E356 - Go Public - Top 5 Mutant Disco Songs

From Only Three Lads - Classic Alternative Music Podcast · 2:10:47

Show by O3L Media

Mutant disco…huh? It's also been called avant funk, disco-not-disco or leftfield disco among them. In a recent episode, we talked a bit about how disco and punk were originally perceived as warring musical factions, painted in such a way that you had to pick a tribe. Especially in a large metropolitan area like New York that was a hotbed for both, those walls broke down relatively quickly in the late ‘70s and early ‘80s, and artists began fearlessly experimenting with blending the sounds of the discos with punk, new wave (and its avant-garde distant cousin no wave), electronic, funk, dub, hip-hop, jazz, and other styles. The syncopated beats and funky basslines that you’d hear booming out of Studio 54 were suddenly laced with abrasive guitars, the occasional skronking sax, electronic noise, and left of center vocals. There was no genre purity. A new crop of record labels began celebrating these barrier-busting new sounds, none more notable than ZE Records, who coined the term "Mutant Disco" for a 1981 six-track compilation including seminal artists like Kid Creole & The Coconuts, Was (Not Was), and Material. Perhaps that compilation’s tagline describes mutant disco best of all - “a subtle dislocation from the norm.” Disco wasn’t dead in the early ‘80s…it just mutated into something weirder and more dissonant, and its influence has carried over to a lot of the post-punk, dance-punk, and indie rock that we still hear today. Case in point is Atlanta band Go Public, whose brilliant, brittle but funky debut album You Are Traffic has just dropped from our friends at HHBTM Records. The attributes of mutant disco that we mentioned apply to this album, but is injected with a distinctly modern sense of anxiety. It’s a record that will keep you dancing while the rest of the world burns around you. Although You Are Traffic is Go Public’s debut, the band has its roots going back decades with indie institutions like Masters of the Hemisphere, Still Flyin’, and Elf Power. Huge thanks to Mike Turner from HHBTM for the introduction and coordination! Proudly part of Pantheon Podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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