Disco Fridays: CLASSIC DISCO (2009) and DISCO LADIES (2009)

We've featured a glittery mess of disco compilations here on The Hideaway through the years, from Rhino's The Disco Years and Rebound's Disco Nights through Priority's Mega Hits Dance Classics and several Time-Life disco collections.  But we've never featured anything quite like the sixteen albums that make up Demon/Harmless's Disco Discharge series of disco compilations.  Conceived by Dave Akerman aka Mr. Pinks, who is too young to have frequented the clubs in their decadent heyday - he admits to beginning his club experience in 1983 - was schooled in all the music thanks to his older partner Steve.  The goal was to create albums that would appeal to seasoned disco aficionados as well as the younger generation just getting into the scene. He would accomplish this by licensing tracks heretofore unlicensed and only in their full length album or twelve inch disco lengths.  And finally, each double CD album would be packaged attractively with extensive liner notes and simple photos on the covers.  The first fruit of his efforts was 2009's Classic Disco and it is the first album we'll be featuring on today's special double wide post here on the first of thirteen consecutive Disco Fridays here at The Hideaway.

Classic Disco serves as a perfect introduction to the unfortunately named Disco Discharge series as it has a variety of disco sub-genres that would see the spotlight on future volumes such as gay disco, Euro and Hi NRG, with Cheryl Lynn's "Got To Be Real" being undoubtedly the biggest pop hit in the collection.  The tracks range from 1975-1984 with the average year falling around disco's post-Saturday Night Fever peak of 1978 before the backlash set in amongst the easily bored and homophobic.  While the three tracks running about five minutes apiece clock in as the shortest tracks, thanks to an abundance of longer tracks the average song on Classic Disco runs a respectable 7:09.  Playing both discs will be the quickest two and a half hours you will spend all day.  Best of all, all songs are unmixed (they don't fade in and out of one another) making them perfect for DJ play or mixtape making.

year	title	artist		Billboard Disco Chart
1976	Cherchez La Femme / Se Si Bon	Dr. Buzzard's Original Savannah Band	5:47	1
1982	Thanks For Loving Me	Double Discovery	8:43	-
1978	Got To Be Real	Cheryl Lynn	5:06	11
1977	Do Your Dance	Rose Royce	9:17	20
1978	Funk Encounter	The Constellation Orchestra	6:36	-
1977	Could Heaven Ever Be Like This	Idris Muhammed	8:34	2
1979	Love Magic	John Davis & The Monster Orchestra	7:39	5
1979	Keep On Dancin'	Gary's Gang	7:08	1
1975	What A Diff'rence A Day Makes	Esther Phillips	4:29	2
1980	Gone Gone Gone	Johnny Mathis	6:32	-
1980	Counting On Love (One Two Three)	Peter Jacques Band	6:08	57
1976	Makes You Blind (Re-edit)	The Glitter Band	5:58	4
1979	Turn The Music Up!	The Players Association	6:51	56
1979	(Everybody) Get Dancin'	Bombers	9:26	3
1979	Dancin'	Grey & Hanks	7:04	21
1984	It Burns Me Up	Change	5:04	-
1978	Just A Groove	Glen Adams Affair	6:17	-
1978	Look For Love	Cerrone	10:14	7
1983	Living Up To Love	Companion	9:08	-
1978	Got To Have Loving	Don Ray	8:17	4
1980	Twilight Zone / Twilight Tone	The Manhattan Transfer	6:05	4

white-colored song titles are not on Spotify - YouTube links provided

Northern Soul DJ legend and Harmless label head Ian Dewhirst interviews Mr. Pinks and Alan Jones, author of the liner notes for the Disco Discharge series in the video below, Part One of a series.

As I mentioned at the start, we're kicking off a thirteen consecutive week run of Disco Fridays here at The Hideaway (Lord willing and the creek don't rise) with a double wide post today and the first Fridays of November and December as well.  Today's second featured album is the second in the Disco Discharge series, catalog #HURTCD085 aka Disco Ladies.

Disco Ladies serves up twenty-two songs, all sung by disco sirens not named Donna Summer. The oldest songs are from 1976 while the newest tune is a Shep Pettibone Remix of "I Like You" a Number One Disco song from 1985 that only hit #65 on the R&B chart and #61 on the Pop chart.  It's a toss-up which is most well-known pop song on the album; either "More, More, More" (#4) or "Boogie Oogie Oogie" (#1) or maybe even "Get Up And Boogie (That's Right)" (#2). Disco Ladies features more shorter songs overall with the average track clocking in at 6:30.  

Slipped onto the second disc are two songs from motion picture soundtrack albums released on the Casablanca label: Janis Ian's "Fly Too High" from Foxes (1979) and The Ritchie Family's "Give Me A Break" from Can't Stop The Music (1980).  (Both tracks also appeared on albums by their respective artists.)  For five years, Disco Ladies was my only CD source for Nona Hendryx's beautiful "Keep It Confidential" (aside from this off-pitch Hot Tracks remix on their 15th Anniversary Collection) before her Nona album was re-released on compact disc at an affordable price by the fine folks at Funky Town Grooves.

year	title	artist		Billboard Disco Chart
1979	Groove Me	Fern Kinney	8:53	6
1976	More, More, More	Andrea True Connection	6:14	2
1980	You Fooled Around	Sister Sledge	4:25	-
1980	Love At First Night	Kim Hart	3:20	-
1978	Bring On The Love (Why Can't We Be Friends Again)	Gloria Jones	6:57	-
1980	Jump To The Beat	Stacy Lattisaw	5:08	1
1978	Boogie Oogie Oogie (LP Remix Version)	A Taste Of Honey	7:30	1
1978	Gotta Get Out Of Here	Lucy Hawkins	5:46	34
1981	Get On Up & Do It Again	Suzy Q	5:54	4
1981	Shake It Up Tonight	Cheryl Lynn	5:40	5
1981	This Beat Is Mine	Vicky D	5:52	11
1983	Keep It Confidential	Nona Hendryx	5:55	25
1976	Get Up & Boogie (That's Right)	Silver Convention	7:52	5
1976	Blood & Honey	Amanda Lear	8:56	-
1979	Come On And Do It	Poussez	9:51	15
1980	Spacer	Sheila & B. Devotion	5:54	44
1979	Fly Too High	Janis Ian	6:48	30
1979	Harmony	Suzi Lane	6:57	1
1979	Instant Love	Sylvia Love	4:42	-
1979	Pick Me Up I'll Dance	Melba Moore	6:56	22
1980	Give Me A Break	The Ritchie Family	6:25	25
1985	I Like You (Shep Pettibone Remix)	Phyllis Nelson	7:20	1

white-colored song titles are not on Spotify - YouTube links provided

Here's the second part of the eight part Disco Discharge interview:

Have a great weekend!

Disco Friday will return next Friday 

with the next album in 

the Disco Discharge series:

EURO DISCO!