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Photo by Ktvin Hlgiey
Couple grooves to the latest disco vibrations at Uncle Sam's, a discotheque at 24th and O streets. Some go just to dance ; others have more offbeat goals.
By Rich TBI'
. .Now I know that all you people like disco dancing.
You like to go to parties and steal dances from your negro
friends. . . but I know that some ofym still can 'tget that
emphasis on the two and four best, so we re going to
show you how to do it "(Enter three transvestites beating
on garbage can lids). ..
-spoken prelude to "Disco Shit," by Darryl Rhodes and
the Hahavishnu Orchestra, Atlanta, 1976.
E,
krobably the biggest thine to hit the entertinment
1 J 5 .xl a TV 1
woaa in tne seventies is disco, wrucn is rapidly developing
a culture, a lifestyle and a major force in music and
fashion. The disco is a phenomenon far beyond the fad
level, in creating a new multi-level industry supporting it.
According to a recent article in Nrttk magazine, there
are over 10,000 discos in the United States, or about
seven times the number existing two years ago.
The author visited three local places, risking health and
sanity in search of the disco phenomenon in Lincoln.
There may be more, but he doesn't want to know about
them. .
Fanny's, at the Lincoliu-Hilton Hotel, is what you
would expect a hotel disco to be. More of a lounge than
anything else, the evening population consists mostly of
junior executive types, traveling salesmen, secretaries,
receptionists, with a few students thrown in. The dance
floor is small, and the light show resembles an after
Christmas sale of blinking tree lights. The music the
deejay selects is slow-to-middle gear, and on the night I
was there almost no one danced.
The place seemed to be heavily hustle-oriented, but a
few persons came in to talk and dance. The costumes the
waitresses wear indicate the scene there: "Fanny's" is
embrodered across the dettierre of the shorts. Cute, real
cute.
'To fa here every nfejht . . . It's a"
good place to booote and pick up
-chicks and . . yen know . . t
little Bo's East, a larger disco at 27th and Comhusker
Highway, Kerns to be more universally appealing to
people under thirty. If dress is any indicator, it also draws
people from many economic and social classes.
The emphasis here is on hiuding, with predatory
members of both sexes out en "search-and-destroy"
misdons. The de:J -vjri "3. Cn'.vlyV adept &t - ctc-;J -control.
He keeps .tca it modern isvjmca'hf
the night, "but he throws m o occassional rocker to get
we stumble 'round. . .
J say "Go!"
She say 4'Yes."
Dim the lights
You can guess the rest
OHH-Ohh, can't you see -.
Love is the drug I need to score. .."
- 'Love is the Drug" by Roxy M usic
The disco (from "discoteque", a French word meaning
a record library) has brought with it a specific music; a
new technology of manipulating environment, snazzy
clothes, a new variety of disco jockey or deejay and
several new dances-notably the bump, the hustle, the bus
stop, the rope and the roach.
The discotheque originally was a European invention
migrating to the States in the 1960s. It stayed popular
only tropditan black and Puerto Rican neighbor
hoods, pushed there by the rise in popularity of rock con
certs, dances with live bands and psychedelia. In the
seventies people decided they had had enough of "re
levance," social chance, anti-establishment attitudes and
hallucinogenic drugs.
The disco was there as an escape form as the '60s died
out. Early discos brought the act to the streets in the form
of mobile disco jockeys in disco-vans equipped with sound
and light equipment, and -of course-records.
The gay community made the advancing discos their
home for a while. At a disco everyone is anonymous and
reahtively ignored, and boys dancing with boys and girls
with girls were acceptable. The straight world, hit by in
flation, began to see in discos a cheap night's worth of
entertainment. The expansion of the business seems to
have no end in sight.
Disco music has become mainly a device for manipulate
ing the emotions and moods of dancers. With roots in
soul, Latin and rock music, it has become a distinguish
able entity. As a rule", over-orchestrated arrangements with
predictable, repetitive riffs support inane and repetitive
vocal spots-disco has become this generation's "easy
listening" music. Often the discos will add a live drummer
with a full trap set, who adds his live sound to the records
coming in on headphones. The disco deejay can select the
slower music to calm down a crowd, or he can win up
the dancers to a frenzy with faster numbers leaning
toward rock.
people
to "boorie down.
The patrons seated at tables
look extremely bored, but those corning with or finding
partners who dance seem to have a good time. little Bo's
is almost always packed to the rafters.
Uncle Sam's, 24th and O streets, has college students as
its primary clientele. Sam's has the most sophisticated
I;-ht show in town, and the sound system is good.
Secminy less husde-oriented then the two places above,
the emphasis is on drinking, dancing and some conversa
tion. Its environment is more tightly controlled with a
dr?ss code and large bouncer staff. Sam's also has a live
drocmcr who copies the drum lints in tie songs.
"Facetoface . -
toe to toe
kczrt to kssrt .
us tit the floor
Lfr&srvp
t iiUzrsce
.he disco mania also has brought back the peacock in
human beings. Disco clothing designs show off the body
of the wearer, while being comfortable enough to spend
t' night dancing in. Body shirts, jump suits and tight,
flared pants accompanied by all kinds of jewelry. The
disco aoJ"5j rerght back the once -rebelled tg:?r-tS
"ttprtssisv.3 -drca-code. Urxle Sam's enforces a policy
cf "no Tirts, tank tops, hats, faded jeans or shorts,"
Disco music usually is accompanied by an impressive
array of seventies technology in lighting. Colored lights
flash underneath translucent dance floors, on wall and
ceiling, and coupled with stroboscopic and ultraviolet
lights and mirrors. Fhrhing and changing with the music,
they create mocdi from intimate sensuality to frenzied
robot entropy. Together wUh the nusic, they can be dis
orienting to Cie point of nausea upon entering the disco,
but in time the nervous system adjusts. The lights give
the Elusion cf frantic movement on the dance floor, even
when people ere crowed to they barely can move.
Tl:y do people go to disco? During my alcohol-crazed
research, I received urtrd ba!eful gisres, some sharped
iQ-JZ:r, two "grt tests," and several l dunnos." Seme
rt!7'criss were more IsxListfrs.
H just Lie to discs. You wanta dance?" replied one
gfd, Umilkd herself as Dunny the Terrible. -
"I'n la hers n try rJ.t" a ycurj man Li a blue jump-
suit and rszor-sh-g haircut said. "It's a good place to
n
booris and pickup chicks, and . . . yea kr.ow . . " Spying
a likely prosoect just coming in the door, he approached
her and put his arm around her waist. Looking uncomfort
able, she disappeared into the crowd, with him following.
"I don't dance. I just come here to sit and drink and be
disgusted," said Jim Wallace, a UNL student.
"I come here because it really fascinates me" said
Mark Safarik, another UNL student. "I want to figure out
the whole game so I can . . . use it, manipulate it. It's
really a strange scene."
In the Lincoln discos, no dance step prevails. People
move catatonicaily, jerkily, smoothly, spastically, up and
down, in and out, around and around. The totally
programmed nature of the disco environment produces a
sort of artificial electronic sensuality, and some of the
more uninhibited dancing can politely be described as
"copulating with the ak".
But the prevailing attitude is narcissism, where each
dancer is converted by clothes, lights, music and alcohol
into his or her very own superstar.
"Last call for alcohol" precedes the final number,
usually an upbeat rocker that brings the disco to a final
crashing climax, leaving the crowd wanting to come back.
The deejay is in a hurry to go home.
"You have two minutes to drink up," he says. A few
minutes later he is visibly more irritated. "C'mon, we all
have parties to go to. Let's go." A few minutes later all
pretenses of hospitality dissolve, We all have parties to go
to ... let's get out of here . . . move your behinds
floormen, you may assist people out of here. Let's GO!!"
. Hand over mike, the deejay points to the crowd and
says something obviously uncomplimentary about them
to the drummer. 12:40 a.m. is the magic moment when
the adored deejay tells his fans to bug off.
The crowd, for the most part untouched by the rude
stage display, nevertheless shuffles slowly toward the exit,
presumably to boogie again another day. -
Standing in line to get my coat from the cloak room, I
hear a conversation between two men in front of me that
summed up the evening.
"Votta night,' says one,
"Bummer . . . BUMMERf agrees the other.
K
S S f