The Rise and Fall of Disco

Disco has never died, but it has evolved into post-disco/boogie/underground dance, which remained popular until 1984, the year hip hop starred to become more popular..

The Loft was not the first! You forgot to mention Francis Grasso who invented beatmatching where Nicky, Frankie and Larry learned from. Nice broad overview though.

I was a teenager in the 70s. The disco that's played now from that era is the best of the bunch, some great songs. In my opinion though, most of it was ......not good.

Who cares?

I graduated in 1976 from Hight school ,the stat of the Disco beat .The thing I don't like about these people who say Disco Sucks , never said Rap Sucks , and there lyrics are very bad . That's how we know these republican red hat end some thing good ,to keep something bad around . They burn Beatles records , republicans , and now Disco sound . It seen they like people sing about killing one other and singing about love . Tell a teen , did he like dancing to a rap song , that's now being use to put a rapper in the electric chair in court . OUCH !

YAMAHA DX7 keyboard, Disco killer.

Greed and drugs. Especially drugs, they were everywhere during the late 70s. That's still why people come to New York, so they can go to a place like 54 and drink beer all night and do coke and not have to drive home. But unfortunately life doesn't work like that.

What really killed disco was the AIDS epidemic. I remember the clubs emptied out in those days. And it really didn't die, it just separated into its elements and only the names were changed to protect the innocent.

The 70s/80s had the best music..all of it..rock..R&B..PoP..jazz..wish i could of grew up 10 years earlier!

Disco committed suicide. There was too much as everybody was joining the bandwagon. There was lots of garbage disco and people began to tire of it all.

so we cant have blues, jazz, rock, disco house, techno, rap..... America has a problem with blacks......

Disco never really died in the rest of the world. So, when City Pop blew up in recent years it was a new sound to a lot of people.

Why does this otherwise good history of disco have a thumbnail photo that implies that Debby Harry killed disco? The video doesn't even mention her, and Blondie's "Heart of Glass" was a solid contribution to the disco canon.

I remember leaving the 6th grade that summer and disco was all over the radio, by the time I started 7th grade in the fall new wave music took over & the 80's officially started.

Disco sucks

I did. 8/11/1979

Propaganda they like to put it in everything

Man, the lengths people are going to to try and make disco not the shallow cultural underbelly of American culture it really was. Puh-lease.

So many homophobics and transphobics lmaoooo. Literally people that weren't affected directly -- went OUT of their to be affected directly.

What?! No disco personalities?! Most were one hit wonders ?! You can tell this was put together by someone younger who did not live during this time period. A lot of bologna in this video.

So without the gay community disco will not exist?

Good synopsis and concise summary!

Stop talking about race and sexuality in a monolithic sense, this video is purely ideological

I will always love Disco!

Thank you very much for this James..

Steve dohl wouldn't do that to hip hop artist blowing their record suge knight Jay z and Diddy probably kick his ass

The other problem I'd argue is how black and gay people are always grouped together. They're not one in the same. It's not always, but usually white people that refer to the lgbtq+ & black community as a whole. And if not intended, it sure as hell comes across that way. You don't group a race and gender identity as a single group.
As this once great but racist octogenarian president once said, 'c'mon man!'

60s it was Motown.

Punk! Seeing Debbie Harry says it all. Punk and New Wave.

Why is Debbie Harry on the thumbnail? She and Blondie were Punk and New Wave. Great Alt band.

Short and impactful documentary; that’s as good as it gets.

Between 1976 - 2001 Club Dancing, I Had Fun. (smile) I Miss Those Weekend Nights.

Music today has no personality

Disco = Freedom!

Great video!!! very informative. Thank you.

it wasn't racism or homophobia that caused people to turn on disco for pete sakes how many times can u hear a 4 to the floor beat before u get tired of it.then commercialism was the finale killer of it.

Disco never died it morphed and gave birth to other dance music, freestyle, House, and Techno. It may never die as it is tied to the underground/marginalized everywhere who love to dance.

Racism killed Disco

Thanks for highlighting the political context and how the 'fall' of disco (only in the USA btw) was deeply homophobic and racist. Something also interesting that you didn't mention was the timing of the AIDS crisis in all of this. Really interesting video, thank you!

2013 disco comes back: Daft Punk - Get lucky

And then Chicago happened

Oh oKay. Never heard of foe on the flo!! Glad you cleared that up. (Or the utter Disgust of lgbtQ— or whatever

Disco sucks

This video is only 12 minuts long but feels 12 hours.

Disco was killed by a movement started by a bitter dj that was fired from a rock station that had converted to Disco. I hope he is still alive and now see that rap music killed rock. What goes around cones around.

So disco did suck. Thanks for informing me 😂🎉

Disco was created by the African-American community. first disco songs were created by African-Americans, it was promoted and loved by the white lgbtq community