Why Italo - German Disco Was Not Successful In The US

[bazac]

With very few exceptions, Italo/German Disco were not successful in the US.

Why?

[DavyMac]

I think it mattered where you were in the US. Chicago, San Francisco, parts of Los Angeles had HiNRG followers.

[Paulo]

I think it wasn't successful because of the (then) recent 70's US disco backlash.
The US "stablishment" had banned music which had started in their own country. Once it was gone, they wouldn't import "cheaper" disco coming from Italy. The music industry was now into new wave rock.

Hi-nrg was not successful because it was even more gay than the original disco music.

Here in Brazil, in the early 80's, hi-nrg or italo disco didn't make it. But as the 80's progressed a lot of hi-nrg music hit the charts thanks to the Pet Shop Boys, Madonna and New Order.

Some examples were:

SANDRA - MARIA MAGDALENA & LITTLE GIRL
EXPOSE - POINT OF NO RETURN
BALTIMORA - TARZAN BOY
SAVAGE - DON'T CRY TONIGHT (early 80's)
PET SHOP BOYS - IT'S A SIN, WEST END GIRLS, LOVE COMES QUICKLY
NEW ORDER - BIZARRE LOVE TRIANGLE, THE PERFECT KISS
RICK ASTLEY - NEVER GONNA GIVE YOU UP
plus hundreds of other SAW songs

[remicks]

*****

Was Italo disco even successful in Italy ??
You'd never know it from the disco music they chose to play for the Olympics recently held there .... :roll:

*****

[Paulo]

BAZAC:
The link below provides the story of italo... how it began from the ashes of 70's DISCO and how it was superseded by HOUSE.

http://www.euro-flash.net/italo.php

[Giovanni]

Originally Posted by remicks

*****

Was Italo disco even successful in Italy ??

It was! For some reasons I also explained in some other posts:

1) In the early 80s many italian djs and musicians began to transform themselves in disco producers for reasons of money
2) The US dollar was very very strong against the italian lira at that time and the imports began to be very expensive and scarce
3) The importers began to produce disco themselves (DiscoMagic for example)
4) The synths began to be cheap and largely used and they eliminated the need for an orchestra or session men. With only one or two synths you could produce a track
5) Italo productions were absolutely cheap. I know some of the people that produced records back then and they were putting very little money in, because they were thinking to produce disposable records... use once and destroy! The vast majority of the producers and players and singers thought that their production were trash!
6) The contemporary evolution of rock and pop music towards a more danceable beat influenced the dancefloors towards a more electronic sound
7) Many italo productions were heavily promoted in radios and TVs here since productions of the same people working in those radios and TVs
8) In conclusion, the shops were flooded with italo records and you have to buy them if you were a dj.
Some more clever dj began to explore new sounds, and the so caled "afro" sound was born.... it was a mix of disco, african and ethnic music, electronic stuff (mostly german), percussive beats etc. (mixtapes by Baldelli, Mozart, Rubens, TBC etc. are available in the net).
Some other djs (like me) decided to stop spinning since the music was so bad.
Anyway the italian success of italo is confined to 82/83 up to 86.... then the house sound of Chicago arrived and blew away everything

[mrkick20000]

Originally Posted by Paulo

BAZAC:
The link below provides the story of italo... how it began from the ashes of 70's DISCO and how it was superseded by HOUSE.

http://www.euro-flash.net/italo.php

Thank you for your info. The site was really interesting and informative. Actually Italo Disco was very popular in Japan in 80s and sitll has lots of fans nowadays. The Hot Mix Five's Mix is a stunt !

German disco like Falco and Hubert Kah also was popular in 80s here. We like synthesizer sound on the whole???

[JussiK]

Originally Posted by Giovanni

Some other djs (like me) decided to stop spinning since the music was so bad.

But there certainly was a lot of excellent product coming out of Italy as well during the 80's, not just catchy but musically simplistic crowdpleasers like "Around My Dream". Think of the brilliant Balearic scene hits by Enzo Avallone, "Maracaibo" by Luisa Colombo, the extremely well produced "Hey Survivor" and "Aide" by Belen Thomas, the ever-popular "Ma Quelle Idea", Loredana Berte's "American Boys", "Rhapsody" and the "Casino" album by The Passengers, Tullio di Piscopo, and especially the cool and jazzy "Miss Manhattan" by Metropol which is currently very desirable and one of THE tracks among groove djs ( unbeliveably produced and composed by Al Festa who later during the 90's became Italy's answer to Ed Wood with his mindblowingly entertaining trash film extravaganza Fotogrammi Mortali/Fatal Frames, starring his wife Stefania Stella, no words can do justice to this exuberant woman ), and so on. And like current dj supremos such as Daniel Wang are ready to testify, there's a fine line between madness and brilliance in stuff like "Boys" by Sabrina Salerno. Wouldn't wear those late 80's Versace jackets ever again, though.

[Giovanni]

Originally Posted by JussiK

But there certainly was a lot of excellent product coming out of Italy as well during the 80's, not just catchy but musically simplistic crowdpleasers like "Around My Dream". Think of the brilliant Balearic scene hits by Enzo Avallone, "Maracaibo" by Luisa Colombo, the extremely well produced "Hey Survivor" and "Aide" by Belen Thomas, the ever-popular "Ma Quelle Idea", Loredana Berte's "American Boys", "Rhapsody" and the "Casino" album by The Passengers, Tullio di Piscopo, and especially the cool and jazzy "Miss Manhattan" by Metropol which is currently very desirable and one of THE tracks among groove djs ( unbeliveably produced and composed by Al Festa who later during the 90's became Italy's answer to Ed Wood with his mindblowingly entertaining trash film extravaganza Fotogrammi Mortali/Fatal Frames, starring his wife Stefania Stella, no words can do justice to this exuberant woman ), and so on. And like current dj supremos such as Daniel Wang are ready to testify, there's a fine line between madness and brilliance in stuff like "Boys" by Sabrina Salerno. Wouldn't wear those late 80's Versace jackets ever again, though.

Of coure, Jussi, but I was referring strictly to the italo disco, as it is intended among music collectors.

I agree about some balearic classics (but that's not italo!) and some other gems like Maracaibo" (do you remember who made you aware of that....?!?!).

Pino D'angiò's "Ma quale idea" is a cult classic but it's not italo, since it was released in 1980 and it's based on a "ain't no stopping us now"-clone rhythmic groove, that means pure funky disco with a bit of rap.
The same is true for Metropole's "Miss Manhattan", from 1981, a great boogie disco classic, not italo! It was also written by F. Puccioni aka Mike Francis, author of other such beautiful italian boogie classic like "Survivor" and "Nighttime lady"

[Nano]

Nice link Paulo. Some tracks like Righeira's "Vamos a la playa" (which had a version in Spanish), Gazebo's "I like Chopin" and Baltimora's "Tarzan Boy" were huge dance hits in Argentina. "I like Chopin" is now a FM standard.

Of course, I danced to "Ma quale idea" but like Giovanni said, that was before synths took over. I think the first Italo tracks I heard were "Vamos a la playa" and "Acapulco" (if this one qualifies), both in 1983.

Another first that had the sound, but was not Italian, was Laid Back's "Sunshine reggae", from Denmark. Was so huge it ended being untolerable. It was at this time that I began to lose interest in dance music.

[JussiK]

[quote=Giovanni]Of coure, Jussi, but I was referring strictly to the italo disco, as it is intended among music collectors.
QUOTE]

So, speaking in academic terms, an "Italo" as opposed to an "Italian" tune can only refer to records produced from 1982 until 86, right? There must have been stuff produced during that same period that would confuse people like me - what exactly are the required components of an "offical" Italo tune?

"Maracaibo" got some plays all over the world I imagine as it certainly was spinned here. The 7" was sold in stores. Later like some 5 years ago or something, I got a dj's-only-four track 12" pressing from someone connected with this site, was it you - and I think someone sent me a 7" with a color sleeve. Those versions were the same as on my old 7" only in better condition. I recall I lost touch with that person, am under an impression I sent him a 12" of "Weekend", the second Christine Wiltshire one. - Do you know what was the status of Luisa Colombo in the music industry, is she still around?

[Giovanni]

Originally Posted by JussiK

So, speaking in academic terms, an "Italo" as opposed to an "Italian" tune can only refer to records produced from 1982 until 86, right? There must have been stuff produced during that same period that would confuse people like me - what exactly are the required components of an "offical" Italo tune?

"Maracaibo" got some plays all over the world I imagine as it certainly was spinned here. The 7" was sold in stores. Later like some 5 years ago or something, I got a dj's-only-four track 12" pressing from someone connected with this site, was it you - and I think someone sent me a 7" with a color sleeve. Those versions were the same as on my old 7" only in better condition. I recall I lost touch with that person, am under an impression I sent him a 12" of "Weekend", the second Christine Wiltshire one. - Do you know what was the status of Luisa Colombo in the music industry, is she still around?

Jussi, I tried to define "italo-disco", as opposed to "italian disco" and "disco in italian" in an old post....
http://www.discomusic.com/forums/sho...=italian+disco

It is true that in those years there have been italian productions that cannot be classified as italo, but the large part of dance records comin out of italy where italo then.

By the way, that person was me!

[Studio74]

Hmmm...good Italo-Disco, in my opinion, is stuff like Problémes D`Amour/Dance Boy Dance by Alexander Robotnick, Spacer Woman by Charlie, Livin It Up by BHW, Stranger In A Strange Land By N.O.I.A. , Take A Chance By Mr. Flaggio, Mr. Game By Klapto, Dirty Talk/MBO Theme by Klein & MBO, Penguin Invasion by Scotch, Fun Fun by Happy Station or Self Control by R.A.F., stuff that was produced in a period between 1979 and 1983. Later stuff like Sandra, Modern Talking, Silver Pozolli, Sabrina, Ryan Paris,etc, although i like to hear it, i consider them the "cheesy" parto of Italo/German Disco...

But hey, that`s only my opinion ;) .

[Nano]

Originally Posted by Studio74

Take A Chance By Mr. Flaggio

Yeah I think I remember that song too. BTW, I read myself in the old topic linked by Giovanni and I see where I learned "Italo Disco 101", because I had it all wrong too... Giovanni is our teacher! :) And it's true that there's a big difference between Jimmy Ross, Pino D'Angio etc. and the later stuff, so it fits that this other stuff have its own name.

It's interesting... reading that old topic many people made comparisons between Italo and HiNRG. A great part of this material was released in my country in a series of compilation releases by a small importer/disco label called Gapul (their most known series was Paradise Dance, with 4-5 volumes between 1981 and 1985-6). The two first Paradise Dance issues had some funky gems in them, like "Big Guitar" by Vaughan Mason and "Do me" by Mona Rae/Raye, but they were in between HiNRG tunes like Patrick Cowley's "Menergy". Later, this and other compilations by Gapul consisted almost exclusively by a mix of HiNRG and Italo material like Flaggio, Gary Low and others. (BTW do you remember a track called "I'm in love", with a kinda robotic voice? I can't say in which one of these styles it fitted.) My point: the two styles catered to the same audience, which was younger and different from the late-Seventies/early-Eighties discogoers.

[euroflash]

Originally Posted by remicks

*****

Was Italo disco even successful in Italy ??
You'd never know it from the disco music they chose to play for the Olympics recently held there .... :roll:

*****

This is a GREAT point, Remicks! I have many Italian friends my age who are way more into funk, fusion and disco (all the music that came from US and UK in 70's and early 80's ). Most of them frown upon Italo Disco and for that matter on German Disco, and they usually sell italo disco to support their habit of buying rare Disco cuts.

From what I gathered, they had their own "Italo Sucks" period; and while Italo Disco had way more airplay than it received anywhere in the US or UK, it never became "mainstream" and remained somewhat a "dance underground" phenomena.

In the US, Chicago WBMX's "HotMix Five" played a lot of italo/euro 80's disco. In fact, Mickey "mixin'" Oliver's shows featured 80-90% of European imports from that time. Also, you will find lots of Italo in his "top favorites" list.

Another peculiar detail: Italo records that were really "hot" in Europe, were totally ignored in the US, and vice versa.

HOLLAND is the country that worships Italo Disco, and that's where you will find many fans, collectors, connoisseurs and even italo pirate radios...