Disco Songs Commenting On "Death of Disco"

[daviddiebel]

I came across a couple disco songs that comment on the "death of disco" taking place:

ABP Orchestra "The Day That Disco Died" (1980)

Gonzalez "Disco Can't Last Forever" (1980 - Gonzalez, the group that made "I Haven't Stopped Dancing Yet")

I also think that the 1980 Chic song "Rebels Are We" has a related element: "We can’t give up, now that we’re movin’
The whole world’s groovin’, we must stay free..."

Disco has been wrongly accused of being devoid of social consciousness as a genre. I disagree; I think disco, from a sociological perspective, represented people making the best of their situation, and fulfilling their personal desires. That's not escapism at all. I find it interesting that disco performers would comment on the "death of disco," heralding the (temporary) end of good times and personal freedom.

[Bernie]

La Flavour's 1980 "Can't Kill the Beat" may as well be a Disco will survive anthem of sorts.

Haven't played it in a while, but part of the verses are...

We're going to lay down the law
We're going to fight for the cause

We're going to give you the beat
We won't retreat

We feel the need and so do your feet
Because you can't kill the beat

Look a here, they say Disco is dead
They say it's bad for your head...

They say Disco is dumb, but what's in a name...

Because you can't kill the beat, you can't..."

[Giovanni]

Another one is "Disco's dead" by THE CRITICS on Panorama (1980)

[discosavvy]

David, "Disco Can't Live Forever" by Gonzalez is an interesting discovery. I hadn't heard of that song before.

I wonder if Celi Bee's "Dancin' Nuts" (1980) counts? I only heard the start of the song, where she says "Dancin' Nuts, that's what they call us, Dancin' Nuts, That's All We Are..." Who's "they"? The anti-disco critics?

For what it's worth, "Can't Stop the Music" by the Village People has the line "you can't stop the music, nobody can stop the music..."

In a catalog I saw a mysterious 1980 song "D.I.S.C.O." by some group calling themselves A.N.T.I. Rock. Is it really a pro-disco, anti-rock song like I think it would be?

One of the ultimate self-referential pro-disco affirmations must be "Disco Kicks" by Boys Town Gang, which defiantly declares in late 1981: "You know I really love it when the band gets down... I really love to hear that big band sound... and I really love the music when it spins me
around and around and around..."

Meanwhile, "Disco's Dead" by the Critics is NOT a disco song, but a hostile anti-disco rock song. The lyrics include "Ding dong, disco's dead, ding dong, ding dong, wicked disco's dead. Disco's dead, goodbye disco... shook your boogaloo till you were run out of town... Getting back to rock 'n roll..."

I wonder what the lyrics are to "The Night They Invented Disco" by D.D. Sound (1981)? That's like the opposite theme of ABP Orchestra's "The Day Disco Died".