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Best 1978 P&J Album (POLL Closes 11 May)

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P&J Album Poll No. 6.

New Wave!?!

Poll Results

OptionVotes
Wire: Pink Flag (Harvest) 15
Blondie: Parallel Lines (Chrysalis) 15
Elvis Costello: This Year's Model (Columbia) 10
Funkadelic: One Nation Under a Groove (Warner Bros.) 9
Pere Ubu: The Modern Dance (Blank) 8
Talking Heads: More Songs About Buildings and Food (Sire) 4
Nick Lowe: Pure Pop for Power People (Columbia) 4
Devo: Are We Not Men? We Are Devo! (Warner Bros.) 3
Brian Eno: Before and After Science (Island) 3
Captain Beefheart and His Magic Band: Shiny Beast (Bat Chain Puller) 3
Warren Zevon: Excitable Boy (Asylum) 3
The Cars: The Cars (Elektra) 2
The Rolling Stones: Some Girls (Rolling Stones) 2
Patti Smith Group: Easter (Arista) 2
The Clash: Give 'Em Enough Rope (Epic) 2
Willie Nelson: Stardust (Columbia) 1
Lou Reed: Street Hassle (Arista) 1
Neil Young: Comes a Time (Reprise) 1
Van Morrison: Wavelength (Warner Bros.) 0
Generation X: Generation X (Chrysalis) 0
Cheap Trick: Heaven Tonight (Epic) 0
Bob Dylan: Street Legal (Columbia) 0
Television: Adventure (Elektra) 0
The Who: Who Are You (MCA) 0
Dave Edmunds: Tracks on Wax 4 (Swan Song) 0
Ian Dury: New Boots and Panties! (Stiff) 0
David Johansen: David Johansen (Blue Sky) 0
Ramones: Road to Ruin (Sire) 0
Bruce Springsteen: Darkness at the Edge of Town (Columbia) 0
Al Green: Truth 'n Time (Hi)0


― JN$OT, Monday, 7 May 2007 11:12 (eighteen years ago)

http://www.robertchristgau.com/xg/pnj/pj78.php

― JN$OT, Monday, 7 May 2007 11:14 (eighteen years ago)

This was the poll (and the Xgau essay) that single-handedly led me to make my career choice.

I just voted for Pere Ubu.

― xhuxk, Monday, 7 May 2007 11:15 (eighteen years ago)

I voted for the most obvious choice, again.

― JN$OT, Monday, 7 May 2007 11:16 (eighteen years ago)

wotta year! i was working in record store and starting to write revues.

torn between Dub Housing and One Nation Under a Groove, though many of these albums hold up after years of heavy listening. still, I'd probably give the retrospective nod to 1977.

suprised there's not more non-Marley reggae on this list and 76-77 as well, weren't rock critics were all over this stuff? I sure was...

― m coleman, Monday, 7 May 2007 11:25 (eighteen years ago)

What's the obvious choice?

― Rockist Scientist, Monday, 7 May 2007 11:31 (eighteen years ago)

Parallel Lines, I guess.

― Alba, Monday, 7 May 2007 11:33 (eighteen years ago)

I think you must mean The Modern Dance. You don't want to vote for the wrong Ubu album after all. (Dub Housing made the '79 list, I think.)

― JN$OT, Monday, 7 May 2007 11:34 (eighteen years ago)

Obvious choice? Er, I meant the winner, TYM.

― JN$OT, Monday, 7 May 2007 11:35 (eighteen years ago)

xp: Nah, rock critics didn't seem to be paying attention to reggae all that much then. (Honestly, it never scored very big on Pazz & Jop in the '70s; I'm not even sure that changed much later.) (I've been kind of surprised by all the "where's the Marley albums?" on these threads, to be honest. But then Marley was never close to my reggae favorite, and I've never paid much attention to his individual albums myself; hard for me to think of them as major, though that's my own fault probably.)

And the 1978 Ubu album is Modern Dance, not Dub Housing, which apparently didn't actually come out in the States until 1979 (and finished notably higher in Pazz & Jop, when it did.)

I devoured not only the main list that year, but these voters' lists, which still look way cool to me; I can barely count how many LPs I bought through the '80s on the basis of these lists alone (and Xgau's 1978 list as well, of course):

VINCE ALETTI: USA-European Connection (Marlin) 10; Don Ray: Garden of Love (Polydor) 10; Musique: Keep on Jumpin' (Prelude) 10; Voyage (Marlin) 10; Sylvester: Step II (Fantasy) 10; Alec Costandinos & the Syncophonic Orchestra: Romeo and Juliet (Casablanca) 10; Steve Reich: Music for 18 Musicians (ECM) 10; James Wells: True Love is My Destiny (AVI) 10; Ashford & Simpson: Is It Still Good to Ya (Warner Bros.) 10; Cerrone: Cerrone IV: The Golden Touch (Cotillion) 10.

LESTER BANGS: The Clash: Give 'Em Enough Rope (Epic) 30; Ramones: Road to Ruin (Sire) 20; Joe "King" Carrasco and El Molino: Tex-Mex Rock-Roll (Lisa) 15; David Johansen (Blue Sky) 5; Bob Seger & the Silver Bullet Band: Stranger in Town (Capitol) 5; Lou Reed: Street Hassle (Arista) 5; Television: Adventure (Elektra) 5; Pere Ubu: The Modern Dance (Blank) 5; Brian Eno: Before and After Science (Island) 5; No New York (Antilles) 5.

PABLO "YORUBA" GUZMAN: Parliament: Motor-Booty Affair (Casablanca) 15; Funkadelic: One Nation Under a Groove (Warner Bros.) 15; Bootsy's Rubber Band: Bootsy? Player of the Year (Warner Bros.) 15; Tito Puente: Homonajo a Beny (Tico) 10; Eddie Palmieri: Lucumi Macumba Voodoo (Epic) 10; Gil Scott-Heron and Brian Jackson: Secrets (Arista) 10; Chick Corea: Secret Agent (Polydor) 10; Tipico Ideal: Out of This World (Coco) 5; Van Morrison: Wavelength (Warner Bros.) 5; Neil Young: Comes a Time (Reprise) 5.


TOM HULL: Talking Heads: More Songs About Buildings and Food (Sire) 15; Pere Ubu: The Modern Dance (Blank) 15; Ramones: Road to Ruin (Sire) 14; Nick Lowe: Pure Pop for Now People (Columbia) 12; Blondie: Parallel Lines (Chrysalis) 12; The Clash: Give 'Em Enough Rope (Epic) 9; Brian Eno: Before and After Science (Island) 8; Dave Edmunds: Tracks on Wax 4 (Swan Song) 5; Silver Convention: Love in a Sleeper (Midsong International) 5; Captain Beefheart & the Magic Band: Shiny Beast (Bat Chain Puller) (Warner Bros.) 5.

DAVID JACKSON: Ornette Coleman: Body Meta (Artists House) 30; Captain Beefheart & the Magic Band: Shiny Beast (Bat Chain Puller) (Warner Bros.) 10; Funkadelic: One Nation Under a Groove (Warner Bros.) 10; D.J. Rogers: Love Brought Me Back (Columbia) 10; George Thorogood and the Destroyers: Move It on Over (Rounder) 9; Sun Ra: St. Louis Blues: Solo Piano (Improvising Artists) 8; Joan Armatrading: To the Limit (A&M) 8; Television: Adventure (Elektra) 5; 21st Century Singers: Saturday Night Fever (Creed) 5; Peabo Bryson: Reaching for the Sky (Capitol) 5.

JOHN MORTHLAND: David Johansen (Blue Sky) 17; Joe "King" Carrasco and El Molino: Tex-Mex Rock-Roll (Lisa) 16; The Clash: Give 'Em Enough Rope (Epic) 12; Eric Dolphy: The Berlin Concerts (Inner City) 12; Captain Beefheart & the Magic Band: Shiny Beast (Bat Chain Puller) (Warner Bros.) 12; Bob Seger & the Silver Bullet Band: Stranger in Town (Capitol) 10; Raydio (Arista) 6; Jack Clement: All I Want to Do in Life (Elektra) 5; Delbert McClinton: Second Wind (Capricorn) 5; Professor Longhair: Live on the Queen Mary (Harvest) 5.

JON PARELES: Captain Beefheart & the Magic Band: Shiny Beast (Bat Chain Puller) (Warner Bros.) 10; Air: Open Air Suit (Arista Novus) 10; NRBQ: At Yankee Stadium (Mercury) 10; Steve Reich: Music for 18 Musicians (ECM) 10; Brian Eno: Before and After Science (Island) 10; Happy the Man: Crafty Hands (Arista) 10; Jules & the Polar Bears: Got No Breeding (Columbia) 10; Weather Report: Mr. Gone (Columbia) 10; Talking Heads: More Songs About Buildings & Food (Sire) 10; Carla Bley: European Tour 1977 (Watt) 10.

TOM SMUCKER: Willie Nelson: Stardust (Columbia) 17; Funkadelic: One Nation Under a Groove (Warner Bros.) 14; Kraftwerk: The Man-Machine (Capitol) 12; The Gospel Keynotes: Gospel Fire (Nashboro) 11; Bonnie Koloc: Wild and Reculse (Epic) 10; Alec R. Costandinos & the Syncophonic Orchestra: The Hunchback of Notre Dame (Casablanca) 9; Ramones: Road to Ruin (Sire) 8; Rolling Stones: Some Girls (Rolling Stones) 8; Television: Adventure (Elektra) 6; Elvis Costello: This Year's Model (Columbia) 5.

― xhuxk, Monday, 7 May 2007 11:36 (eighteen years ago)

xp: Nah, rock critics didn't seem to be paying attention to reggae all that much then.

Didn't it become a cliche that reggae was every pro-punk critics other favourite music? Maybe not in the US.

― Alba, Monday, 7 May 2007 11:45 (eighteen years ago)

Wow, that's some list. I'll go with More Songs About Buildings and Food by a slight margin over Darkness on the Edge of Town and Comes a Time, which may be Neil's most underrated record. Of course, This Year's Model, Stardust, Who Are You, Are We Not Men? and The Cras are awfully great, too.

― Jiminy Krokus, Monday, 7 May 2007 12:20 (eighteen years ago)

Pareles' list is delightfully peculiar, btw. Big ups to Steve Reich!

― Jiminy Krokus, Monday, 7 May 2007 12:21 (eighteen years ago)

Pareles was totally prog in those days!

― xhuxk, Monday, 7 May 2007 12:24 (eighteen years ago)

Can I pick from Pablo "Yoruva" Guzman's list? (Actually, "78 is one of my favorite years for salsa, and some major albums are missing from his list, not that he was just doing salsa to begin with, but no Siembra? The weird but great Palmieri album makes up for it though.)

― Rockist Scientist, Monday, 7 May 2007 12:26 (eighteen years ago)

Yoruba I mean. (Typing standing up while putting on my belt.)

― Rockist Scientist, Monday, 7 May 2007 12:27 (eighteen years ago)

Voted Nick Lowe, but not having "All Mod Cons" in the list is a crime towards music.

― Geir Hongro, Monday, 7 May 2007 12:30 (eighteen years ago)

Or a crime against anglophilia, y'mean.

― JN$OT, Monday, 7 May 2007 12:33 (eighteen years ago)

ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON ZEVON

― Dom Passantino, Monday, 7 May 2007 12:34 (eighteen years ago)

Wasn't Frampton Comes Alive from '78? Or was that '77?

― Jiminy Krokus, Monday, 7 May 2007 12:34 (eighteen years ago)

The Zevon is really good, yes.

x-post

FCA was '77, I believe. Not that it would have made P&J either way.

― JN$OT, Monday, 7 May 2007 12:36 (eighteen years ago)

Major props to the sponsors of these polls ... has me posting on ILM about somthing other than VVM-New Times again. That is a relief. Music is king. :-)

― Jiminy Krokus, Monday, 7 May 2007 12:36 (eighteen years ago)

FCA should have ... killer rock record!

― Jiminy Krokus, Monday, 7 May 2007 12:36 (eighteen years ago)

FCA was released in 1976, it was inescapable that summer :-(

I like Modern Dance a lot, the first time I heard UBU was when that album came into the rec store and innocently played it on the store system...whoa they're from CLEVELAND wtf but I voted for One Nation Under A Groove.

loved seeing the lists from Aletti, Morthland and Guzman though I'm surprised Pablo didn't vote for DEVO! forgot what a critics fave that first Johansen record was, it's kind of a bar-band classic I guess.

but where oh where are Burning Spear Mighty Diamonds Culture Agustus Pablo etc etc etc tho i bet LK Johnson shows up on 1979

― m coleman, Monday, 7 May 2007 12:44 (eighteen years ago)

A crime against Anglophilia is a crime against music.

― Geir Hongro, Monday, 7 May 2007 12:46 (eighteen years ago)

Ha ha.

― JN$OT, Monday, 7 May 2007 12:51 (eighteen years ago)

will you arrest me you big ol racist?

― 600, Monday, 7 May 2007 12:52 (eighteen years ago)

Voted for Talking Heads, but just as easily could have voted for Pere Ubu, EC, Funkadelic, or Parallel Lines.

― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Monday, 7 May 2007 12:58 (eighteen years ago)

Parallel Lines. Thought Zevon was a close contender.

― Joe, Monday, 7 May 2007 13:19 (eighteen years ago)

Total life-changing year for me--the start of the best five-year stretch of music that I've ever experienced first-hand: '78-'82. I think even the next two or three lists are better than this, but I love this one lots. Not sure what to vote for.

― sw00ds, Monday, 7 May 2007 13:48 (eighteen years ago)

I still hadn't seen or heard of P&J or Village Voice or Robert Christgau in 1978 (and had no concept of, or interest in, "black music," either, to be honest), but back then I filled out (though never sent in) [i]Creem reader polls, which were a lot of fun. To my disappointment and horror, however, I came across the '78 one a few years ago, and discovered that I had written in a tie between Abba and the Bee Gees for "worst group." Which is weird, because I don't even remember thinking that much about them. If [i]Saturday Night Fever was on this list, I'd probably vote for it, just to atone for my sins against disco.

― sw00ds, Monday, 7 May 2007 13:58 (eighteen years ago)

Ah yes, sins against disco. I'm quite sure many of us old-timers have been there at one time or another.

― JN$OT, Monday, 7 May 2007 14:01 (eighteen years ago)

This list is fucking hopeless, by the way.

Just had a look at my iTunes library and found that the following key things are missing:

Marvin Gaye - Here, My Dear
Kraftwerk - The Man Machine
Chic - C'est Chic
Nina Simone - Baltimore
Gang of Four - Entertainment

Never mind The Only Ones, Buzzcocks, Magazine, Undertones et al. And Althea & Donna. And The Rutles.

― Alba, Monday, 7 May 2007 14:02 (eighteen years ago)

Clearly, I also need to keep in check my sins against italics.

― sw00ds, Monday, 7 May 2007 14:03 (eighteen years ago)

Christgau really sounds like a psycho in that essay with all the name-calling.

― Rockist Scientist, Monday, 7 May 2007 14:04 (eighteen years ago)

The Marvin and GO4 records were '79 releases, I believe.

x-post

― JN$OT, Monday, 7 May 2007 14:04 (eighteen years ago)

xxx-post

Entertainment
Are you sure? did you engineer that album or something? Because I think that was '79 in the UK and it shows up in the '80 P&J.

Never mind The Only Ones, Buzzcocks, Magazine, Undertones et al. And Althea & Donna. And The Rutles
You might have heard of this country. It's called America.

― sw00ds, Monday, 7 May 2007 14:06 (eighteen years ago)

Christgau really sounds like a psycho in that essay with all the name-calling.

I don't see why.

― JN$OT, Monday, 7 May 2007 14:07 (eighteen years ago)

there are some good ones missing, but a great list and I remember being constantly surprised by 1978...Costello, Lowe, Ubu, a new Beefheart record! I voted for Ubu and feel bad I didn't for Funkadelic. Anyway, the Gaye record is surely great and Big Star's Thirdwas released that year, altho recorded four years earlier. My fave of the Big Star records. But the Ubu stuff strikes me as the most prescient.

― whisperineddhurt, Monday, 7 May 2007 14:09 (eighteen years ago)

You might have heard of this country. It's called America.

Well, that's why I put those in the "never mind..." list. But Dave sodding Edmunds made the list.

Oops, re: Entertainment. Here My Dear was '78 though.

― Alba, Monday, 7 May 2007 14:14 (eighteen years ago)

Yeah, yer right about the Marvin. Although it was released in Dec., so I assume many critics wouldn't have had a chance to hear it in time for the poll.

― JN$OT, Monday, 7 May 2007 14:16 (eighteen years ago)

Also, I think Here, My Dear was received pretty poorly at the time; it was considered nothing more than the ultimate fuck-off album due to its backstory. Silly critics.

― Dimension 5ive, Monday, 7 May 2007 14:20 (eighteen years ago)

Although that certainly doesn't explain why it didn't make the '79 poll.

x-post

― JN$OT, Monday, 7 May 2007 14:21 (eighteen years ago)

But Dave sodding Edmunds made the list.

True enough... it always seemed like he snuck in the door riding on Nick Lowe's coattails.

― sw00ds, Monday, 7 May 2007 14:22 (eighteen years ago)

Were Kraftwerk obscure in the US or did they just not like The Man Machine?

I thought rock critics kind of liked Chic, too.

― Alba, Monday, 7 May 2007 14:24 (eighteen years ago)

Pretty sure that Kraftwerk were mostly considered a novelty by US critics at that time. They even had a novelty top 40 hit ("Autobahn").

― sw00ds, Monday, 7 May 2007 14:31 (eighteen years ago)

No one, outside of Lester Bangs, I don't think, thought they were in any way important... someone should correct me if I'm wrong.

― sw00ds, Monday, 7 May 2007 14:32 (eighteen years ago)

Christgau really sounds like a psycho in that essay with all the name-calling.

I'm curious what name-calling you're referring to. Do you mean his notion that the anti-disco backlash was closet racist?

― o. nate, Monday, 7 May 2007 15:15 (eighteen years ago)

These assholes are such fanatics that they seize upon the first hint of synthesized percussion or rhythmic strings or chukka-chukka guitar--hell, the first lilt--as proof that anybody from Bowie to Poco has "gone disco," though most often the discos could care less even when it's true. . . .
. . .True, most music bizzers are relieved that the Sex Pistols have vanished into infamy; they still find the Clash strident and the Ramones simplistic, declaring such bands unacceptable to the imaginary consumer who personifies their own complacency and cowardice. But because it's the nature of complacent cowards to hedge all bets--and because they want to prove they're not, you know, square--they reassert their own putative attachment to "good" rock and roll at the same time, thus easing the sales breakthrough of 'twixt-wave-and-stream bands like the Cars and Cheap Trick.

― Rockist Scientist, Monday, 7 May 2007 15:33 (eighteen years ago)

Sure he sounds a little pissed-off, but psycho? I don't think so.

― JN$OT, Monday, 7 May 2007 15:36 (eighteen years ago)

Parallel Lines and the Cars' debut were two of the records that got me fired from the radio station I was working at in '78. I was on air mornings, where I was supposed to be playing Olivia Newton-John and Andy Gibb, and both "One Way Or Another" and "Just What I Needed" were dayparted for after 3:00PM when kids were home from school, but I just couldn't resist.

Blondie for me, as the first example that my "weird" musical tastes were somehow prescient.

― Dan Peterson, Monday, 7 May 2007 15:41 (eighteen years ago)

But Christgau's right!

― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Monday, 7 May 2007 15:44 (eighteen years ago)

Taking the second quote there, no, it's not complacency and cowardice to prefer a certain level of complexity in your music.

― Rockist Scientist, Monday, 7 May 2007 15:46 (eighteen years ago)

Since I wasn't there, it's hard for me to say whether or not Christgau was right, though he does paint his chosen enemies with a pretty broad brush. But I agree that it does seem a bit weird for him to get so worked up over what mostly comes down to a difference in aesthetic taste.

― o. nate, Monday, 7 May 2007 15:49 (eighteen years ago)

I guess he was trying to channel a bit of that punk anger.

― o. nate, Monday, 7 May 2007 15:49 (eighteen years ago)

Yeah, I wasn't old enough to remember the anti-disco backlash, but remember: Cominsky Park took place not long after the P&J essay; and Peter Shapiro's Turn the Beat Around does an expert job of proving that disco backlash was mostly a white conservative phenomenon. The late seventies were also known for the rise of AOR (REO Speedwagon, Foreigner, Styx), and no doubt this genre served as a rest home for white guys tired of fags and niggers (I am, of course, generalizing).

― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Monday, 7 May 2007 15:53 (eighteen years ago)

^Comiskey, obviously

― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Monday, 7 May 2007 15:54 (eighteen years ago)

I think none of what Christgau says in that paragraph is untrue. Rockist Scientist, did you choose Journey and Foreigner over punk and disco in the late 70s?

― Patrick, Monday, 7 May 2007 16:02 (eighteen years ago)

(keep in mind, he's not talking about jazz and latin fans, which were not much of a factor in the poll - he's talking about classic-rock/AOR assholes)

― Patrick, Monday, 7 May 2007 16:04 (eighteen years ago)

and I love a lot of the AOR bands I mentioned, but arguing "Fuck that faggoty disco shit; gimme real rock like `Cold As Ice' and `More Than a Feeling'!" (as some dickwad friend of my cousin's did a few weeks ago) creates a polarity where none exists.

― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Monday, 7 May 2007 16:09 (eighteen years ago)

(...specifically "music bizzers" - he seems to be talking especially about radio people, in which case I don't think he's being nearly harsh enough - there should be a fucking war crimes tribunal for AOR program directors of the late 70s)

― Patrick, Monday, 7 May 2007 16:11 (eighteen years ago)

Patrick, no, but that doesn't mean people who did were all those things Christgau says. Also I did like the Cars and Cheap Trick alongside disco (although maybe those bands got temporarily superseded later when I got more seriously into punk/post-punk). (My chronology is a little disjointed since I was enjoying a cover band that played a lot of Ramones before I'd actually heard any Ramones.)

(You know what's peculiar about this time for me? I can't think of another period which I remember so much in terms of what albums were being advertised on the radio. I remember getting excited by ads for Cheap Trick and Elvis Costello (Armed Forces, in particular) more than I even remember hearing them on the radio.)

― Rockist Scientist, Monday, 7 May 2007 16:13 (eighteen years ago)

I might have admitted this before a few times, but I grew up in a small town and formed an anti-disco club at my junior high school. I don't think I was a racist homophobe; I think I just thought it wasn't very good music, based on the fact that all my parents' friends danced to Saturday Night Fever at their parties, and I really liked new wave, soul, jazz, AOR rock, and other "real music." No excuses, but I was very young then, and kinda stupid. The joke was on me; there wasn't a lot of traction for my anti-disco club, and the girls were like "but it's fun to dance to!" HOW I LEARNED MY LESSON

― Dimension 5ive, Monday, 7 May 2007 16:21 (eighteen years ago)

Go and sin no more (I hope you got laid some more too).

― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Monday, 7 May 2007 16:22 (eighteen years ago)

Rockist Scientist - I enjoy the Cars and Cheap Trick too! *In addition to* punk and disco, rather than *instead of*.

― Patrick, Monday, 7 May 2007 16:23 (eighteen years ago)

Hmmm - much tougher to choose than most of the previous P&Js. For the first time, my tastes and those of the crits are in frequent alignment. (Actually, now that I think of it, the '71 poll was hard too.) The Cars and Blondie don't deserve to be overlooked merely because they haven't been off the airwaves since. (So I'll overlook 'em merely to make my choice easier.)

One Nation Under A Groove, Modern Dance and Shiny Beast are my three favourites. All three contain track or two I usually skip, but only Funkadelic had the decency to include theirs on a separate 7". Plus Bernie Worrell trumps both Ubu's Allen Ravenstine and (future Ravenstine replacement!) the Magic Band's Eric Drew Feldman.

One Nation it is.

― Myonga Vön Bontee, Monday, 7 May 2007 17:11 (eighteen years ago)

thus easing the sales breakthrough of 'twixt-wave-and-stream bands like the Cars and Cheap Trick.

Guess I'm a twixter--Parallel Lines gets my vote just slightly over The Cars, with Cheap Trick in 3rd, 4th, or 5th (Pink Flag and Devo have to be in that mix too). (Aside: Would xgau consider Blondie a twixter?)

I'm all for post-prog-avant-punk what-have-you, and greatly dig Ubu, Eno, Beefheart, et al, but when you're voting in a pop, er "jop", poll, no one wrote better white radio pop at the time than Blondie, Cars, and Cheap Trick. (Stateside that is, with Nick Lowe on the other side of the Atlantic.)

Funny innit that, ultimately, punk didn't end up killing disco, metal, or hippies, but prolly did away with halfway decent top 40 rock (for good?).

― MC, Monday, 7 May 2007 18:45 (eighteen years ago)

unny innit that, ultimately, punk didn't end up killing disco, metal, or hippies, but prolly did away with halfway decent top 40 rock (for good?).

Not at all, as a host of Top 40 entries between 1979-1984 flaunted their punk/New Wave influences not so discreetly.

― Alfred, Lord Sotosyn, Monday, 7 May 2007 18:48 (eighteen years ago)

I don't consider Modern English to be rock.

― MC, Monday, 7 May 2007 18:51 (eighteen years ago)

Herman Brood was rock! Joan Jett was rock! The Go Gos were rock! Pat Benatar was rock! And so was Van Halen and Tommy Shaw and ZZ Top and Prince and Loverboy all the other bands who were trying to sound new wave (at least sometimes -- "Jump"!) within the next couple years.

― xhuxk, Monday, 7 May 2007 19:05 (eighteen years ago)

In fact, by 1984, the entire Top 40 wanted to sound like the Cars, pretty much. (Which is part of what made the top 40 so great that year.)

― xhuxk, Monday, 7 May 2007 19:09 (eighteen years ago)

And the punk rock singer on the #29 Pazz & Jop album on the list above wound up with a few rocking Top 40 hits of his own, if I remember right.

― xhuxk, Monday, 7 May 2007 19:14 (eighteen years ago)

And Devo went to #14 on the pop chart in 1980! Etc. (Xgau in his P&J essay, ha ha: " if Rockpile is willing to slog it, they'll do all right too. So will Blondie, already a major [band] in Europe and Australia; if Devo doesn't go the way of the Tubes, they will too, which I'll try to convince myself is a mixed blessing.")

― xhuxk, Monday, 7 May 2007 19:23 (eighteen years ago)

Since no one else will, I voted for The Cars. That's a fucking monster power pop album, with hook after hook and hit after hit. Patti Smith or Wire woulda been my second, I think. But that Cars album, when I got it (after years of trying to find that "Living in tremelo" song that was really Moving In Stereo), was one of those moments where the soundtrack perfectly matches the life. I let my car windows down and just loved the hell out of it. There's plenty of other albums on that list that I appreciate as art, but none that I appreciate as so much fun.

― I eat cannibals, Tuesday, 8 May 2007 01:41 (eighteen years ago)

I wasn't born in 1978 but I do like Journey more than the Sex Pistols or Ramones FWIW (though I like both of those bands to some extent) and it probably is partly because they're not as simplistic. (To a great extent, though, it's probably because they're what I knew first. Even then I don't think this preference necessarily makes me complacent or cowardly.)

My favourite that I've heard is Patti Smith (whom I also prefer to the Pistols or Ramones) but I'd want to listen to at least the Funkadelic, Eno, and Beefheart albums. The Cars and Blondie albums are really good too. My favourite albums from any of the lists are Weather Report (which would get my vote right away if it were on the final list) and Steve Reich. I don't like this list nearly as much as any of the earlier 70s lists.

― Sundar, Tuesday, 8 May 2007 03:22 (eighteen years ago)

I find the line of argumentation Xgau's using to be just as fallacious as that of the kind of Guitar Center dorks who would say that people listen to punk and disco because they're too simple-minded/unmusicianly/complacent to appreciate shred-happy AOR descendants.

― Sundar, Tuesday, 8 May 2007 03:41 (eighteen years ago)

I still think Christgau was talking about people in positions of power who made deliberate decisions to keep any and all punk off the airwaves (key words: "music bizzers" "declaring such bands unacceptable to the imaginary consumer"). He's not talking about music lovers who were willing to give punk and disco a chance and liked some of it but still enjoyed Cheap Trick or Steve Reich more.

― Patrick, Tuesday, 8 May 2007 04:02 (eighteen years ago)

I like Vince Aletti.

― Eric H., Tuesday, 8 May 2007 04:28 (eighteen years ago)

x-post. Yea I eventually realized that I liked Vince too but first:

Like Matt C.(Dimension 5ive) I must also confess to briefly being part of the 'disco sucks' crowd--but not for homophobic or racist reasons (in high school I knew nothing about disco's African-American or gay aspects)---at the time I was just sick of the heavy mainstream marketing push everywhere behind Travolta's white suit (while the punk and new wave I was starting to embrace was being ignored--I was also into Springsteen then and a year or 2 later me and my buddies were some of the only white guys at a P-Funk show at the Capital Centre, just outside Washington DC). I also hated much of the popular album rock of that era. It took me a few years to move beyond my uh rockist tendencies (and sometimes I still struggle with them).

― curmudgeon, Tuesday, 8 May 2007 04:39 (eighteen years ago)

I am very very fond of Adventure, but I think that probably has more to do with the feelings I was going through when I first listened to the album, than with it being a great album per se. So I went for Devo instead.

― braveclub, Tuesday, 8 May 2007 11:19 (eighteen years ago)

Sundar--one minute you say you "like Journey more than the Sex Pistols or Ramones FWIW (though I like both of those bands to some extent) and it probably is partly because they're not as simplistic", then another post down you seem to criticize "the kind of Guitar Center dorks who would say that people listen to punk and disco because they're too simple-minded/unmusicianly/complacent to appreciate shred-happy AOR descendants" . So which group of music appreciators are you in?

― curmudgeon, Tuesday, 8 May 2007 14:38 (eighteen years ago)

No Kate Bush, no Siouxsie, no Suicide, no Buzzcocks, no Magazine, no Alternative TV, no Dr Alimantado, no Saturday Night Fever soundtrack, SIGGGGGHHHHHHHH

So I went for The Modern Dance.

(though my personal 1978 number one would have been Frames: Music For An Imaginary Film by Keith Tippett's Ark)

― Marcello Carlin, Tuesday, 8 May 2007 14:44 (eighteen years ago)

No Abba band in any of these polls either.

― Marcello Carlin, Tuesday, 8 May 2007 14:45 (eighteen years ago)

Or Gerry Rafferty.

― Marcello Carlin, Tuesday, 8 May 2007 14:45 (eighteen years ago)

curmudgeon, I prefer Journey but I don't think that people who disagree with me do so because they're complacent or simple-minded.

― Sundar, Tuesday, 8 May 2007 14:47 (eighteen years ago)

(To be fair, and this probably proves Patrick's point, I don't necessarily like Journey more than Television or Joy Division or Donna Summer or P-Funk. There are a lot of people, though, who like AOR/hard rock and look down on punk and disco and their fans altogether, just as there are people who do the reverse. I'm distinguishing myself from both groups.)

― Sundar, Tuesday, 8 May 2007 15:03 (eighteen years ago)

Your comment was clear enough to anyone who read it with any attention and an ability to make fairly simple disctinctions between different ideas.

― Rockist Scientist, Tuesday, 8 May 2007 15:11 (eighteen years ago)

Sorry RS, but I still do not think his definition of "simplistic" or "simple-minded" or the way he used them as it relates to circa 1978 music was clear. So I am glad he clarified.

― curmudgeon, Tuesday, 8 May 2007 16:17 (eighteen years ago)

No Abba band in any of these polls either.

ABBA weren't critically rehabilitated until way later. Which is another reason why the Acclaimed Music lists are better - they take later critics list into account too, not only lists from the same year

That said, in 1978, ABBA only released the "Take a Chance On Me" and "Summer Night City" singles.

― Geir Hongro, Tuesday, 8 May 2007 21:11 (eighteen years ago)

I'm still stumped about how anybody could interpret the following passage as being about anybody but people in the music business; after all, it says "music bizzers" right there at the start. Not to mention how anybody who turned on a radio for five minutes in the late '70s could remotely disagree with it, or find it anything but smart:

True, most music bizzers are relieved that the Sex Pistols have vanished into infamy; they still find the Clash strident and the Ramones simplistic, declaring such bands unacceptable to the imaginary consumer who personifies their own complacency and cowardice. But because it's the nature of complacent cowards to hedge all bets--and because they want to prove they're not, you know, square--they reassert their own putative attachment to "good" rock and roll at the same time, thus easing the sales breakthrough of 'twixt-wave-and-stream bands like the Cars and Cheap Trick. A similar snap-to by old fans (including radio people) who had previously been backsliding into resignation makes quick, surprising commercial successes of Dire Straits (42nd in Pazz & Jop despite late-year release) and George Thorogood and the Destroyers (51st despite a small press list), spearheading a minor white-r&b revival.

My favorite Pazz & Jop essay ever, by the way, and one of my couple favorite Christgau pieces ever. I may have even included it in my top five pieces of rock criticism ever list I send to rockcritics.com a few years ago. If nothing else, it may well be the rock essay I've read the most times in my life.

― xhuxk, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 11:04 (eighteen years ago)

And I say that, incidentally, as somebody who personally likes Boston and Foreigner as much as the Sex Pistols, and Journey as much as the Ramones (i.e, less than the Pistols and Foreigner, but whatever). Though I also say that as somebody who had barely read any music criticsm at all before he read this essay, so I admittedly have a pretty strong sentimental attachment to it that I'd no doubt be unable to detach from even if I tried.

― xhuxk, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 11:11 (eighteen years ago)

Whatever the real dangers and deficiencies of disco as a genre and a mentality, some disco records do more than just succeed on their own terms, as dance music--some of them are wonderful rock and roll.

if a non-xgau critic wrote this in 1978, say some hack in rolling stone, wouldn't it be interpreted today as 'rockist'?

not by xhuxk, of course, but still...interesting.

― m coleman, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 11:15 (eighteen years ago)

rock and roll does not equal rockism.

― JN$OT, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 11:18 (eighteen years ago)

xp That line probably inspired me too, actually! (And it's also completely fucking true. And he gives really great examples -- comparing "Disco Inferno" to Wilson Pickett, and the Bee Gees to "Carrie Anne" and "Itchycoo Park," if I remember right off the top of my head.) I don't get what would be "rockist" about it. (Does anybody really think "rockism", assuming it means anything, means hating rock'n'roll? But let's not get into that.)

― xhuxk, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 11:20 (eighteen years ago)

The problem with it is exactly the same problem we have nowadays where music critics of the 70s let us know it's OK to like, I dunno, Avril or Pink or whoever because they're "totally punk rock", ie: this matches up to the musical standards my generation established, thus I approve of it. It's the most reactionary and backwards looking form of music appreciation, seeking weaker and weaker carbon copies of the songs that moved you as a 19-year-old rather than developing progression of musical taste.

― Dom Passantino, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 11:23 (eighteen years ago)

Or, maybe it just amounts to keeping your ears open to whatever happens to be going on at any given time.

― JN$OT, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 11:26 (eighteen years ago)

Explain.

― Dom Passantino, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 11:27 (eighteen years ago)

Or saying, "I love this because it reminds me of other songs I love." Which is completely valid.

― xhuxk, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 11:27 (eighteen years ago)

Or, not letting rigor mortis set in just yet.

― JN$OT, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 11:29 (eighteen years ago)

He finishes by comparing them to the songs he loves, but his opening thesis is that they are "not just good as disco, but also (ie, even better) good as rock 'n' roll". The genre, not the performances. There's a pretty obvious subcurrent that "rock and roll is better than disco" in that statement. Isn't it just a "disco sucks, but..." missive?

xp

― Dom Passantino, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 11:30 (eighteen years ago)

i dunno dom, i do kind of agree with what you are saying there, and the parallel is self-evident, but, well, maybe it depends on when you think rock'n'roll 'ended' as a genre. i dont know if i agree with it but i kind of think you could have a lot of 70s music as 'rock'n'roll' rather than just rock music

78 does seem to stretch that a little though. 73 would have worked though?

― 696, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 11:31 (eighteen years ago)

xp(And it's hardly the only reason Christgau would have said he loved "Disco Inferno" and the Bee Gees, I'm sure -- It's just one reason, that worked in the context of the argument he was making. It doesn't negate his other reasons [which he no doubt articulated elswhere], just like good critics comparing Avril and Pink to punk -- I'm not one of them, by the way -- would surely have plenty of other reasons to like Avril and Pink as well. But there's nothing wrong with that reason, per se.)

― xhuxk, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 11:31 (eighteen years ago)

"Rock 'n' roll" was a, cough, "superword" by 1978, yes?

― Dom Passantino, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 11:33 (eighteen years ago)

i had to google that, but, yea, i agree with that. but maybe not yet an ossified superword?

― 696, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 11:35 (eighteen years ago)

..And it's hardly his only justification for liking disco in that essay, either. (Though you'd no doubt object to "Maybe, just maybe, if new wave is bebop, then disco is rhythm-and-blues," too. Which makes more sense if you read it in context.)

― xhuxk, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 11:36 (eighteen years ago)

Isn't Christgau just sneaking vegetables into the readers' hamburgers, so to speak?

― Dom Passantino, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 11:37 (eighteen years ago)

xp: Also, I'm pretty sure Xgau will call any music he really loves rock and roll, regardless of genre, be it disco, punk, or whatever.

― JN$OT, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 11:38 (eighteen years ago)

Yes and no. Fuck "superwords" -- Rock'n'roll was the most tired old cliche on earth by 1978. Hell, it was a tired old cliche by 1968. (At least to Christgau, I'm sure.) (Except when it wasn't -- it was also this great kind of music that's out there, and now and then it still applied.) (And yeah, the bebop thing is probably a vegetable. But that doesn't make it not a totally intriguing idea.)

― xhuxk, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 11:39 (eighteen years ago)

Is that a healthy attitude to have, though? Even if his intent isn't validation of the past over the present, surely that's the end result?

xp

― Dom Passantino, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 11:40 (eighteen years ago)

But the way I see it he's not using "rock n roll" to mean, I dunno, "Chantilly Lace" or whatever, but as an "attitude". Although the "attitude" of rock 'n' roll was undoubtedly cliche by 78, but then again, criticism is the art of rearranging cliches in an order they've never been seen in before.

― Dom Passantino, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 11:41 (eighteen years ago)

Where does he talk about an "attitude"? When he compares the Tramps to Picket, or Bee Gees to Small Faces, he's clearly talking about the sound.

The thing is, he was obviously (obviously, because it's what big chunks of his essay are about) writing in a context where people out there were setting "rock" up against disco. So he says, "No, you idiots, disco is rock music. It's a completely arbitrary dichotomy." Which was a smart move on his part. And yeah, it probably didn't change Vince Alleti's or Brian Chin's or Michael Freedberg's minds, or the minds of people who actually went to discos to dance on Saturday nights -- nobody had to convince them about disco. But changing their minds wasn't the point.

― xhuxk, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 11:45 (eighteen years ago)

a) the term "rock n roll", like the terms "punk", "pop", and "hip-hop" carry cultural baggage, and when a critic uses that term in such a wide-ranging context (rock n roll means 90% of anglophone releases, what, 53 through 68, right?) they must be aware that they're applying cultural costs to the term rather than just musical ones
b) by saying "hey, some of this stuff is as good as rock n roll", you're operating on the assumption that rock n roll is intrinsically better than disco

― Dom Passantino, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 11:49 (eighteen years ago)

Not if you see it (r&r) as a continuum, as Xgau apparently does, stretching from the dawn of '50s R&B (and quite possibly before) to present hip-hop and what have you.

gah! x-post hell!!!

― JN$OT, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 11:51 (eighteen years ago)

and when a critic uses that term in such a wide-ranging context (rock n roll means 90% of anglophone releases, what, 53 through 68, right?) they must be aware that they're applying cultural costs to the term rather than just musical ones

Has nothing to do with anything other than music and that is a FACT!

― Geir Hongro, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:00 (eighteen years ago)

Fuck "superwords" -- Rock'n'roll was the most tired old cliche on earth by 1978.

Showaddywaddy were still having hits in Britain in 1978 so I can back up Chuck on this point.

― Marcello Carlin, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:00 (eighteen years ago)

Oh and Abba: The Album came out in 1978 and that is a fact. FACT!

― Marcello Carlin, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:00 (eighteen years ago)

i wonder if geir has ever left his house

― 696, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:02 (eighteen years ago)

xp: Xgau's not putting disco up against rock'n'roll; he's saying disco is part of rock'n'roll. And I don't get how seeing music as part of a continuum is less valid than ahistorically pretending "new" music has no connection to what came before. As good critics tend to do, he's putting it in a context, admitting it doesn't exist in a historical vacuum.(He also argues in his essay that 1978 was the best year ever for hard rock, which hardly sounds like opting for the past over the present.)

― xhuxk, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:04 (eighteen years ago)

Status Quo did score a Top 20 entry in 1978 with their ironically titled hard rock anthem "Again And Again."

― Marcello Carlin, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:06 (eighteen years ago)

xhuxk absolutely OTM!

x-post

― JN$OT, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:10 (eighteen years ago)

dom otm, disco wasn't rock & roll it was a clean break from that tradition the NEXT BIG THING as it were hence so many people irrationally hating on it (along with homophobia and racism etc)

― m coleman, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:13 (eighteen years ago)

"Miss You" by the Rolling Stones to thread.

― Marcello Carlin, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:14 (eighteen years ago)

Disco was corporate. And that's the only criticism that doesn't have to do with the music itself.

― Geir Hongro, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:14 (eighteen years ago)

thats one thing you could never say about rock'n'roll in the 70s!

― 696, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:16 (eighteen years ago)

Writing your own songs is always considerably less corporate than having some professional songwriter/producer write them for you. Always.

― Geir Hongro, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:18 (eighteen years ago)

(Which means Bee Gees were less corporate than Donna Summer, this is not to say they were better, but they were less corporate and had more artistic control)

― Geir Hongro, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:19 (eighteen years ago)

disco wasn't rock & roll it was a clean break from that tradition

Hardly. Lots of rock (guitar rock) got played in early New York discoteques; lots of rock bands did disco songs; disco acts incorporated rock guitars and words about rocking and covered '60s garage songs; boogie singers playing in a rock'n'roll band started playing that funky music white boy; and so on. If it was such a "clean break," when exactly did that happen? Even Eurodisco acts had plenty of connections to Kraut-rock/art-rock that came before.

― xhuxk, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:20 (eighteen years ago)

The Bee Gees who were so non-corporate and had so much artistic control they were forbidden to release any records under their own name for six years while engaged in legal action with the Robert Stigwood Organisation.

― Marcello Carlin, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:22 (eighteen years ago)

The music itself was still less corporate. Except they chose money rather than quality when they switched from 60s pop into disco.

― Geir Hongro, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:23 (eighteen years ago)

I mean, surely you had people such as Robert Stigwood, Allen Klein etc. with way too much power, but they had limited power over how the music actually sounded. The concentrated on the business part and left the music part up to the acts.

― Geir Hongro, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:24 (eighteen years ago)

To paraphrase Barry Gibb: "You're the fucking tosser, pal."

― Marcello Carlin, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:25 (eighteen years ago)

the music itself is only about the sound geir! the melodies. anything else is irrelevant. you taught me that!

― 696, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:25 (eighteen years ago)

TS: augmented fifth vs corporate fifth

― 696, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:27 (eighteen years ago)

It's what the listener makes of it, not what the artist puts into it. I taught me that!

― Marcello Carlin, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:27 (eighteen years ago)

Does disco have to be seen as part of rockand roll rather than as part of r'n'b, and/or aren't both disco and rockandroll part of a r'n'b continuum? Or is that rockandroll has come to mean everything? Although maybe Xgau was trying to simply win over the rockandrollers by his disco and rockandroll comparisons, as seems to be sugggested above.

― curmudgeon, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:27 (eighteen years ago)

augmented fifth = THE DEVIL'S MUSIC! (c) whichever Pope it was, 14(??)

― Marcello Carlin, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:28 (eighteen years ago)

the music itself is only about the sound geir! the melodies.

While the melodies (and their belonging harmonies) remain the most important part, there's more to music. Production is part of the actual music, and rhythm, obviously. Lots of textural stuff.

Outside factors such as race, sexuality, class, Nationality or politics are not though (and not gender, except the singer's gender affects the singing voice, which will also affect the way the music sounds)

― Geir Hongro, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:28 (eighteen years ago)

Capital N for Nationality - sounds like NATIONAL SOCIALISM!

― Marcello Carlin, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:29 (eighteen years ago)

Does disco have to be seen as part of rockand roll rather than as part of r'n'b

Again, Christgau explicitly compares disco to both in that essay. So I'm guessing he would say no.

― xhuxk, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:30 (eighteen years ago)

outside factors such as race, sexuality, class, nationality, BUSINESS, WHO WROTE IT, and CORPORATE matters????

― 696, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:30 (eighteen years ago)

Who wrote it is matter of artistic control. Whenever you let somebody else write your stuff, music loses against irrelevant outside factors. The singer/songwriter should control every not, every timbre, absolutely everything, and not allow anyone else interpret anything the slightest bit.

― Geir Hongro, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:31 (eighteen years ago)

it is irrelevant if the singer wrote the song because it is an external factor. take a piece of music and you can analyse it on melodies, rhythm, harmonies, texture

you cant analyse or make a judgement about whether whether the singer wrote it or not. UNLESS you consult external factors. ie you cant tell from the music itself

― 696, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:32 (eighteen years ago)

"You Never Give Me Your Money" by the Beatles to thread.

― Marcello Carlin, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:32 (eighteen years ago)

external factors geir, irrelevant.

i send you a song, you tell me what is good or bad about it, you dont know if the artist wrote it or not, you cannot make the judgement.

― 696, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:33 (eighteen years ago)

im arguing with geir hongro, king of the autists

you can tell im stressed about other stuff right now

― 696, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:33 (eighteen years ago)

artistic control is control over who sings your song

― 696, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:34 (eighteen years ago)

a voice is an instrument, same as a wood block

― 696, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:34 (eighteen years ago)

disco acts incorporated rock guitars and words about rocking and covered '60s garage songs;

I'd say "appropriated" rather than incorporated, and there's the rub.

most of xgau's essay is right on. but to employ a popular neologism he implicitly "privileges" rock & roll over disco. of course he doesn't have the 20/20 hindsight I'm enjoying right now which affords a view of how disco utterly transformed pop music and the music business.

― m coleman, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:35 (eighteen years ago)

Artistic control is complete control over everything. Every single note.

Mozart still has complete artistic control even though he has been dead for more than 200 years. But he wrote notes. In a world without notation, the composer needs to secure artistic control. Best is if he is a multi-instrumentalist like Todd Rundgren or Stevie Wonder, but if he isn't he should at least be around during the recording, telling the instrumentalists exactly how their parts should be played.

― Geir Hongro, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:36 (eighteen years ago)

(And, obviously, he should credit himself, not the artist)

― Geir Hongro, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:37 (eighteen years ago)

theres no should or shouldnt in music. external factors. its about the music only. you are once again in error

― 696, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:37 (eighteen years ago)

X-gau to thread!

xp

― JN$OT, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:38 (eighteen years ago)

the artist is unimportant, it is only the work that can be judged

― 696, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:38 (eighteen years ago)

does anyone have any neurofen, my tooth is killing me:(

― 696, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:38 (eighteen years ago)

Music in itself is only possible if the music's creator has complete artistic control. And obviously, since melody is the most important thing, the creator is the one who needs the control and deserves all credits.

― Geir Hongro, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:39 (eighteen years ago)

Best thread ever.

― Dom Passantino, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:40 (eighteen years ago)

incorrect. i have heard a piece of music that had more than one creator. it was about 15 minutes ago

― 696, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:41 (eighteen years ago)

you would think i would have learnt by now, wouldnt you. and to think i tought nrq was annoying

― 696, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:41 (eighteen years ago)

a child is only possible if its parents have complete control

― 696, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:42 (eighteen years ago)

a nation is only possible if its dictator has complete control

ah, now i see where you are coming from

― 696, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:43 (eighteen years ago)

aka the ayatollah theory of music appreication

― m coleman, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:44 (eighteen years ago)

"Ballack - a nation in one man!"

― blueski, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 12:52 (eighteen years ago)

Geir's a busy guy this week. On the Stargate thread he dismissed r'n'b and hiphop producers plus he shrugged his shoulders at Brill Building, Motown, and Stax songwriters, and now his theories here.

― curmudgeon, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 13:00 (eighteen years ago)

well, if you dont get out much, leaves a lot of time to dismiss

― 696, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 13:01 (eighteen years ago)

Rock'n'roll was the most tired old cliche on earth by 1978

On that point, I find it interesting that Christgau is still using this particular phrase so often--21 times in that essay. I'm curious as to when the phrase is finally (more or less) excised from his vocabulary. I would've thought it was earlier than 1978. (You often hear early rock critics talk about the late-60s shift from "rock and roll" to "rock"; and notice how rock critics are never ever referred to as "rock and roll critics"?) And yet, in regards to disco, for reasons I can only sort of grasp at (Chuck can probably explain it, and probably already did in one of his books), it feels more correct to say (at least in 1978) that disco is/was part of "rock and roll" than to say it is/was part of "rock" (though I can also see why "pop" became the favoured term, as it works much better than all of the above).

― sw00ds, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 13:02 (eighteen years ago)

if Geir actually lived in Tromso all would be forgiven.

― blueski, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 13:03 (eighteen years ago)

Geir's a busy guy this week. On the Stargate thread he dismissed r'n'b and hiphop producers plus he shrugged his shoulders at Brill Building, Motown, and Stax songwriters, and now his theories here.

Perhaps if he'd slowed down and taken it easier in the final week of his life, his heart wouldn't have given out like that. RIP.

― Dom Passantino, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 13:08 (eighteen years ago)

Even if Geir left his house, I think he'd stubbornly stick to his views. You could "Zelig" like plop him into NY and Berlin discos, Fela all-night sessions, Timbaland's studio, and Hittsville Motown, and he'd stand there stiffly with his arms folded, mumbling "this does not sound like the Beatles."

― curmudgeon, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 13:12 (eighteen years ago)

I smell sitcom.

― Dom Passantino, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 13:12 (eighteen years ago)

Christgau really sounds like a psycho most of ILM in that essay with all the name-calling.

― braveclub, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 13:13 (eighteen years ago)

To answer my own non-question: Christgau doesn't excise "rock and roll" from his vocabulary. In the 1979 P&J his usage is down to 11; in 1980, it's down to a mere 4. But he's still using it even in more recent polls, and his employment of the term seems to waver.

― sw00ds, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 14:30 (eighteen years ago)

Does anyone give a shit? Didn't think so!

― sw00ds, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 14:30 (eighteen years ago)

"It's still rock and roll to me."

― JN$OT, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 14:34 (eighteen years ago)

"New wave,
Be-bop,
post-skronk,
pig-fuck,
It's still rock and roll to me"

― sw00ds, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 14:37 (eighteen years ago)

Why did people drop the 'roll' anyway?

― braveclub, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 14:38 (eighteen years ago)

They were like too busy mellowing out, man.

― JN$OT, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 14:40 (eighteen years ago)

Greil Marcus had this to say in rockcritics.com (his answer to the second last question; it's all kind of around this topic, how the term "rock & roll" changed over the years):

"I stopped using the term 'rock & roll' to apply to anything contemporary years ago, because it seemed to have been completely emptied of meaning. If anything, by 1993 or so the term seemed to refer only to a certain style of playing, i.e., rockabilly. In other words, 'rock & roll' had been reduced to the same level of meaning, or un-meaning, as it had long had in the UK."

That 1993 always struck me as odd, though I imagine there's a reason behind it.

― sw00ds, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 14:49 (eighteen years ago)

yet, in regards to disco, for reasons I can only sort of grasp at (Chuck can probably explain it, and probably already did in one of his books), it feels more correct to say (at least in 1978) that disco is/was part of "rock and roll" than to say it is/was part of "rock"

Because you can dance to it, maybe? (Well, you can dance to lots of "rock," too. But what people have historically called "rock'n'roll" probably tends to be more associated with dancing. Which is what the rolling part was often for.)

― xhuxk, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 15:07 (eighteen years ago)

You're right that he's clearly talking about music biz people, xhuxk. I guess I was reacting more to Patrick's comments ("I think none of what Christgau says in that paragraph is untrue. Rockist Scientist, did you choose Journey and Foreigner over punk and disco in the late 70s?... (keep in mind, he's not talking about jazz and latin fans, which were not much of a factor in the poll - he's talking about classic-rock/AOR assholes)")
than anything. But I have to ask, then: Are you guys lamenting that the radio wasn't playing music that appealed to a niche audience (as maybe it was in the earlier 70s, I don't know) or do you actually think that the Sex Pistols could have been as big in the US as Foreigner or the Eagles if they'd just got more support from the radio?

― Sundar, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 15:18 (eighteen years ago)

The Sex Pistols were as big in the UK as the Eagles with zero support from the radio.

― Marcello Carlin, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 15:27 (eighteen years ago)

Right, that's partly what I'm getting at. I think their music was quite overtly directed at a specifically British audience, or at least was something that would have had more direct resonance for a British audience.

― Sundar, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 15:35 (eighteen years ago)

wow. I'd say that disco was part of "rock" by '78 if not before. I mean "Tea Dance" by, who is that guy? that's like a prog-rock song with tempo shifts and wonky little piano four-to-the-bar and Chipmunk vocals and that's also "disco" because it's a tea dance, you know? Fey and out of his mind. Really amazing shit, and I spent a lot of last year listening to all this disco stuff that's pretty obscure and figured out that it took from ALL musics--which is the point of that book on disco I read last year--I can't remember titles this morning and everything's packed up. But in the clubs early '70s NYC it was like rock at its most tribal, except inside, and then disco took from r&b, definitely, I mean Willie Mitchell and Philly Soul and Don Davis and producers like that helped invent the shit, too, Northern Soul morphing, Chicago soul, all of that was producer's music just like disco became. Anyway, Christgau sounds sane as hell to me in that section, he's right--gotdamn, this shit's got a beat and it goes "chucka-luck" (Fritz Lang reference for all the assholes out there who are still scared of anything "Euro" in their "westerns of the good ol' USA"). it was rock.

― whisperineddhurt, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 15:38 (eighteen years ago)

xp
This ignores the fact that you can't (or anyway, you couldn't) reach a mass audience in the US without major radio airplay, which I don't think (correct me if I'm wrong) was ever as true for the UK (the weeklies played a much bigger part in all this, no?). I don't think it's beyond the realm of possibility that the Pistols could've been huge in America had they made it on to radio.

― sw00ds, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 15:40 (eighteen years ago)

do you actually think that the Sex Pistols could have been as big in the US as Foreigner or the Eagles if they'd just got more support from the radio?

Well, they could have been as big as Toby Beau or Jay Ferguson, at least.

― xhuxk, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 15:41 (eighteen years ago)

Really, though, is there any good reason why Kiss and Alice Cooper and Sweet and AC/DC (and maybe Stones and Bowie and Nugent) fans wouldn't have gone out and bought the Sex Pistols LP? I can't think of one, myself.

― xhuxk, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 15:53 (eighteen years ago)

(Inasmuch as AC/DC fans existed at that point, that is. Highway to Hell didn't enter the charts til 1979, eventually peaking at #17; before that, none of their albums had climbed higher than #113 in the U.S. So forget I mentioned them.)

― xhuxk, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 15:56 (eighteen years ago)

Actually, okay, here's one good reason they might not have sold in the U.S.: Too British. (Slade didn't sell, either.) But who knows?

― xhuxk, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 15:57 (eighteen years ago)

Yeah, that's exactly what I said. Their music is not about partying or sex & drugs nihilism or anything. Why would Americans care if the Queen's a fascist regime? (But, really, did anyone in the UK really feel that way about the monarchy?)

― Sundar, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 16:01 (eighteen years ago)

I hadn't seen your Brit post, Sundar; we probably cross-posted, somehow. But the Pistols were totally about nihilism, duh! Plus the songs were catchy! Great riffs, too! So maybe that would've been enough.

― xhuxk, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 16:03 (eighteen years ago)

I have been lamenting what rock (rock and roll) has not been played on commercial radio in America from the mid 70s through the present. I lament that late '70s Ramones and Buzzcocks songs get played on tv commercials now, but did not get commercial American radio play then.

― curmudgeon, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 16:10 (eighteen years ago)

yeah, funny that.

The Stooges' "No Fun" to advertise CBeebies, a year or so ago.

― Mark G, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 16:15 (eighteen years ago)

I'd guess that in 1978, commercial radio guru Lee Abrams, the creator of AOR radio, decided what would work radio-wise in the States. He and Clear Channel have alot of explaining to do...

― curmudgeon, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 16:17 (eighteen years ago)

xp Right, TV ads and sports events have sort of demonstrated over time that those sorts of songs could have been big hits with American audiences had they gotten at least a little airplay at the time. By now, everybody knows "Blitzkrieg Bop," right? People's ears and nervous systems really haven't evolved all that much in the past 30 years, I don't think. (The closest AOR stations in Detroit got to punk rock in the late '70s, I think, was "Homicide" by 999, which was still pretty cool, you gotta admit. Album only went to #177 in the U.S., though, so I doubt other cities were playing it.)

― xhuxk, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 16:20 (eighteen years ago)

As other people have pointed out already, that list doesn't look much like the 1978 I remember so fondly.

No Adverts, no Burning Spear, no Buzzcocks, no Cabaret Voltaire, no Jam, no Linton Kwesi Johnson, no Magazine, no Bob Marley, no Only Ones, no Augustus Pablo, no Lee Perry, no Public Image Ltd., no Saints, no Siouxsie, no Steel Pulse, no Stranglers, no Peter Tosh, no Ultravox!, no Tom Waits, no X-Ray Spex: and two of the best albums that have been included (New Boots and Panties and Pink Flag) were actually released in 1977.

― Stewart Osborne, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 16:23 (eighteen years ago)

actually released in 1977

In. England.
(Ditto PiL, X-Ray Spex, Adverts, etc.)

― xhuxk, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 16:29 (eighteen years ago)

"In. England."

That's where I was in 1978 (and 1977 and 1979 for that matter) so that's what I remember.

Looking at what were apparently the best albums released in the US in 1978 (no reggae at all? ReallY? Not even Bob Marley????) I'm extremely glad I was.

― Stewart Osborne, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 16:37 (eighteen years ago)

Wasn't reggae sort of considered a commercial failure in the US by that time (even though Marley's Exodus album had apparently gone top 10 in '77)?

― JN$OT, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 16:41 (eighteen years ago)

American critics got it, I think--Exodus is a fucking bore.

― sw00ds, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 16:44 (eighteen years ago)

I don't believe Ian Dury, Wire, Captain Beefheart or Pere Ubu were exactly huge commercial success stories....

― Stewart Osborne, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 16:47 (eighteen years ago)

Yeah, the critics got it, but commercial failure meant fewer releases in the US by Island and others. Also, the heavier, dub-oriented stuff, was pretty much completely ignored.

BTW, it was actually Rastaman Vibration that went top 10 (in '76, I think) not Exodus. Still pretty boring, I know.

xp

― JN$OT, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 16:50 (eighteen years ago)

Rastaman Vibration went #8; Exodus went #20; Kaya in 1978 (which Xgau put in his top 30 that year, looks like) went #50.

Was reggae ever considered a commercial success Stateside in the pre-Musical Youth/Eddy Grant era, outside of the isolated Desmond Dekker or Millie Small or Johnny Nash single? Marley never got much rock or r&b airplay in the '70s when he wasn't being covered by Eric Clapton, did he?

― xhuxk, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 16:57 (eighteen years ago)

Not real reggae, I guess. The Police probably don't count.

― JN$OT, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 17:03 (eighteen years ago)

"Magnet and Steel" by Walter Egan was a big hit...and come to think of it, it's one of my favourite singles of 1978.

― sw00ds, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 17:04 (eighteen years ago)

Though it might've come out in 1977 in Britain...I forget.

― sw00ds, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 17:05 (eighteen years ago)

Also "Hotel California" went to #1 way back in 1976.

― xhuxk, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 17:08 (eighteen years ago)

We are Devo

― whatever, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 19:42 (eighteen years ago)

most of xgau's essay is right on. but to employ a popular neologism he implicitly "privileges" rock & roll over disco. of course he doesn't have the 20/20 hindsight I'm enjoying right now which affords a view of how disco utterly transformed pop music and the music business.

I think this is really smart and gets at the heart of the problems some people are having with Xgau placing disco in a rock & roll continuum. It renders rock & roll normative, unquestioned, always there. A good analogy is a computer operating system (I'm on a Mac so e.g. OSX). Unless there's something fundamentally wrong with your computer, you don't think about your operating system. You can't even really see it. It helps your computer work, allows your programs to run. (Foucault would call this the episteme.)

Xgau isn't exactly saying that rock & roll allowed disco to operate. But the effect of his words transform rock & roll into a sort of OSX. In 1978, this was a necessary move to counter those "people out there...setting "rock" up against disco." But even if those people eventually came around to disco, there's a way in which rock & roll is still the victor because it supersedes disco in this scenario.

The real challenge would be to get these people to come around to the most un-rock & roll disco available in 1978. Which would be what, though? "I Feel Love?" But Jon Savage said punks at least dug that record (along with "Magic Fly" or whatever that Space song was called).

But again, this essay was written in 1978 (actually 1979, right?). As Coleman suggests, we can now treat disco as its own operating system and place all sorts of things in its continuum - rap (esp. early), post-punk, house (duh), Debbie Gibson, Moby, almost all strains of techno (even Ricardo Villalobos whom I'm told people dance to), etc. Then we can go back and call things like Wilson Pickett's "Land of 1000 Dances" (best version, btw) disco. And clubs/nights like Squeezebox/Don Hill's in Manhattan and Saphir in Montréal play AC/DC, The Sex Pistols, and Billy Childish for your disco delectation. I doubt Xgau would have problems with any of this.

Also, compare the 1978 P&J to his brilliant review of Red Hot + Blue: A Tribute to Cole Porter here:

http://robertchristgau.com/get_album.php?id=675

Written over a decade later, he places rock in a pop continuum (although I still don't get what's so great about Sinead O'Connor's "You Do Something to Me").

― Kevin John Bozelka, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 19:47 (eighteen years ago)

I've always loved Vince Aletti's lists. They're so damn silly (would calling them "punk" amount to the epistemic pumping outlined above?). I think disco is the greatest popular music genre of the latter half of the twentieth century. But it's just not an album genre and all of the disco albums on his list (which is most of it) contain some wretched minutes (althought I've never even heard of James Wells...who was he? disco?). Still, I'm glad they're there. Must have pissed off a lot of critics/readers.

― Kevin John Bozelka, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 19:56 (eighteen years ago)

the most un-rock & roll disco available in 1978. Which would be what, though? "I Feel Love?"

Only if you never heard Kraftwerk (which many critics, admittedly, probably hadn't at that point.)

― xhuxk, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 20:01 (eighteen years ago)

Same with ABBA. I've heard all of their albums many, many times. But there's not a single one consistently great from beginning to end. The early ones are reliable in their kookiness but they offer less highlights. Christ, even ABBA Gold demands the sue of the skip button.

― Kevin John Bozelka, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 20:02 (eighteen years ago)

Oh yeah, the poll. I can't think of a more blandly great year than 1978. Not really married to any of these even though I dig many. I'd go with X-Ray Spex if I could (that I'm married to!). So I'll go with Funkadelic.

― Kevin John Bozelka, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 20:08 (eighteen years ago)

Geir's a busy guy this week. On the Stargate thread he dismissed r'n'b and hiphop producers plus he shrugged his shoulders at Brill Building, Motown, and Stax songwriters, and now his theories here.

Not Brill Building and Motown, no. They predated The Beatles, and as such they are forgiven. The Beatles changed music forever, and after The Beatles everyone should do like The Beatles.

― Geir Hongro, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 20:09 (eighteen years ago)

the most un-rock & roll disco available in 1978. Which would be what, though? "I Feel Love?"

I'd rather say Baccara and Boney M

― Geir Hongro, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 20:14 (eighteen years ago)

Also, if I remember right, The Rolling Stone Illustrated History of Rock'n'Roll (ha, is that what it was called?), which came out a couple years, later, included "I Feel Love" in its art-rock discography.

And Boney M (who I loved) covered several rock songs (by Neil Young, Creedence, Yardbirds, etc), not to mention Bob Marley. And their beats were often not that far from Gary Glitter-style glam rock, either.

― xhuxk, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 20:24 (eighteen years ago)

it's just not an album genre and all of the disco albums on his list (which is most of it) contain some wretched minutes

I totally disagree with this too, by the way. Don't see how they contain any more minutes of wretchedness than most of the rock records above. And disco, when it's good, sounds as listenable and consistent to me on album as punk, reggae, or AOR ever did. But yeah, Aletti's lists were always awesome - no argument there.

― xhuxk, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 20:31 (eighteen years ago)

Before & After Science

... which is the best crossbreed of Eno's pop and ambient leanings, evar.

― stephen, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 20:32 (eighteen years ago)

Wire Wire Wire Wire Wire. (wotta year tho)

― Maciej, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 20:58 (eighteen years ago)

Don't see how they contain any more minutes of wretchedness than most of the rock records above.

Well, we'll just have to disagree then. I'll take Machine's "There But For The Grace Of God Go I" over ANY of the albums on the P&J album poll. But the Machine album is worse than practically any of them.

Or to keep it to 1978, "You Make Me Feel (Mighty Real)" smokes all the P&J albums. But Step II smokes only a few.

I do like the Don Ray, Voyage, and Cerrone albums. But they're not great. And I never figured out what the big whoop was on USA-European Connection.

And is Keep On Jumpin' even an album? I know it is an album but it doesn't signify as an album - two great singles each accompanied by an awful b-side, the SAME awful b-side.

Or take Tantra's The Double Album.The very title tries valiantly to enforce a gestalt that just isn't there. Don't get me wrong - I adore every loopy minute of it (used to spin "The Hills of Katmandu" in and out of "Wishbone" into boogie perpetuity on dead nights at a leather bar). But again, it feels more like two 12" singles doubled up with some remarkable b-sides.

I don't even think disco works in comp form as much as people let on. Rhino's Disco Years series is genius. But their Disco Box is a mess. And Barry Walters went waaaay overboard giving a 10 to that Give Your Body Up series in Spin - too damn R&B overall. Same with the two Super Disco comps. That Tom Moulton comp from last year was wildly ocerrated. Etc.

Or even my fave disco band Chic. Most of their albums work as albums. But I'm taking The Best of Chic Vol. 2 (Rhino 1992) to that desert island.

― Kevin John Bozelka, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 21:43 (eighteen years ago)

Also, if I remember right, The Rolling Stone Illustrated History of Rock'n'Roll (ha, is that what it was called?), which came out a couple years, later, included "I Feel Love" in its art-rock discography.

It's actually in John Rockwell's essay. He mentioned a version of it was "performed in New York (?) by Blondie and Fripp." Wuzdat?

But yeah, Baccara is the disco of rockist nightmare. Also Madleen Kane? France Joli?

― Kevin John Bozelka, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 21:46 (eighteen years ago)

know it is an album but it doesn't signify as an album

I adore every loopy minute of it...[but] it feels more like two 12" singles doubled up with some remarkable b-sides.

Most of their albums work as albums

Ha ha, I don't even know what these mean! A good album is a good album is a bunch of good songs that sound good together. (I'd accuse you of being a rockist, actually, if I believed there was such a thing.)

Then, again, I never understood The Wall, either.

― xhuxk, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 22:02 (eighteen years ago)

And oh yeah, Don Ray's album is great!

― xhuxk, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 22:03 (eighteen years ago)

know it is an album but it doesn't signify as an album

I adore every loopy minute of it...[but] it feels more like two 12" singles doubled up with some remarkable b-sides.

Most of their albums work as albums

Ha ha, I don't even know what these mean!

O Teena Marie, grant me the serenity!

Come on, Chuck, you know exactly what those mean. The keyword above is "gestalt." None of the albums I mentioned in that post have it (except the Chic ones..and some of those Disco Years comps). And while the Voyage and, esp., Costandinos albums on Aletti's list do have gestalt, they feature (some) bad songs, IMO (p.s. that Hunchback album on Smucker's list is barely even disco).

For further comment, check out Xgau on Golden Afrique, Vol. 2[/i] here:

http://robertchristgau.com/get_album.php?id=13338

But so what? Who gives a toss about albums? Singles have always meant more to me than albums which is one of 1,234,567 reasons why I said "I think disco is the greatest popular music genre of the latter half of the twentieth century." Now I ask you: could a rockist utter that statement? And besides, gay people can't be rockists (except those that are).

In short, please don't write Love is the Message: The 500 Greatest Disco Albums in the Universe. But do write Mighty Real: The 500 Greatest Singles Albums in the Universe .

― Kevin John Bozelka, Thursday, 10 May 2007 01:08 (eighteen years ago)

Ah ha! Look at this stolen from the 1979 P&J poll thread:

Mike Freedberg ("it's impossible to poll disco, or even black slow music, fairly from LPs alone")

'Nuff said.

― Kevin John Bozelka, Thursday, 10 May 2007 01:30 (eighteen years ago)

It's impossible to poll any music from LPs alone!

That doesn't mean there's no such thing as good albums, though.

― xhuxk, Thursday, 10 May 2007 01:31 (eighteen years ago)

But especially disco!

― Kevin John Bozelka, Thursday, 10 May 2007 01:33 (eighteen years ago)

No one noticed this:

Nick Lowe: Pure Pop for Power People

― Kevin John Bozelka, Thursday, 10 May 2007 01:33 (eighteen years ago)

Apparently a (great) typo from the original poll.

― Kevin John Bozelka, Thursday, 10 May 2007 01:35 (eighteen years ago)

The statement "disco is sometimes great rock and roll" could only be problematic to people who hate either disco or rock and roll. Fuck 'em both.

And I'm totally convinced that many of the catchiest punk bands could have become big in the US if given the chance. It ended up becoming "music that appealed to a niche audience" (to quote Sundar) because nobody got to hear it.

― Patrick, Thursday, 10 May 2007 02:30 (eighteen years ago)

The statement "disco is sometimes great rock and roll" could only be problematic to people who hate either disco or rock and roll.

Also problematic to people who insist that all disco is great, and that no disco has more artistic merit than other disco.

― Geir Hongro, Thursday, 10 May 2007 12:12 (eighteen years ago)

[i]Nick Lowe: Pure Pop for Power People[(i]

Nope. The actual title of that album is "Jesus Of Cool" though ;) and it's damn about time it is remastered an rereleased!

― Geir Hongro, Thursday, 10 May 2007 12:13 (eighteen years ago)

It was entitled Pure Pop For Power People in America.

It is not unknown for albums to be given different titles in different countries.

Were you aware that there were other countries in the world?

― Marcello Carlin, Thursday, 10 May 2007 12:33 (eighteen years ago)

Pure Pop for Now People, actually.

― JN$OT, Thursday, 10 May 2007 12:36 (eighteen years ago)

Quite.

― Marcello Carlin, Thursday, 10 May 2007 12:44 (eighteen years ago)

The Comstock of Cool

― James Redd and the Blecchs, Thursday, 10 May 2007 14:47 (eighteen years ago)

that "power" typo is mine, I'm afraid. I retyped that thing for the Xgau site back when I had more time on my hands.

KJB and Cheddy need to start their own "arguing about disco" thread and let the rest of us watch.

― Matos W.K., Thursday, 10 May 2007 21:40 (eighteen years ago)

and btw, Christgau is totally wrong about GA2, thing moves wonderfully

― Matos W.K., Thursday, 10 May 2007 21:42 (eighteen years ago)

That "power" typo is mine, I'm afraid. I retyped that thing for the Xgau site back when I had more time on my hands.

Was the "Back To Boredom" by James Runt your "typo" too? ;)

― Geir Hongro, Thursday, 10 May 2007 22:12 (eighteen years ago)

KJB and Cheddy need to start their own "arguing about disco" thread and let the rest of us watch.

Was this a mean comment or a friendly one? Your answer will determine whether or not I'll tell everyone about the Don Ray meets Cerrone dream I just had.

― Kevin John Bozelka, Thursday, 10 May 2007 23:00 (eighteen years ago)

Excellent. 9 votes for Funkadelic

― Brigadier Lethbridge-Pfunkboy, Thursday, 10 May 2007 23:15 (eighteen years ago)

Kevin, who precisely do you think wrote this? Captain I Hate Disco? I don't think so.

― Matos W.K., Friday, 11 May 2007 04:48 (eighteen years ago)

Was the "Back To Boredom" by James Runt your "typo" too? ;)

in the 1978 P&J? what?

― Matos W.K., Friday, 11 May 2007 04:49 (eighteen years ago)

Nice. Wire & Blondie tied for first place--Xgau would be in heaven.

― JN$OT, Friday, 11 May 2007 06:25 (eighteen years ago)

Ok then, Captain I Love Disco, here's my dream:

I brought both Cerrone and Don Ray into town to spin (that's how you know it's a dream - Austin is hardly a disco inferno). It was daytime so presumably we were killing time before moving to the club. We were all chilling in my living room making polite but mildly awkward chit chat. One reason for the awkwardness was because they didn't know one another!

Me: Oh, I'm sorry. I just assumed you knew each other. (To Cerrone) This is Don Ray (spoken with reverence as if dropping a silent "The Great" before his name).

Cerrone's jaw dropped. He stood up and shook Ray's hand.

Cerrone: Oh wow. Don Ray. It's such an honor to meet you.

But Don Ray remained seated and rather unmoved by this adulation.

Me: Don, this is Cerrone (spoken with same reverence as above).

But Don just smiled weakly as if he didn't know who Cerrone was. So Cerrone just sat back down, rather dejected. Mildly awkward morphed into VERY awkward. So awkward, in fact, that I woke up at this point.

The end.

P.S. Both looked nothing like they did on their album covers; they were much prettier.

― Kevin John Bozelka, Friday, 11 May 2007 07:16 (eighteen years ago)

Nice result!

― Mark G, Friday, 11 May 2007 08:50 (eighteen years ago)

fave full-length disco album thread:


http://www.ilxor.com/ILX/ThreadSelectedControllerServlet?boardid=41&threadid=50423

― scott seward, Friday, 11 May 2007 14:20 (eighteen years ago)

"And I never figured out what the big whoop was on USA-European Connection."

it's, like, PERFECT or something. so amazing. listen again!

― scott seward, Friday, 11 May 2007 14:24 (eighteen years ago)


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