The Rise of Disco in the 1970s: From the Loft to Studio 54
From David Mancuso’s Loft in 1970 to Disco Demolition Night in 1979: the clubs, records and studio tricks that made disco, and how house music grew out of it.
- Disco grew out of underground clubs in New York, Philadelphia and other US cities in the late 1960s and early 1970s.
- DJs and remixers such as Tom Moulton turned club records into longer, louder 12-inch mixes.
- Saturday Night Fever (1977) took it mainstream; Disco Demolition Night (July 1979) marked the backlash.
The rise of disco in the 1970s started in rooms most people never saw: private lofts and gay bars in New York where DJs played records all night for dancers. By 1979 there were 15,000 to 20,000 disco clubs in the United States, and a disco soundtrack had topped the US album chart for 24 weeks. Then came a violent backlash. What disco left behind — the club DJ, the remix, the 12-inch single — became the toolkit of house music.
Underground beginnings in New York
On 14 February 1970, David Mancuso threw his first “Love Saves the Day” party at his home on Broadway in Manhattan. About 100 people came. The Loft ran on invitation only, sold no alcohol and put sound first: Mancuso was early to use tweeter arrays and bass reinforcement. One account, from Alex Rosner, put the crowd at “probably about sixty percent black and seventy percent gay”. Gay men harassed in public bars could dance together there.
Other rooms followed. Francis Grasso was the resident DJ at the Sanctuary, described as the first fully uninhibited gay discotheque in America. Early Loft regulars included Larry Levan and Frankie Knuckles, who would later shape club culture in New York and Chicago. The press caught up in 1973: Vince Aletti’s Rolling Stone feature of 13 September that year was one of the first to describe disco as a sound of its own.
The records that made the sound
Disco’s early hits came from the clubs, not the radio. Manu Dibango’s “Soul Makossa”, first released in France in 1972, was picked up by New York DJs and reached No. 35 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1973. In Philadelphia, Gamble and Huff’s productions brought lush strings, thumping basslines and sliding hi-hats. MFSB’s “TSOP (The Sound of Philadelphia)”, the theme of Soul Train, went to No. 1 in 1974.
The same year, the Hues Corporation’s “Rock the Boat” topped the US chart and George McCrae’s “Rock Your Baby” became the UK’s first disco No. 1. Barry White conducted the Love Unlimited Orchestra on “Love’s Theme”, and in 1975 Van McCoy’s “The Hustle” named a dance craze.
Then came the Munich sound. Giorgio Moroder and Pete Bellotte produced Donna Summer’s “Love to Love You Baby”, a No. 2 US hit in 1976 whose 17-minute 12-inch version became a club standard. Their “I Feel Love” (1977), driven by a Moog synthesizer, pointed straight at electronic dance music and spawned Hi-NRG.
DJs, remixers and the 12-inch single
Disco changed how records were made for clubs. Tom Moulton, who had started with a tape of overlapping songs for a Fire Island bar, began stretching tracks out for dancers. In 1974 he needed a test pressing of his mix of Al Downing’s “I’ll Be Holding On”. Engineer José Rodríguez could find no 7-inch blank and cut it on a 10-inch disc instead. With the grooves spread wider, the record could be cut louder, with a fuller sound. Moulton also made the first continuous-mix album side, on Gloria Gaynor’s Never Can Say Goodbye.
The format reached the shops in mid-May 1976, when Salsoul Records released Double Exposure’s “Ten Percent” as a 12-inch, with a 9:43 remix by Walter Gibbons. Salsoul, run by Ken, Stanley and Joseph Cayre, became one of the defining disco labels.
Saturday Night Fever, Studio 54 and the backlash
Studio 54 opened at 254 West 54th Street on 26 April 1977 and soon became the best-known nightclub in the world. That November, RSO released the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack. Led by the Bee Gees, it spent 24 straight weeks at No. 1 in the US in 1978, sold more than 40 million copies and remains the only disco album to win the Grammy for Album of the Year. Chic’s “Le Freak” followed in 1978.
The boom did not last. On 12 July 1979, Chicago radio DJ Steve Dahl blew up a crate of disco records between the games of a White Sox doubleheader at Comiskey Park. Thousands of fans stormed the field, 39 people were arrested and the second game was forfeited. Disco Demolition Night came just before disco’s fall from the US charts and may have sped it up; scholars have since debated whether it expressed racism and homophobia. Studio 54 closed in 1980 after its owners were convicted of tax evasion.
From disco to house
Disco left the pop charts, not the clubs. It stayed popular in Italy and other parts of Europe through the 1980s. In New York, Larry Levan’s sets at the Paradise Garage — “Saturday Mass” to its regulars — mixed disco with dub. In Chicago, Frankie Knuckles of the Warehouse helped develop house music in the 1980s. Disco’s synthesizers, drum machines and extended remixes laid the groundwork for house and techno.
Hear the line for yourself with “Tears” by Frankie Knuckles, Black Box’s “Ride on Time”, built on Loleatta Holloway’s 1980 disco hit “Love Sensation”, and “Move Your Body” by Marshall Jefferson.
FAQ
Where did disco start?
In US urban nightlife in the late 1960s and early 1970s, with New York, Philadelphia and Baltimore as early centres. Private parties such as David Mancuso’s Loft, which opened in Manhattan in 1970, were key venues.
What was the first 12-inch single sold to the public?
Double Exposure’s “Ten Percent”, released by Salsoul Records in mid-May 1976, with a 9:43 remix by Walter Gibbons on the A-side.
What was Disco Demolition Night?
An anti-disco promotion at Comiskey Park, Chicago, on 12 July 1979, led by radio DJ Steve Dahl. A crate of records was blown up, fans stormed the field and the second game of the doubleheader was forfeited.
How did disco lead to house music?
Disco’s DJ culture carried on in clubs such as the Paradise Garage in New York and the Warehouse in Chicago, where Frankie Knuckles played. House music grew out of that scene in Chicago in the early 1980s.
