By Todd Lavoie
Disco is back! Quite the polarizing announcement, I know, so perhaps I should qualify: this isn’t some Yvonne Elliman/Studio 54 revival here. Sorry, but no “If I Can’t Have You”, no anatomy-defying Brothers Gibb falsettos, and definitely no dancefloor-anemia takes on Beethoven’s Fifth, mercifully enough. Rather, the ’70s flavors I’ve been picking up on as of late seem to skip right past club night in favor of the long, brisk walk home after closing time.
This new crop of disco-enthusiasts paints relatively few scenes of dancefloor hedonism and sweat-soaked glamorama, instead focusing on what happens when the hip young things are flat out of cab fare and decide to hoof it back home, trying their best to ignore the vague shuffling shadows in the dark and to avert the eyes of passing strangers. Their clothes are a sad shambles of how they looked only hours before, their makeup streaked and smudged. Danger lurks around every corner, and it’s palpable in every rudimentary rhythm, every Giorgio Moroder-/John Carpenter-informed minimalist synth ripple.
A spooky, lights-down-low vision of neo-disco burrowed its way under the skin of many when the fittingly titled After Dark compilation (Italians Do It Better) was released earlier this year. Artists such as Mirage, Farah, Glass Candy, and Chromatics unleashed throbbing, haunting, feathered-haired odes that seem to have more in common with Halloween than Thank God It’s Friday – sure, you can dance to ’em, but while you’re grooving be sure to keep looking over your shoulder.