An Ode To The ‘Queen Of Disco’

A Brief Comment by Doug Draper

I almost bought one of those “Disco Sucks” t-shirts back in the 1970s, But not quite.

Those shirts had become a cliché so quickly during the hyper buck-making market that consumed the counter culture” of the 1960s (if there ever was such a thing as a counter culture of the sixties) that it was looking like the ‘Disco Sucks’ crowd was just as interested in cashing in as the people who were making the Disco music they claimed to despise so much.

Not that I didn’t have problems with Disco. As a half-ass musician and as the brother of someone who really was a musician playing in clubs at the time, it was sad to see how many clubs and bars around the Niagara area at the time, and all over Canada and the U.S. for that matter,  stopped hiring real live bands to play live music. It was a trend that spelled the virtual end of an era that, for example, had someone called Brian Epstein go down to a sweaty club in Liverpool, England and discover a band called The Beatles.

Having said that, there is no doubt that one of the most soulful, engaging, charismatic – hurl out all the superlatives you want – singers of the 1970s, if nowhere else in time, was Donna Summer, who died way too young (at age 63 from cancer), as U.S. President Barack Obama mentioned in a statement.

God Bless her. Whether you liked Disco music or not she was, to cop a few titles from her songs, hot stuff on the radio. How sad that the last dance is over. If you wonder why the tribute, find an extended single version of “Last Dance” by Donna Summer and crank it up. There will be no doubt.

(Feel free to share your views below.)