didn't care for it...

[Jukka]

Anywho, I recall Jardine once said in an interview that the recording session for that disasterpiece was one of the worst experiences of his career.  And that's saying a lot for a guy who almost traded his fame to be a dentist. 

Where did he say his? Do tell more.

[Awesoman]

It was in an interview he did with ESQ back in the late 90's/early 00's. This was during his feuding with Mike Love and he was kind of bitter.  I don't remember his exact words, but he did not enjoy that recording session.  

[DonnyL]

In the Rolling Stone article from the period, I remember it said Brian and Dennis were not involved, and Carl said he "just kind of walked through it". Since Al wasn't into it either ...

[Bud Shaver]

The monkey scream is a little much for my taste.  It is the product of that 'dark' period of pop culture but I still enjoy it for the cheese factor.

[JanBerryFarm]

ALthough worse than most Beach Boys material -  it's better than most 'Disco' material, simple because it's the Beach Boys.

That's my story and I'm stickin' with it.

[MBE]

I never saw it as a race thing or lifestyle, I simply think it wasn't a good genre. I've heard some disco I liked but it was by people like The Jacksons, James Brown, or Ike Turner which all was a lot harder than a lot of the music being done then. Elvis and Jerry Lee incoperated it slightly into a few songs but it worked because it was still rock and roll. The Beach Boys went about it wrong because it wasn't subtle, it wasn't unique, and at least four out of six members didn't like it. Honestly I don't think rock or r&b ever totally recovered because it took electronics to an extreme and set us up for synth pop and all the other crap to follow. Maybe it would have happened anyway but it certainly didn't help organic musicians thrive.

[hypehat]

I'm telling you, DISCO RULES. If you cannot kick it with Donna Summer, you're fools, I tell you!


Sure, the disco HCTN sucks, not because it's disco, but because it's just an old song dreadfully sung and produced.

[phirnis]

I'm telling you, DISCO RULES. If you cannot kick it with Donna Summer, you're fools, I tell you!


Sure, the disco HCTN sucks, not because it's disco, but because it's just an old song dreadfully sung and produced.

Couldn't agree more!

As far as I'm concerned, Curt Boettcher wasn't a very good disco producer to begin with (love his work with The Millennium, by the way!). I've heard the California Music album and most of it is really dull and uninspired (save for Jamaica Farewell, which is really nice). HCTN is not even half as bad as CM'S attempt at I Can Hear Music but still... an experiment, yes, but not very successful at all.

[Cliff1000uk]

Every time I hear the begining of this song I envision Ponch & Jon roaring down the freeways of LA on their motorcycles.

Completely agree but would Ponch think disco was gay?

[Danimalist]

Timely thread. Last time we moved, I thought I sold all of my vinyl. My wife and I are moving again, and I woke up this morning to find that she had found my HCTN 12" and the Celebration album among hers. No sign of Pacific Ocean Blue.

Kill me.

[Ron]

"Here Comes the Night" is an alright song, I don't see why so many people hate the disco version.  It's not bad in any way (besides being disco), but it's not a very good disco song either, I guess it's just the boys experimenting with it.

My favorite disco song is probably "Disco Inferno"... the Trammps lead singer just died in Rock Hill, SC a few months ago... .where I happen to be logged on at the moment.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wbFgH0mHw3w

The video is so great, and the guy is so into it.  If the Beach Boys would have sang "Here comes the night" with the same zest that this guy sings with, maybe it would be the greatest disco recording of all time.  Doubt it, though.

At the end of the actual record, he goes "How many of you understand what I'm talking about?  I ain't talkin' about burnin' down a building.  It's comin' from my Soul, yall!    Don't you rescue me!  Let my spirit burn free."

His name was Jimmy Ellis, he just died 3 months ago. 

I can understand people aren't into Disco, but don't lump it all in as just shitty music, some of it was fantastic.  It was birthed in Soul Music, some of it is indistinguishable from fantastic soul stuff that was being recorded at the time. 

Here's the Trammps doing "Where do we go from Here", the guy was a fantastic singer.  So soulful. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2QvNClAC6BQ&feature=related

If that's disco, sign me up. 

[BillA]

[/quote]

That it was racist should be uncontroversial. As already noted, disco was held as a threat to white hegemony by nationalist organizations who spearheaded anti-disco movements during the time of Disco Sucks. As Lester Bangs noted at the time, leading rock journalists and critics were even prone to referring to music by Otis Redding as "n----r disco sh!t." The movement itself gathered steam as a racist movement too. Rolling Stone magazine is on record as noting that when they devoted part of an issue to disco, they were inundated with racist letters.

Steve Dahl who coined the term Disco Sucks admitted that he had more of a problem with the culture than the music. Disco, for Dahl, was "intimidating" and he wrote a parody of Do You Think I'm Sexy called Do You Think I'm Disco which suggested that men could "re-masculinize" themselves by abandoning disco music.
[/quote]

Um, no - The biggest Disco fans where the racists.  I was going to school in Boston at the time and what you would find is that the discos were full of the Italians from Eastie and the Irish from Southie and Charlestown who four years earlier were throwing rocks at school buses.  The culture portrayed by Saturday Night Fever was very real and very racist.

I personally disliked disco because I viewed as taking the blues out of R&B.

As for HCTN - It isa generic disco song.  It sounds like it was produced, played and arranged by the same people who did the CHiPs soundtrack.  Every time I hear it I expect to turn around and see Ponch and Jon break into smiles.

The greatest Disco song - "Miss You".  gotta love "Some Girls" where the Stones show the Punks and the Disco people how it's done.

[Lonely Summer]

I never saw it as a race thing or lifestyle, I simply think it wasn't a good genre. I've heard some disco I liked but it was by people like The Jacksons, James Brown, or Ike Turner which all was a lot harder than a lot of the music being done then. Elvis and Jerry Lee incoperated it slightly into a few songs but it worked because it was still rock and roll. The Beach Boys went about it wrong because it wasn't subtle, it wasn't unique, and at least four out of six members didn't like it. Honestly I don't think rock or r&b ever totally recovered because it took electronics to an extreme and set us up for synth pop and all the other crap to follow. Maybe it would have happened anyway but it certainly didn't help organic musicians thrive.

I agree, disco gave a lot of suburban kids the excuse to say "black music sucks", despite the years preceding disco having some of the best music ever recorded by Marvin Gaye, Stevie Wonder, and many others - hard to believe now, but early to mid  70's FM rock radio (AOR) included a lot of soul or r&b music. Earth, Wind and Fire, Tower of Power, Billy Preston, Stevie, Marvin, they were just as much a part of that format as Led Zeppelin, Jethro Tull, Bad Company, and Elton John. The backlash against disco meant that AOR went totally white, arena rock...anything with a bit of "soul" to it was now branded "disco"....and you didn't get your music played on AOR if you were black....unless your name was Jimi Hendrix. Racist? That's a strong word....but a lot of people felt that's just what it was all about. As for incorporating a disco sound into the music of an already established act, I would say that Wings, the Kinks and the Rolling Stones did it a lot better than the Beach Boys. Wings hit "Goodnight Tonight" certainly had a disco tempo/rhythm, but was still a very McCartney-esque production. The Kinks did "Wish I Could Fly Like Superman" with Mick Avory play a straight disco beat on the drums throughout, but the guitars were pure Kinks. And no one but Ray Davies - at least in the Rock God Universe - would write a song with lines like "I'm so weak, I'm too thin, I'd like to fly but I can't even swim!" Can't imagine James Brown or Wilson Pickett covering that one!

[Mike's Beard]

The monkey scream is a little much for my taste.  It is the product of that 'dark' period of pop culture but I still enjoy it for the cheese factor.

I can just picture Bruce in the monitor room now, speaking into the mike saying "it needs more monkey".

[filledeplage]

That it was racist should be uncontroversial. As already noted, disco was held as a threat to white hegemony by nationalist organizations who spearheaded anti-disco movements during the time of Disco Sucks. As Lester Bangs noted at the time, leading rock journalists and critics were even prone to referring to music by Otis Redding as "n----r disco sh!t." The movement itself gathered steam as a racist movement too. Rolling Stone magazine is on record as noting that when they devoted part of an issue to disco, they were inundated with racist letters.

Steve Dahl who coined the term Disco Sucks admitted that he had more of a problem with the culture than the music. Disco, for Dahl, was "intimidating" and he wrote a parody of Do You Think I'm Sexy called Do You Think I'm Disco which suggested that men could "re-masculinize" themselves by abandoning disco music.
[/quote]

Um, no - The biggest Disco fans where the racists.  I was going to school in Boston at the time and what you would find is that the discos were full of the Italians from Eastie and the Irish from Southie and Charlestown who four years earlier were throwing rocks at school buses.  The culture portrayed by Saturday Night Fever was very real and very racist.

I personally disliked disco because I viewed as taking the blues out of R&B.

As for HCTN - It isa generic disco song.  It sounds like it was produced, played and arranged by the same people who did the CHiPs soundtrack.  Every time I hear it I expect to turn around and see Ponch and Jon break into smiles.

The greatest Disco song - "Miss You".  gotta love "Some Girls" where the Stones show the Punks and the Disco people how it's done.
[/quote]

You may have gone to school as a "visitor" in Boston, but the stereotype which you castigate, appears to be insultingly replicated with your intolerant pigeonholing of "Irish" and "Italian" kids.  Those neighborhoods, as well as others were havens for clusters of people who emigrated from Europe, with little but what they wore, and the comfort of a common language, and/or background.  South Boston had a large immigrant population from Eastern Europe, specifically Lithuania and Poland. New York was similar, in that large immigrant groups "self-grouped" for religious reasons, and for similar cultural identity and commonality of languages. The great Dick Dale is from South Boston. (Lebanese/Polish/Belarusian) SNF is a "snapshot" of a cultural phenomenon and not an indictment.  JMHO

And frankly, as one who taught in that school system for several decades, after the busing order, what was largely left, were poor people who could not afford private school and who had no choices in life and no education.  People who view themelves as powerless often become violent.  This is no apology for that outrageously bad behavior. And, Apartheid was no different, with violence, but for different reasons. (sandbox discussion)

I happen to like HCTN, because it shows the Boys were open to trying a different genre, even though the timing of the release seemed to coincide with the wane of disco. (Thank God)

Rock music was classified largely as "white music" as well.  Does that make it racist?  I don't think so. Composers take their influences from many genres, nations, and races, and often subliminally influenced.   It is largely race "neutral" as a finished product. 

[hypehat]

Seriously, why does everybody here hate disco? Your only exposure to it being HCTN is NOT a valid reason.