Turn the Beat Around: The Secret History of Disco (Hardcover)

by Peter Shapiro (Author) "To many, disco is all about those three little words: "Halston, Gucci, Fiorucci..." (more)
Key Phrases: New York, United States, Northern Soul (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From The New Yorker
To its detractors, disco was nothing but a pageant of glitter and Ultrasuede, but Shapiro's history emphasizes its roots in nineteen-seventies New York, where hippie idealism had given way to stagflation and gang warfare. While the city decayed, marginal communities—gays, blacks, Latinos—congregated in abandoned warehouses to commune on makeshift dance floors. Shapiro argues that disco was "glamour as defiance," a movement that promoted racial integration and aided the mainstreaming of homosexuality. His book ranges widely, from Nazi Germany, where Swing Jugend (proto-discogoers, in Shapiro's view) met covertly to dance to "degenerate" jazz, to the rooftops of the Bronx, where Latino gangs did the hustle. This dance step, curiously, found favor with the conservative columnist William Safire, because it required a partner, and thus responsibility.
Copyright © 2005 The New Yorker

From Booklist
Few pop-music genres have so dominated the charts and airwaves as disco at its height; fewer still have subsequently been so reviled. Shapiro considers disco as much more than glitzy dance music with fashion ramifications. Emerging at a time when gay sexuality and rights were exploding and African Americans were entering the "post Civil Rights" era, disco combined elements of the subcultures of both. Shapiro describes how disco grew from roots stretching from World War II, became a worldwide phenomenon, and ended in a homophobic, racist backlash. High points in passing include Shapiro's incisive disquisition on how Saturday Night Fever had "more popular culture impact than any movie since Gone with the Wind." Shapiro cites record producer Nile Rodgers: "Those songs are powerful . . . just as relevant and as valid . . . as when the Sex Pistols . . . Pink Floyd [or] the Beatles are delivering a message." Let the pop-culture wars begin anew, with Shapiro's deeper, more balanced take on disco vitally informing the discussion. Mike Tribby
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 384 pages
• Publisher: Faber & Faber (June 1, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0571211941
• ISBN-13: 978-0571211944
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.4 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #247,753 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Politics and Dancing, August 15, 2005

By	disco75 "disco75" (State College, PA United States) - See all my reviews

Shapiro eschews the standard chronological format in his book, documenting the rise of US disco with a topical format instead. This approach sets it apart from the other books that have come out about disco. He also spends a greater amount of space critically describing the music itself, which also is a change from the other books. (In fact, he incorportates material from his other book, the Rough Guide to Soul, in his musical analyses.) He is able to embed the history of disco in a detailed examination of US society and politics-- something some other authors have tried but not succeeded at.

*Turn The Beat Around* thus comes across as a serious examination of disco-- both the genre of music and the style of nightclubbing. It is able to recognize the different subsets of disco that emerged over time (electronic, Eurodisco, Hi-NRG, soul-based, etc), to describe these subsets in meaningful ways, and to link 70s disco with the R&B-based dance musics that followed in the 1980s.

Shapiro is able to view the discotheque scene from various angles-- from the perspective of serious clubbers who started off in the late 60s, of the singles who took to the trend in the mid-70s, of the US citizens who did not join in and might have been benignly accepting of what they heard on the radio in the late 70s or were dismayed by the sounds of this Sodom-and-Gomorrah of race, gender, and sexuality upheaval.

His book is not as first-hand as the memoir *Keep On Dancin'* or the research piece *Love Saves The Day.* It is not as much a valentine as *Saturday Night Forever.* It is less academic than *You Better Work* but less accessible than *Last Night A DJ Saved My Life.* Shapiro provides a good balance of journalism and criticism, and this above all marks *Turn The Beat Around* as a good volume on the subject. Unfortunately, it comes on the heels, at least to US readers, of these other books that have pretty much covered the territory.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Superior history of disco -- maybe the best of the lot, January 16, 2006

By	Gary Morris (Portland, OR USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Who knew that disco would ever become respectable enough for a wave of books about it? By the time disco had transitioned from minor club scene to worldwide phenomenon in the late `70s, punk had also arrived, and the two styles were like armed camps, with disco dissed as "gay music" (like that's a bad thing) and punk extolled as raw and real. I guess those sad, grim, grungy straight punks couldn't stand the image of all those queer party boys, mindlessly writhing on the dance floors of every major urban center with their black brothers and sisters, dressed in chiana and sequins and waving fans and feathers while the fog machines cranked and huge speakers thumped out trancelike beats and diva shrieks at earsplitting levels. Punks declared "death to disco" and mounted record-burning campaigns but could do little to stop their least favorite musical form.

Author Peter Shapiro, who appears to be straight, seems to know more than any non-queer should about disco, and says it with panache in what is probably the best of the recent slew of books on the subject. Shapiro expertly ties the emergence of the form to the new gay freedom mixed with an increasingly empowered African-American community - the perfect musical marriage between queers and blacks as both consumers and creators of the joyous soundtrack to liberation. The author has obviously done deep research to uncover the personalities behind all those obscure sounds. The dates, personnel, even studio locations are all here. This was no small task; no musical genre has ever been as faceless as disco, with many of the "groups" simply studio musicians hired for a session or two by the real creator, the producer. But Shapiro casts his net much wider, weaving such elements as DJ culture and its superstars, disco's influence on hip hop, legendary venues like Studio 54 and the Paradise Garage and even gay bathhouses, and much more into this rich portrait of a music-based culture pulsing with creativity. A detailed discography, an amusing photo section of period disco performers and fashions, a useful song index, and a notes section round out this wonderful read.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The story of a music genre born from the social and economic turmoil of the 1970's, February 6, 2006

By	Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA) - See all my reviews

Turn The Beat Around: The Secret History Of Disco is the story of a music genre born from the social and economic turmoil of the 1970's. Blending elements of post-civil rights African-American culture, the newly out-and-proud gay movement, and the syncopation of the recently developed synthesizer, disco became a craze that flared brilliantly in its time, then fell by the wayside to fond memories and derisive scorn as its pop-culture peers of punk and hip-hop rose in its place. Chapters of Turn The Beat Around explores New York, where disco originated; disco's links to sexuality, its feverish era of popularity, its movement underground, and its legacy today. Turn The Beat Around is a thoroughly researched, plain-terms, no-holds barred scrutiny, recommended for ordinary disco fans and music students alike.