Disco/dance Music Subgenres

[shootyourshot]

It's been a while since I last posted here. I hope everyone is doing well.

Lately, I've been trying to define the subgenres of pre-modern disco/dance music. So far, I've come up with the following:

Disco
Examples:

• “Dream World”, Don Downing, 1974
• “Fear”, Easy Going, 1979
• “The Player”, First Choice, 1974
• “Magnifique”, Magnifique, 1979
• “The Hills of Katmandu”, Tantra, 1980
• “Stormy Weather”, Viola Wills, 1982

Proto-Disco
Examples:

• “Girl You Need a Change Of Mind”, Eddie Kendricks, 1972
• “When the Fuel Runs Out”, Executive Suite, 1973
• “Sugar Pie Guy”, The Joneses, 1974
• “Soul Makossa”, Manu Dibango, 1972

Electronic Disco
Examples:

• “Lay All Your Love On Me”, ABBA, 1980
• “Supernature”, Cerrone, 1977
• “Automatic Lover”, Dee D. Jackson, 1978
• “I Feel Love”, Donna Summer, 1977
• “The Force”, Droids, 1977
• “Moskow Diskow”, Telex, 1979

Symphonic Disco
Examples:

• “Yes Sir, I Can Boogie”, Baccara, 1977
• “Try Me, I Know We Can Make It”, Donna Summer, 1976
• “Cocomotion”, El Coco, 1977
• “Baby Love”, USA-European Connection, 1978
• “Souvenirs”, Voyage, 1978

Italo-Disco
Examples:

• “New Dream”, Clay Pedrini, 1984
• “Right”, Fake, 1984
• “Hypnotic Tango”, My Mine, 1983
• “Life Is Very Short”, One System, 1987
• “War in Love”, Panorama, 1985
• “Good Times”, Paul Paul, 1983

Electro
Examples:

• “The Dominatrix Sleeps Tonight”, Dominatrix, 1984
• “I.O.U.”, Freeez, 1983
• “Don’t Stop the Rock”, Freestyle, 1985
• “Angel Eyes”, Lime, 1983

Electro-Funk
Examples:

• “Keep In Touch”, Freeez, 1980
• “Give Me”, I Level, 1982
• “Don’t Stop”, K.I.D., 1981
• “I’m Ready”, Kano, 1980
• “Zulu”, The Quick, 1981
• “Call Me”, Skyy, 1981

Garage
Examples:

• “P.S.”, Dolly Dots, 1981
• “Dyin’ to Be Dancin’”, Empress, 1981
• “Love Is Gonna Be On Your Side”, Firefly, 1981
• “Heartbeat”, Taana Gardner, 1981

Hi-NRG
Examples:

• “I’m Free”, Celi Bee, 1983
• “Shoot Your Shot”, Divine, 1982
• “Take a Little Chance”, Eve, 1983
• “Whatever I Do, Wherever I Go”, Hazell Dean, 1984
• “Spin It”, Sunbelt, 1981
• “This Is Love”, Susan Stevens, 1982
• “Do You Wanna Funk”, Sylvester, 1982

Disco-rap
Examples:

• “Rapture”, Blondie, 1980
• “Last Night a DJ Saved My Life”, Indeep, 1982
• “Rap-O Clap-O”, Joe Bataan, 1979
• “Body Rock”, Kool Moe Dee & the Treacherous Three, 1980

Disco-rock
Examples:

• “Hot Stuff”, Donna Summer, 1979
• “I Was Made for Loving You”, Kiss, 1979
• “Enola Gay”, Orchestral Maneuvers In the Dark, 1980
• “Da Ya Think I’m Sexy”, Rod Stewart, 1978
• “Miss You”, Rolling Stones, 1978

Synthpop
Examples:

• “Living Inside Me”, Data, 1983
• “Face to Face”, Twins, 1982
• “Fade to Grey”, Visage, 1980
• “Don’t Go”, Yaz, 1982

Freestyle
Examples:

• “When I Hear Music”, Debbie Deb, 1983
• “Point of No Return”, Expose, 1985
• “Match Made Up In Heaven”, Jill, 1986
• “Let the Music Play”, Shannon, 1983

Dance
Examples:

• “Solid”, Ashford & Simpson, 1984
• “I Feel for You”, Chaka Khan, 1984
• “Burning Up”, Madonna, 1983
• “I Can’t Wait”, Nu Shooz, 1986
• “1999”, Prince, 1982
• “Two of Hearts”, Stacy Q, 1986
• “Tell It to My Heart”, Taylor Dayne, 1987

Post-Disco
Examples:

• “Flood”, Delanua, 1980
• “Shine Up”, Doris D & The Pins, 1981
• “Under My Thumb”, Fast Radio, 1983
• “Your Love”, Lime, 1981
• “Nights of Arabia”, Miro Miroe, 1982
• “My Love Won’t Let You Down”, Nathalie, 1983
• “Strange Desires”, Peter Richard, 1981
• “Mondo Man”, Roni Griffith, 1980
• “Don’t You Want My Love”, Vera, 1982
• “Dancin’ the Night Away”, Voggue, 1981

Of all these subgenres, post-disco is the most problematic. I define it more by what it’s not than by what it is. Even the term “post-disco” was used because there no other appropriate term I could think of. I don't think it's "disco" enough to be considered electronic disco. I also think it's not stripped-down enough to be considered electro, too slow to be considered Hi-NRG, too early/American/poppy to be considered Italo, and not funky or soulful enough to be considered garage or electro-funk. This results in a very broad category.

Italo-disco could probably be further broken down into early, classic, and late periods. The songs listed above all belong to the “classic” period. Discofox (think Modern Talking) may also be a distinct subgenre due to the increased emphasis on vocals.

Anyway, what do you guys think? What genres do you use to sort your music?

[InvisibleMan]

interesting list...that's more catergories than I am used to, like Baccara I always just considered early Eurodisco...
I always thought of Lime and Roni Griffith as Hi-Nrg.....
Taylor Dayne's was a rather Freestyle sounding track I think, but maybe it could be just 80's dance...

there is also Eurobeat, which I think SAW popularized, but then many Italian artists started having commercial success with it in Japan... I kinda consider Stacy Q American Eurobeat because it had that sound to it.... maybe that's just me

there is also Italo Funk of the likes of Rainbow Team and Ago... not sure if that's a category though, I think you have it as Electro Funk, which is probably a better name

but that's a cool list, very interesting

[JussiK]

What genres do you use to sort your music?

In Europe djs today speak of Boogie style, meaning soulful American dance music from the 70's & early 80's, from Prelude, Salsoul etc. labels. This is also called Deep disco. The sound embraces stuff not always considered pure disco such as Marvin Gaye's Funky Space Reincarnation. The djs into this wear straw/pork hats, loose t-shirts with a logo (Bruce Lee, a cannabis leaf, Serge Gainsbourg, Blue Note), Brazilian-flavour Puma sneakers and baggy gargo pants. Favoured colours are retro, with lots of orange, green and brown. Think Matt Bianco or Deconstruction label artists from the late 80's.

Then there's cosmic disco ( prog-style, mostly electronic, vintage or new disco, experimental rhythmic jazz, non-techno non-house non-electro dance music with an underground/jazz/krautrock feel, check Den Haan productions, Arpadys: Stone Roller ), hippie disco, (also called beach disco, meaning organic, druggy, underground/pop crossover eurodisco from the mid 70's with acoustic Spanish guitars, sitars, bongos and hippie-style vocals, breaks from 60's beat-era vinyls, folksy overtones, see El Tigre: Figure, Slang: Johnny Guitar, ), and space disco ( like cosmic disco but all-electronic, new or vintage Moroder-influenced stuff, with bleeps). The djs wear more black and designer than the boogie style people, but other than that, the same fashions seem to apply.

Italo is still in the vocabularies, and every now and then, someone mentions hi-nrg.

[shootyourshot]

Baccara I always just considered early Eurodisco...

I know European symphonic and electronic disco are often grouped together as "Euro disco" and have many artists and producers in common, but I think they're too stylistically different to be kept together.

I always thought of Lime and Roni Griffith as Hi-Nrg.....

I'm trying to categorize songs, not artists, since many artists made music in multiple genres. For example, I would definitely consider Roni Griffith's "(The Best Part Of) Breakin' Up" Hi-NRG, and I think Kano's first album has examples of electro-funk ("I'm Ready" & "It's a War"), disco ("Super Extra Sexy Sign"), and post-disco ("Cosmic Voyager").

Despite being an extension of Hi-NRG and Italo-disco, I consider Eurobeat recent enough to be a form of modern dance music. I'm not that interested in it, anyway.