the very first disco song???

[Simon White]

This one could run and run of course but......I'm sticking my neck out again here.

First of all to answer 'what was the first Disco track' you have to define 'Disco'. The general and loose consensus for that definition in this thread here seems to be a consistency of beat, the inclusion of strings and, errr ....to some extent...length.

But as has already been suggested in this thread, it's all about certain elements coming together...yes 'Shaft' is a very important track but there were definately other, less well known records that count.

The first one I nominate predates 'Shaft' by at least three years but has all those elements cited in this thread for Shaft's 'first Disco track' claims.
The other one is so well known !

Firstly, The Soulful Strings 'Burning Spear' recorded in 1967 in Chicago for the Cadet label.
The song got covered a few times in subsequent years, once by its composer arranger, conductor and all round genius Richard Evans. The 45 version is shorter but the album version is over four minutes long.

The one has already been mentioned but surely it defines exactly what Disco was all about in the early days of the phenomenon....?

The Trammps "Zing ! Went the strings Of My Heart" from 1972, a cover of a song made famous by Judy Garland as far back as 1937 (although even she didn't sing it originally) and covered in 1958 by Doo Wop/ Rock and Roll group The Coasters and the influence for the Trammps version.
The "Legendary Zing Album" from '75 and mixed by Mr Moulton contains the longer version and the fact that by 1975, a track from 1972 was still "Disco" enough to compete with brand new tracks says a lot about it's credibility !

And the influence of 'Shaft' is in there too....but 'Zing' draws all the elements together...making it "Disco"

[Disco Funk]

Originally Posted by JussiK

...Espresso Espresso, Serge Gainsbourg, Titanic, tracks like "Ode To Linda" from the Benelux countries, endless obscure forgotten one shot wonders created during the early 70's to make people do nothing but dance in non-rock style, in Europe? Known in the US or not they still remain prototypes if not actual disco already and as such will be canonised in Academia in a 2 weeks time, offically :-)!

And these guys took their inspiration from whom? There must have been a common source that inspired the Americans and Europeans to use heavy strings over a funk groove. Were they all emulating Motown? Early Philly? James Brown? It is all very intriguing! :)

Disco Funk

[Disco Funk]

Originally Posted by Simon White

The "Legendary Zing Album" from '75 and mixed by Mr Moulton contains the longer version and the fact that by 1975, a track from 1972 was still "Disco" enough to compete with brand new tracks says a lot about it's credibility !

This is a very important observation you made, which I should have seen for myself, since I love the Zing LP! Thank you for making it clear.

Check it out - something like Shaft, while containing elements of disco, really only contains danceworthy material for about what, half a minute? The rest is all build up and wind down soundtrack mood stuff. While there are disco tracks that start slow and go fast, and the occasional ones that go back to slow and then back to fast again (I'm thinking of MFSB's 'Touch Me In The Morning'), it generally moves at a consistent pace throughout.

The songs offered from the Trammps Zing sessions, which were remixed and reprocessed in '75 to extend them (remember, Moulton used the same instrumentation - there was no new drum track added to any of them, as far as I can tell, although he did speed up or slow down a couple of tracks), contained elements from 1972 that were still relevant and current sounding when the LP was released in '75 when disco was officially Disco!

The Zing sessions also sound like the music was recorded before the upgrades were done to Sigma to thicken the sound of the instruments, especially the drums, but you can hear the way Earl Young plays, that they were really pushing for a consistently heavy sound in the beat. Even if he didn't clue into the four on the floor, he accentuated the up beat with a tom tom hit, but keep the groove flowing, unlike the jerky Tom Bell/Spinners beat. Heck, if you listen to the original Buddha 45s, even though they were pressed in mono, you can hear them really forcing the pulse of the groove.

Now, some might argue that Tom Moulton remixed older tracks for his Disco Gold series in '75 as well. But when you listen to most of those songs, with the exception of We're On The Right Track and a few others, they sounded dated and not typical of the 'true' disco sound.

So I have to put my foot down right there and say it was Philadelphia that was the true birth place of what eventually became the archetypal sound of disco. The Zing sessions didn't contain 'proto-disco', but instead if featured disco music in it's finished form!

Thanks Simon for pointing that out. Man, it was totally staring us right in the face.

Oh, I should throw out some other honorable mentions for early disco grooves. These were proto disco, and ironically, featured similar sounding drum grooves, were originally recorded or released in 1970, and were remixed by Moulton for the Disco Trek record, although one didn't make it:

This World by Sweet Inspirations
I'm The One by Little Sister (AKA Sly & The Family Stone)

Disco Funk

[JussiK]

Originally Posted by Disco Funk

And these guys took their inspiration from whom? There must have been a common source that inspired the Americans and Europeans to use heavy strings over a funk groove. Were they all emulating Motown? Early Philly? James Brown? It is all very intriguing! :)

Disco Funk

We'll never know for sure. Maybe it was just musicans taking happening forms of backing elements and adding stuff from other sources on top of those to create a mutated form of pop. That was of course what just lounge maestros like Martin Denny, Les Baxter and Xavier Cugat had done earlier with Latin sounds, they sweetened boleros etc with strings to produce a more accessible and marketable hybrid. Maybe it was a collective moment in musical history when they all seized the opportunity to create or capitalise on something fun/profitable/interesting.

Must seek that Soulful strings version of Burning Spear out immediately, sounds like something one can't do without!

[Paulo]

Originally Posted by Disco Funk

And these guys took their inspiration from whom? There must have been a common source that inspired the Americans and Europeans to use heavy strings over a funk groove. Were they all emulating Motown? Early Philly? James Brown? It is all very intriguing! :)Disco Funk

Most of the tracks Jussi is talking about (from compilations like Espresso Espresso, Serge Gainsbourg, Titanic) have no link with the american sound. It is a complete different style of POP and this sound probably served as a foundaton for european disco.

The problem is that we brazilians didn't know about it because in the early 70's, radio stations were dominated by american black music. So the first disco songs were american. We didn't even call it DISCO in the beginning. It was still philly soul.

But I think each continent or country tends to lean towards its roots. It is absolutely normal that (in the US) disco ''stole'' and evolved from soul and philly soul, because this music is AMERICAN. In Europe the roots were other.

The only ''problem'' is that Jussi considers them to be DISCO. I would say that even if they were played in 60s clubs they were POP songs. But undoubtedly they have elements which were later ''stolen'' by european disco.

I heard some POP of the late 60's by unknown (to me) european artists and it had a strong 4/4 beat with percussion. But what striked me most were the fluttery female voices all over the songs. I would never call that DISCO. I call it 60s POP... but one can't deny they carry a lot of musical elements used later in the eauropean DISCO sound (like BORIS MIDNEY's).

[Mixmachine]

Originally Posted by Disco Funk

The songs offered from the Trammps Zing sessions, which were remixed and reprocessed in '75 to extend them (remember, Moulton used the same instrumentation - there was no new drum track added to any of them, as far as I can tell, although he did speed up or slow down a couple of tracks), contained elements from 1972 that were still relevant and current sounding when the LP was released in '75 when disco was officially Disco!

The Zing sessions also sound like the music was recorded before the upgrades were done to Sigma to thicken the sound of the instruments, especially the drums, but you can hear the way Earl Young plays, that they were really pushing for a consistently heavy sound in the beat. Even if he didn't clue into the four on the floor, he accentuated the up beat with a tom tom hit, but keep the groove flowing, unlike the jerky Tom Bell/Spinners beat. Heck, if you listen to the original Buddha 45s, even though they were pressed in mono, you can hear them really forcing the pulse of the groove.

As far as I can tell the only re-mixing that Tom Moulton did to "Zing" was to stitch together the 1972's 7" vocal version of 'Zing' after the instrumental (“Penguins at the Big Apple”), and he probably duplicated in the Studio and applied a DJ trick (we called "phasing" (sp) at the time) to the drum rolls during the intro (LP) and in some other portions.

Could this be what you refer to as "tiny sound" ??

Also the original 7" was recorded in Stereo with mono on the flip, but the best sound quality of any "Zing" version I know of can be heard in the Pye/Buddah mini LP released in the UK. This original long Moulton LP version retains all the original sounds and elements, but apparently was re-mastered for this release, as all the instruments sound much more clean and clear, the rhythm guitar coming form the left channel is so crisp that you'd swear it was re-recorded.

"Zing" was a great Disco hit and one of my all time faves, this cut was used into the mid- 70's at the clubs, and I'd certainly have no objections for it to be crowned as the first truly Disco record.

But the 4 on the floor (and the other "Proto-disco' elements)was not unique to this Trammps song at the time (relating to Disco club hits) at the same time Eddie Kendricks "Date with the rain" (1972) was burning the Disco floor with similar drumming, but the best example I already mentioned here, "Don't bring back memories" by the Four tops.

This 1969 Four Tops song is very different from the Classic "Motown" sound of the 60's and was also a massive Disco club hit, played way into the mid seventies, in this song you can also hear the same 4 on the floor drumming as in 'Zing' if you listen carefully, even if the drum beat is buried in the mix in favor of Latin Congas and cow bells that are pushed forward, (another future Disco music ingredient).

"Dont bring back.." also features a "break" (if short), again with heavy Congas and backing swirling strings section that could be easily confused with Barry White's ‘Love unlimited’ sound, heck I'm just playing this again, and towards the fade out (on the 7") the strings sound exactly like a Love unlimited Orchestra song I can't place now.

Disco Music was part of unique life style and culture that revolved predominantly around the Night life that was shaped by the "Disco" night Clubs of the day.

If any obscure music of the past, --- even if is discovered today to contain “Shades" and elements of future "Disco music", --- that was not "known" by the majority of Disco fans, and/or was not part of that Night Life of that era (and therefore not part of “Disco Culture”), is as irrelevant today as it was back in the day.

[Paulo]

Originally Posted by Mixmachine

If any obscure music of the past, --- even if is discovered today to contain “Shades" and elements of future "Disco music", --- that was not "known" by the majority of Disco fans, and/or was not part of that Night Life of that era (and therefore not part of “Disco Culture”), is as irrelevant today as it was back in the day.

The problem is that it may be obscure today, but not back in the day. Disco wasn't born out of thin air. It derived from philly soul in the USA, but in Europe the influences were different.

Most of us were too young to see DISCO in its formative years in the very early 70s. So, apart from the chart hits, we can't tell what's obscure and what's not.

Maybe what's obscure today, was played regularly in the clubs of the day and helped shape ''the sound that the world came to know as DISCO'', even though if it wasn't a radio or a chart hit.

Maybe it was obscure in the USA, but not in Europe. Maybe it was obscure in Europe but not in USA. And judging by the differences in style between american and european disco, surely the roots were not the same for both continents/countries.

If we are talking in this thread about the first disco songs, than it is interesting to discover (if we can) from where it came from.

What I mean to say is:
For us who were there in 1976 up to 1981, songs like COCOMOTION, DANCE TO DANCE, LE SPANK, LOVE IN C MINOR, HERE COMES THAT SOUND, ON A RIEN A PARDRE, ALL DAY ALL NIGHT, TURN ON TO LOVE, LOVE HAS COME MY WAY, CAUGHT UP IN A ONE NIGHT LOVE AFFAIR are common ground, but for other music fans (who are not collectors like us) these songs are OBSCURE, even if they listened to disco at the time. They will just talk about I WILL SURVIVE, YMCA, NIGHT FEVER, LAST DANCE, MACHO MAN, STAYING ALIVE, I FEEL LOVE, ZODIACS, etc...

What's obscure and what's not is relative.
The passage of time blurs people's minds and makes them forget things that 30 years ago had some kind of relevance.

Within a hundred years, all the people who is alive today on earth will be dead. New people will exist. All of us in this board (the last disco-flame-bearers) will be dead and gone too... then even STAYING ALIVE by The Bee Gees will be OBSCURE.

[Disco Funk]

Originally Posted by Paulo

... then even STAYING ALIVE by The Bee Gees will be OBSCURE.

Actually, it could be the new American National Anthem by then! :)

Disco Funk

[Disco Funk]

Originally Posted by Mixmachine

As far as I can tell the only re-mixing that Tom Moulton did to "Zing" was to stitch together the 1972's 7" vocal version of 'Zing' after the instrumental (“Penguins at the Big Apple”), and he probably duplicated in the Studio and applied a DJ trick (we called "phasing" (sp) at the time) to the drum rolls during the intro (LP) and in some other portions.

Could this be what you refer to as "tiny sound" ??

Phasing is a swooshy sound. Funny think, I have the Unidisc CD release of this record. No phasing on the bouncing/back beat high hat sections, which I think sounds better. And Hold Back The Night is longer by a dozen or so seconds, running all the way to the end of the take! I guess they must have gotten their hands on some special master tapes, because I don't Buddha sending the masters for the records to a Canadian studio and saying "here, and make sure you fade out Hold Back The Night at the 3:50 minute mark".

I don't know if Moulton had any of the instruments augmented, I doubt it. Otherwise, he might as well have dubbed a four on the floor beat throughout too. But he did mix some of the tracks, he must have. The most glaring example of a change in mix is Sixty Minute Man. On the original single's mono mix, the clavinet is really loud and to the front in the chorus section. On the Zing LP, it's been all but mixed out.

Also, I don't know if this has to do with using damaged original tapes, but I noticed that on some songs, there is a choppiness to the sound. As if something was degraded with the tapes. Perhaps the original masters were damaged over the years, so when Moulton made his new two track master for LP release, those damages were more audible? Rubber Band is one song that stands out where there is slight cutting out in some instrumentation. You have to listen to the track more than once to catch them.

Also the original 7" was recorded in Stereo with mono on the flip, but the best sound quality of any "Zing" version I know of can be heard in the Pye/Buddah mini LP released in the

UK. This original long Moulton LP version retains all the original sounds and elements, but apparently was re-mastered for this release, as all the instruments sound much more clean and clear, the rhythm guitar coming form the left channel is so crisp that you'd swear it was re-recorded.

Unfortunately my copy of the EP was pretty used, so the sound quality wasn't much better than the LP. Oh well, I have the CD, which features the best sound quality.

"Zing" was a great Disco hit and one of my all time faves, this cut was used into the mid- 70's at the clubs, and I'd certainly have no objections for it to be crowned as the first truly Disco record.

But the 4 on the floor (and the other "Proto-disco' elements)was not unique to this Trammps song at the time (relating to Disco club hits) at the same time Eddie Kendricks "Date with the rain" (1972) was burning the Disco floor with similar drumming, but the best example I already mentioned here, "Don't bring back memories" by the Four tops.

I'll have to listen to the Four Tops track, but I do know that Date With The Rain didn't have a four on the floor element. It was just kick drum, snare, kick drum snare. Not kick drum, snare-kickdrum, kick drum, snare-kickdrum.

This 1969 Four Tops song is very different from the Classic "Motown" sound of the 60's and was also a massive Disco club hit, played way into the mid seventies, in this song you can also hear the same 4 on the floor drumming as in 'Zing' if you listen carefully, even if the drum beat is buried in the mix in favor of Latin Congas and cow bells that are pushed forward, (another future Disco music ingredient).

"Dont bring back.." also features a "break" (if short), again with heavy Congas and backing swirling strings section that could be easily confused with Barry White's ‘Love unlimited’ sound, heck I'm just playing this again, and towards the fade out (on the 7") the strings sound exactly like a Love unlimited Orchestra song I can't place now.

Disco Music was part of unique life style and culture that revolved predominantly around the Night life that was shaped by the "Disco" night Clubs of the day.

If any obscure music of the past, --- even if is discovered today to contain “Shades" and elements of future "Disco music", --- that was not "known" by the majority of Disco fans, and/or was not part of that Night Life of that era (and therefore not part of “Disco Culture”), is as irrelevant today as it was back in the day.

I'll have to check out that Four Tops track. Actually, Zing doesn't have 4 on the floor either. None of the Zing tracks do. The augmentation of the snare is done by hitting a tom drum on tracks like Rubber Band and Tom's Song. I think the first Philly track to have four on the floor is Waitin For The Rain. I haven't heard anything earlier than that.

I don't count Bohannon as having the first or earliest four on the floor because he liked to hit the snare on every beat. To me, four on the floor was the enhancement snare on the upbeat only.

I can see the argument that was it relevant today might not be relevant to people at the time. Discos were probably playing more James Brown than Philly in 1972. But that doesn't make the contribution of certain artists significant, because someone took that sound, reworked it, took it again, reworked, and eventually came up with the prototype for the disco sound.

As far as I'm concerned, the Zing sessions were the first disco music sessions.

Disco Funk

[omordha]

Catchee by Ace Cannon. It was released in 1968 and you'd swear it was 1975. It's got all the hallmarks of mid 70s Disco. Yet, no one mentions this song as early disco. It was way ahead of its time. Check out a sample on Amnazon.

[Disco Funk]

Originally Posted by omordha

Catchee by Ace Cannon. It was released in 1968 and you'd swear it was 1975. It's got all the hallmarks of mid 70s Disco. Yet, no one mentions this song as early disco. It was way ahead of its time. Check out a sample on Amnazon.

That's probably because they were re-recordings made in the 70s! I listened to three different music samples on allmusicguide, and they all sound like they were done in the 70s. This isn't unusual for artists who weren't making money off the original recordings, or the rights to the original tapes were locked up in legal red tape, to go back in the studio and record 'faux' original hits. By that, I mean, you'll buy a compilation of their greatest hits on some no-name label thinking it was the version you remember from back in the day, and its some recent re-recording instead.

Disco Funk

[omordha]

Disco Funk, I think you're right. The recording
I have of Catchee is on a collection and it says
'original artists', not 'original recordings'.
There's a Grass Roots song on there that I know is not
the original recording.

The weird thing is: I can't find the original
recording of Catchee anywhere. I don't remember it
from the 60s and all the recordings on the web are the
version I have. Was this really a hit in 1968?

[Mixmachine]

Originally Posted by Disco Funk

[/font]


I'll have to listen to the Four Tops track, but I do know that Date With The Rain didn't have a four on the floor element. It was just kick drum, snare, kick drum snare. Not kick drum, snare-kickdrum, kick drum, snare-kickdrum.

I think then my definition of "Four on the floor" is different from yours, I was under the impression that hitting the - drum - snare - kick drum on every beat constituted "Four on the floor".

Certainly Zing qualifies under my definition, so does "Date with the rain" certainly Bohannon, others faves with this early "Disco Music" beat was "Honey Please" Barry White and "I can't quit your love" by BT and TB a 1975 Philly release .

I'll have to check out that Four Tops track. Actually, Zing doesn't have 4 on the floor either. None of the Zing tracks do. The augmentation of the snare is done by hitting a tom drum on tracks like Rubber Band and Tom's Song. I think the first Philly track to have four on the floor is Waitin For The Rain. I haven't heard anything earlier than that.

The augmentation of the snare sound, like in "waiting for the rain" is of course a trade mark of the early Disco Music sound used on countless hits of the day as we all know, especially Philly hits, but if this sound constitutes "Four on the floor" , this is news to me, but then again, I'm not a musician, the little I know, I picked up by listening to records, not under any formal training.

I'm gonna check out the "Standing on the Shadows of Motown" DVD again, in there one of Motown's original Funk Brothers drummers recalls playing what he calls "four on the floor" for the first time in the Motown studio, but I don't remember the songs he mentions.

I don't count Bohannon as having the first or earliest four on the floor because he liked to hit the snare on every beat. To me, four on the floor was the enhancement snare on the upbeat only.

And I thought he was the "King" of "four on the floor"

I can see the argument that was it relevant today might not be relevant to people at the time. Discos were probably playing more James Brown than Philly in 1972. But that doesn't make the contribution of certain artists (in)significant, because someone took that sound, reworked it, took it again, reworked, and eventually came up with the prototype for the disco sound.

I think in my previous post I didn't make it clear that I meant "Obscure" at the time (early 70's) at the (re-)birth of Discotheques and Disco Music, and Paulo missed my point as a result.

I believe all "important" and potential club hit records of the day were used at the Discos back then, including lots of European records -- many of them not very memorable even though they were sold and played in the US---, and this are the club records that shaped the sound of Disco that came later in the 70's, to go around today digging up pseudo-Disco records from some old forgotten soundtrack or Porno flick that no one saw -- and/or didn't sell much-- and now try to say that this song was "influencial" is modern revisionist non-sense.

Originally Posted by Paulo

The problem is that it may be obscure today, but not back in the day. Disco wasn't born out of thin air. It derived from philly soul in the USA, but in Europe the influences were different.

The influences of late 70's Euro-Disco are very clear to me, Europeans added their "classical" symphonic music historical influences to a Disco beat, this Disco beat was in the early days more influence by "world" beats as you can find in many early European club record hits that invaded US discos from groups like like Barrabas, Titanic, Bimbo Jet, Equals, Banzai, Osibiza, Dibango (Africa-France), Black Soul, Black Blood, Gary Glitter, Crystal Grass ,Wall of Steel, Chocolats, (and many others), this Europeans group's sound had very little in common with what came to be associated later with the term "Euro-Disco", as a matter of fact , most US disco fans didn't know this music came from Europe at all.

[JussiK]

Originally Posted by Mixmachine

I to go around today digging up pseudo-Disco records from some old forgotten soundtrack or Porno flick that no one saw -- and/or didn't sell much-- and now try to say that this song was "influencial" is modern revisionist non-sense.

This is what David Mancuso did, though, according to Last Night A Dj Saved My Life and according to himself he used to dig up all kinds of obscure sources of sound. Maybe he wasn't of influence to commercial djs as such but possibly helped to broaden minds of others. He still plays the stuff, too.

In Paris, djs used to dig into porno soundtracks and mix afro beats over them. maybe they influenced people like Moroder and Cerrone...?

[SUPERGONZO]

"Zing went the strings of my heart" 1972. Trammps. This was a doo wop song from 1963. Thats the first strike against it. #2. Have you listened to this record lately? This sounds like typical "oldie" revival stuff that was popular around this time period in top 40. It certainly is not Disco. It was remixed later in 1976 I think, to sound more disco-like, but the original 1972 version does not have enough disco elements to be even close IMO.

=========================
I agree this is a fuzzy area, and there will probably never be a "AAH there it is, the first Disco record" answer, but this one's not close.

I'm still going with The Philly sound as a big influence and the early uses of synthesizer as the beginnings. Somebody please listen to Pepper Box...by the Peppers 1973. And tell me thats not real Disco. First Choice/ Barry White/ Deodato......all sound like they were pretty close in 1973 to me.