the genius of gino soccio

http://blog.turntablelab.com/ginosoccio-facetoface.jpg

How many musicians can you name who reach number one on the disco charts with their debut record. Gino Soccio has done it with his hit “Dancer.” Young (he’s only 23 years old!), good-looking (take a gander at the accompanying photo), and very talented, Gino appears to have a very bright future. Although his primary instrument is the piano, Gino plays an amazing number of others: acoustic guitar, drums, synthesizers. In addition, he handles horn and string arrangements as well as lead vocals. Something of a Renaissance disco man, you might say.

Born and raised in Montreal, Canada, Gino began studying piano at the age of 8. His parents insisted that he extend his cultural background. As he puts it, “I wasn’t into sports very much, and music was a good way to get out of it.” By the time he was 11 Gino was enjoying playing Bach sonatas, “because after one listening they would stay in your head – they really had hooks.”

By the age of 18 Gino had begun renting electronic keyboards and synthesizers to use in his own home studio. He was so into recording his own music that he gave up entirely on social life. The next year he was ready for his first break. It came after a producer asked him to play keyboards and write a tune for a group called Kebeletrik. He ended up, however, doing practically the whole LP by himself. This meant recording 48 tracks, synthesized drums to keyboards, soup to nuts. Fortunately for Gino, “War Dance” went top ten disco in the U.S. When Gino walked into a Montreal disco and saw how much people were enjoying dancing to his music, he was hooked on disco.

With this first success, Gino dropped out of college, using the money he made to record one more demo. When Ray Caviano, head of Warner/RFC Records, heard it, he signed Gino to inaugurate his new label and rest is history. The album “Outline” is now considered one of the most adventurous disco LPs.

here's the try it out video clip with Gino on guitar

don't forget Kebekeletrik
who wouldn't love a disco version of Bolero?
http://www.discogs.com/image/R-314146-1093187732.jpg

'There's a Woman' from Outline is killer.

Awesome sleeves all round.

found the 'witch queen' lp in a shop for 50c last year and fell in love with this guy - straight killer discofied versions of some classic rock songs

I love Gino Soccio. "There's a Woman" is one of the spaciest songs ever. It kinda out-spaces Moroder, I think, in the way that it's hardly anchored at all... just the sequencer lines sorta floating around. No strong drum parts to tie it down (this means it's not too hot on the dancefloor though). It really sounds like classic rock if classic rock had been entirely based on synthesizers. AND it's got diva vocals *and* hand percussion. And it begins with a symphony warming up. Weird synth "solos" too.
Also love "Remember" off of Face to Face.

Interesting that you make the rock comparison. I was just about to post:

The AMG review of Outline says 'There's a Woman' "blends high-tech Eurodisco with Beatles-minded Brit-pop"

I don't really hear this at all. It does, however, remind me of a certain late-80s/early-90s dance sound that I can't quite pin down. Mostly in the percussive breakdown bit with layered vocals on top.

I think I hear it in the main vocal melody and the way the vocals are harmonized. There's not much "rock" about the rest of the track I guess, but those vocals kinda seem to do it.
Yeah I guess the harmonizing is a big part of it.

i still have yet to explore a majority of gino's material, but all i know is "dancer" might be the best disco track of all time

Face to Face is my favorite, "Remember" sounds amazingly current and "It's Alright" is a jam too

and the reworked "Love Is"

ahhhh I wondered about that! there's a long edit of that track on Editions Disco and the version on S-Beat is so short ....

have to hunt down Closer

always come back to "there's a woman" over his admittedly tight but more straightforward, and by comparison somewhat one-dimensional releases. hasn't Soccio been sampled by Jeff Mills here & there? I'm aware he isn't much of a sample-based producer but I seem to remember a few instances...

love "so lonely"

esp. as reworked here by Frankie Patella

ooh need to hear that

REALLY WANT THESE

Totally love Outline and the more rock-leaning S-Beat (and yeah, their super-minimalist/ geometric artwork covers); never really connected with the other two, though I haven't listened to them for years. "Running In Circles" is electrodisco conceptually about repetition from its title on down (a la' Love Deluxe's "Here Comes That Sound Again"); S-Beat has guitar parts reminiscent of "Tequila". "The Runaway" is runaway music that I always imagined Bronski Beat combined with Lydon's "run...ahhh...way" neighing from PiL's "Albatross" to get "Smalltown Boy."

Hi dere Tim. (I want them too!)

"Outline" is flat out amazing. The others I haven't really spent much time with, but "Remember" is a classic. Kebekelektrik is great, I also enjoy the Bolero cover. The classic rock/disco covers he produced for Witch Queen ("All right now" and "Bang a gong") are fun too.

"it's alright" is so definitely his best song, and i love alot of his own tunes and the things he did with other people. but man, everytime i play "it's alright" the place erupts, its just one of those moments of pure dancefloor ecstasy.

ha I was listening to "There's a Woman" and really wanted to make a thread about how it's the spaciest most unanchored disco track out there... I need to start freaking out to some new music i guess!
Consider this a Gino Soccio appreciation revive (I've been listening to his stuff non-stop tonight).

this dude should get the full soul jazz-style canonization/reissue treatment really, he is a treat.

I was just thinking that. He's had such a great career and more then enough stuff for a double LP of killer tracks and then some.

The thing is that so much of his stuff is easy and cheap to find. Aside from a couple rare 12"s (it's alright, try it out, remember, war dance) he is strictly dollar bin material for even those novice diggers. I feel like a good comp would have to have unreleased shit to really sell.

as a novice digger myself, i can attest to finding the "dancer" 12" (one that has the same sleeve as outline) for £1 in a care and share, and always see it in the record exchange. don't know about the others though. i love it so much, especially how it starts with just the handclap so you can mix it with practically anything.

Gino is one of those instances where some really great music is just super easy to find. Not every great disco classic is some obscure rare thing!

It's not about being rare, it's about being compiled and recontextualized to attract the interest of new markets. Soul Jazz or Strut telling the world "this is a body of work worth knowing" would canonize Soccio in a way beyond what he's already achieved, which is obvious god-like status among true disco heads to the kind of thing that any old hipster would purchase on the format of their choice.

I don't disagree, but isn't Strut and Soul Jazz' MO more like the collection and packaging of rarities instead of canonizing major label musicians? At least that's the way it seems to me.

I don't know how common it is, but the 12" I have of "The Visitors" sounds completely different (much more intense, with synth stabs etc.) than the album version. And the b-side is the same track in French.

x-post plus it'll make our records worth more

oh and re: dancer 12"... the b-side "So Loneley" makes a great track to use for a cold start when dj-ing... it's super mellow, but sure enough it does ultimately have a beat, and you're off!

Lots of people who would buy a Soul Jazz comp may not even have a turntable, let alone do a lot of digging for old vinyl releases.

I'd really like a dub of "Dancer" that just emphasises the groove bit (as per The Glimmer Twins' first Culture Club mix) and leaves out the more histrionic song section. The latter is good too, but sometimes I just wanna jam that piano/horn section endlessly.

Such a thing might well exist actually - anyone know?

I don't know how common it is, but the 12" I have of "The Visitors" sounds completely different (much more intense, with synth stabs etc.) than the album version. And the b-side is the same track in French.

― altair nouveau, Friday, April 17, 2009 5:02 AM (12 hours ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

i have this

i have that ^ 12" and Dancer. they're both great, but i'll probably never play Visitors out because it's at like 138 or something unheard of.

of the LPs:
Face to Face i think it the most consistent disco record. nice and synthy, everything's around 126-130. good vocals.

i just picked up Closer a few weeks ago. it's pretty good. nothing outstanding, but good. the title track is a great slow, balearic jazz number. there's also some sorta new wave/rock stuff on here.

i can't find S-Beat, and it might be because i got rid of it? i dont' ever remember being really fond of it. i remember it being more new wave than disco? hopefully i find it somewhere so i can give it a once over again.

i dont have, nor have never heard Outline or Remember.

oh, and the kebekelektrik album's pretty great too.

Found a $1 copy of Closer from 1981 last month, and while I still wouldn't say it's as great as Outline or S-Beat, it's a lot better than I'd remembered. The track with the hook that had really stuck with me over the years is also the shortest one, "Love Is," just 2:37 and credited to Bill Withers-Paul Smith (only non-Soccio song credit); looks like Withers did a song of that name on an album in 1979, but as far as I know I've never heard his version. More likely it might've wound up later in some Italodisco mix I heard. Side openers --especially "Hold Tight" on Side Two, thanks to the female vocal -- seem to be going for an almost Chic/Change sound, to my ears. "Street Talk" has a woman talking over some funky Eurodisco; maybe Gino's answer to all the "street" records (Positive Force, Unlimited Touch, etc.) that were coming out of New York as rap was breaking out? (Also possibly an inspiration for Jellybean Benitez's "Sidewalk Talk," five years later?) Side One opener "(It's Been) Too Long" is the rock disco cut, with blues-rock guitar and manly boogie-man vocals; album closer "Closer" (ha, get it?) is a new age smooth jazz proto-techno instrumental, cool.

Oh yeah, related thread here, if anybody needs it:

Gino Soccio

Oh okay, duh, "Love Is" is also on S-Beat (even shorter there, just 2:31); that's why I remember it. Wonder why Soccio kept re-recording it, if it's not even his song? (It's also mentioned at the top of the thread, turns out -- didn't notice til now -- and m coleman mentions Chic in regards to Closer, too. Great ears think alike.)

loooooove soccio. there's also this rework of there is a woman by carl craig ...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8hnQcYUNKKQ

Jaxon refers upthread to some of Closer being "new wave/rock," and yeah, I was actually thinking "Street Talk" sounded sort of new wave myself. (One reason I made that "Sidewalk Talk" connection, I guess.) And yeah, I can see how S-Beat's kind of new-wavey, too, or at least some of it. That's probably part of what I like about it.

"s-beat" the song is incredible. i wonder if it served as inspiration for lil louis's "wargames"

Actually, on relistening, I think I'd only at most characterize the side-openers on S-Beat as sounding sort of new-wavey -- title track is a great "Tequila" rip; "The Runaway" hints at the sort of sharp-edged, robotic beats that maybe inspired Italodisco. But can definitely hear some roots of Italodisco in the playful synth-and-vocal interplay of "Love Is," too (and also the roots of some things Bob Rosenberg was doing on the first Will To Power LP eight years later -- partly for the sampled poltical rant at the start of this "Love Is" version, coming from a poorly tuned old radio or something; curious what that is, but liner notes don't say.) "Steady Operator," at the end of Side One, is reggae. But most of the album still sounds like post-Moroder disco to me -- pinnacle being "Running In Circles"' explicitly stated repetition, and I also like "Heartbreaker," which might sound cool played back to back with the 1983 Zapp track of the same name.

Beat Electric posted a side of Soccio's "Dance Exercise Music Vol. 1" awhile ago - an amazing 13 min. mix of Try It Out, Dancer, and It's Alright. Actually saw a Chicago DJ play the whole thing once... possibly trying to pass the mix as his own.

http://beatelectric.blogspot.com/2009/03/gino-soccios-dance-exercise-volume-one.html

Haven't heard the reverse side 'Detente' but "stretching hippy yoga mix" is def up my alley.

The Mighty Pope album 'Sway' is also a Soccio production I believe - his disco version of Because The Night is banging.

they found him!

http://www.waxpoetics.com/features/articles/invisible-man

not hugely in depth, but way more than we already knew. plus some fantastic, surly quotes

AND i just saw that one of the drummers on the S-Beat album, alfred beasley, commented on youtube that the S is for Southern. always wondered!

A great read.

what the hell is this? a rehearsal. if this is an "official" video it's the all time worst clip ever but not w/o ahem historical interest

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oac7oxBQeds

is the random guy who walks on stage meant to be a "visitor"

Gino Soccio was the one-man-band behind countless disco gems—until he vanished

"Everything I hear is disco. It’s all disco to me. Fuck Billy Joel and ‘it’s all rock and roll.’ It’s still disco to me. That’s what it is.”

Wow, I had no idea he was behind Witch Queen too! So many disco classics he produced! Even though that article says he thought it was too primitive, IMO the Kébekélektrik album is still the coolest thing he ever did, maybe exactly because he didn't know about the rules of dance music yet. The first half of the original (non-Moulton mixed) version of "Bolero", before the crescendo starts, sounds like minimal techno made 15 years before the fact.

Occurred to me recently that "S-Beat," with exception of vocal content, is straight up mid-late 80s The Fall.