In 2013, why does 1970s disco sound better than 1970s punk? Why is it easier to love Abba than Slaughter and the Dogs or Donna summer than Alternative TV?
The answer lies in the timeless of processed beats. From Johnny Taylor to Chic, all these beats are used over and over again like DNA building blocks. When you hear “Love To Love You baby”, if you can get past the wall of synths and the humming metal sensuality, you left with a bass throb and a drum pattern and it is that which is lifted and reused. Many songwriters begin with the drums now and build upwards, and it is easier to renovate old beats than build your own. Plus, unless you have pretty amazing ears, who can tell? But if you rip off the Clash…
Well, aske One Direction how quick you get caught? Or Coldplay? Or the Verve? Melodies are memorable, but beats are so deep in the mix, how can you tell?
So in 2013 the beats that fueled Summer and the Bee Gees and Tranps and Tavares, all those bands, are still around and when you hear old disco today it doesn’t sound ancient because you are still hearing these beats all day longs.
But punk, I mean 8 Track 70s punk, is lost to us in a certain time period. The sound is raw but not the way punk is raw today, it is a spiral scratchy roughness we can’t seem to replicate and the best songs are so indelible they don’t lend themselves to revisionism. You can’t sing Sex Pistols or Clash songs without imitating Johnny Rotten and Joe Strummer, it ends up karaoke. This makes punk impossible to have a second life because you can’t copy them and you can’t sing them.
Meanwhile, by the very nature of its nondescript starlessness, disco can be endlessly covered and updated. I know she is dead, etc, but surely Donna Summer’s entire schtick was predicated on sexuality easy to project yourself upon. Try doing that with Richard Hell. The Village People were, by definition, archetypes, but punks, also by definition, were mold breaking individuals.
What made punk great made it lost to us, what punks hated about disco made it forever a youthful music. I listen to disco much more than I listen to punk if only because I listen to modern pop where disco thrives and punk died.