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| Eurodisco | |
|---|---|
| Stylistic origins | |
| Cultural origins | 1970s, Europe (particularly France, Germany and Italy) |
| Derivative forms | |
| Subgenres | |
Eurodisco (also spelled asEuro disco) is a genre ofelectronic dance music that evolved fromdisco in the middle 1970s,[2] incorporating elements ofpop androck into a disco-like continuous dance atmosphere. Many Eurodisco compositions feature lyrics sung in English, although the singers often share a differentmother tongue.
Eurodisco derivatives generally includeEuropop andEurodance, with the most prominent sub-genres beingspace disco of the late 1970s andItalo disco of the early 1980s. The genre declined in popularity after 1990 in preference tohouse andeurodance.
Eurodisco is largely an offshoot of contemporary American music trends going far back to the early times of disco, pop and rock. During the 1960s, Europop hits spread around France, Italy and Germany, because of the FrenchScopitone (jukebox) and the Italian Cinebox/Coilorama Video-jukebox machines. Another root is theEurovision Song Contest, especially in the 1970s.
The song "Waterloo" by Swedish pop groupABBA, which won the 1974 Eurovision song contest, is a typical example of a 1970s European pop song (Europop).[3] The success was huge and European producers instantly produced pop hits, and a whole new commercial music industry in Europe was met in the demand forsocial dancing music. Thediscofox dancing style was a result of this.
The American music journalistRobert Christgau used the term "Eurodisco" in his late 1970s articles forThe Village Voice newspaper.
The term "disco" in Europe existed long before the Eurodisco and U.S.disco music scene. It was used in Europe during the 1960s as a short alternative to "discotheque". The first dance music venues called discotheques emerged inOccupied France in the 1940s. In the UK, "discotheques" and "discos" were called "clubs" like any other nightclub. In Italy and Spain, the term "discoteca" or "discotheque" means mainstream clubs. In Greece, "discotheque" describes the retro-clubs.
An example of the term "disco" with no relation to a specific music style (and dance music in general), is theDisco series that aired in Germany on theZDF network from 1971 to 1982. This show proved that the term "disco" was widespread enough at the time, and that the second national TV network of Germany used it for a general music TV show in 1971. Another later example is the showDiscoring on Italy's RAI channel (first aired in February 1977).
The term "Euro-disco" was first used during the mid-1970s to describe the non-UK based disco productions and artists such asD.D. Sound, West Germany groupsArabesque,[4]Boney M.,[5]Dschinghis Khan andSilver Convention, the Munich-based production trioGiorgio Moroder,Donna Summer andPete Bellotte,[6] the Italian singerGino Soccio,[7] French artistsAmanda Lear,Dalida,Cerrone, Hot Blood, Banzai (single "Viva America") andOttawan, Dutch groupsLuv' and Eurovision song contest winnersTeach-In. In Spain, disco took off after the death ofFrancisco Franco in 1975, withBaccara. Swedish groupABBA gained the big hit "Dancing Queen".
1970s Eurodisco soon had spinoffs and variations. The most notable spinoff isspace disco, a crossover of Eurodisco and UShi-NRG disco. Another popular variation, with no specific name, appeared in the late 1970s: a "Latin"-like sound added to the genre, which can be heard in Italy'sRaffaella Carrà,La Bionda (D. D. Sound), Easy Going and France'sGibson Brothers.
One of the early representatives of the 1980s genre was the British groupImagination and with their series of hits throughout 1981 and 1982. In the United States, Donna Summer was the only 1980s Eurodisco singer, and the termhi-NRG was used there instead.
1980s Eurodisco variations soon appeared later in France, Germany, Spain and Greece. The French and German Eurodisco productions were the most popular. German pop duoModern Talking was an icon of Eurodisco between 1985–1987 and became the most successful Eurodisco project ever.Bad Boys Blue was another very successful project.
That style became very popular in Eastern Europe and remained popular until the early 1990s. In Poland,disco polo, a local music genre relying heavily on Eurodisco was developed at the verge of the '80s and '90s. Some Canadian disco productions by groups likeLime became hits.
During the late 1980s, Eurodisco hits were produced in Spain and Greece and much later in Poland and Russia. Meanwhile, a sped-up version of Eurodisco with dance-pop elements became successful in the US, under the term "hi-NRG". Even today, for many Americans, "hi-NRG" meansPaul Lekakis and theLondon Boys. Those hits (and a few others, likeLondonbeat's "I've Been Thinking About You" from 1990) were the last hits called "Eurodisco" in Europe.
By the early 1990s, Eurodisco was influenced by the emergence of genres such ashouse,acid house and the electro (pop/dance/synth) music styles, and replaced (or evolved) by other music styles.Eurohouse and Italo-NRG are the most notable and connected directly with the Italo disco music scene. In the United States, especially for the Eurohouse style, they used the earlier term of "Eurodance" to describe this 1990s evolution of Eurodisco.
Technically speaking, the last form of Eurodisco isFrench house, a music style that appeared in France during the mid-1990s and slowly became widespread in Europe. French house is more of a "back to the roots" music style with 1970s Eurodisco influences far before the Italo disco explosion (more specificallyspace disco, hi-NRG disco, Canadian disco andP-funk).
By the mid to late 2000s, Eurodisco saw renewed interest. Artists such asIrene Cara,Berlin and the lateLaura Branigan saw a surge in popularity, especially in places where it was not commercially successful after 1984, such as North America and South America.
The influence of Eurodisco had infiltrated dance and pop in the U.S. by 1983, as European producers and songwriters inspired a new generation of American performers. While disco had been declared "dead" due to a backlash there in 1979, subsequent Euro-flavored successes crossing the boundaries of rock, pop and dance, such as "Call Me" byBlondie and "Gloria" byLaura Branigan, ushered in a new era of American-fronted dance music.
Branigan (produced by German producerJack White) moved deeper into the Eurodisco style for further hits, alongsideGiorgio Moroder-produced U.S. actsBerlin andIrene Cara. By 1984, musicians from many countries had begun to produce Eurodisco songs. In Germany, notable practitioners of the sound includedModern Talking,Arabesque,Sandra,Alphaville,C.C. Catch and AustrianFalco, although he was also heavily influenced byrap and rock music.
A Eurodisco revival was also contributed by northern European record labels such as Iventi D'azzurro (The Netherlands) and Flashback Records (Finland), with rearranged releases of the old hits and unreleased demos resung by the original Italo singers, also including new songs. Recording artists like Joey Mauro, Karl Otto, Diva have been releasing new albums. Joey Mauro was able to recreate the sound of 1980s Italo disco with his synthesizers and keyboard collections, and a special place within the scene is occupied by Peter Aresti, formerly known as Peter Arcade, who officially started his career in the '90s.
AmongVietnamese-diaspora community in the US, Eurodisco was referred asnew wave.[8]
In Mainland China, the Eurodisco was popularized through the spread of the Eurodisco mix albumHollywood East Star Trax (shortened asHedong in Chinese) andMaster Mix (Mengshi in Chinese), compiled by DJ Alex - who at the time was a DJ in the dance club "Hollywood East" in Hong Kong. As the album circulated, "Hedong" and "Mengshi" soon became a figurative term representing Eurodisco.[9][10]
