The Bizarro Universe of Italo Disco

March 5, 2015 5:01 AM

Slotted somewhere amid such hits one night was a song featuring the chintziest of keyboards, the most tuna-can-like drum machines, and a chorus so idiotic that it made my prepubescent mind think: “If this is about sex, sex sounds stupid.” This song was so not cool. In the deepest, most dramatic register imaginable, singer Paul Lekakis intoned: “Boom boom boom/ Let’s go back to my room/ So we can do it all night/ And you can make me feel right.” It was as dumb as chewing gum and it stuck to my mind every time I came in contact with it on the radio, its tackiness inescapable.
posted by josher71 (34 comments total)

Italo disco is the music of my eighties childhood, summer hits by one hit wonders you'd hear incessentally for a couple of weeks, then disappear, often memorable for non-musical reasons, though some hits could also tackle something as heavy as nuclear war.
posted by MartinWisse at 5:14 AM on March 5, 2015 [3 favorites]

Synthetix.FM: 2014 - The Year Italo Came Back

my favorite italio disco band is sally shapiro
posted by rebent at 5:19 AM on March 5, 2015

Martin Wisse: Ugh, first link blocked in the USA.
posted by josher71 at 5:19 AM on March 5, 2015

In the deepest, most dramatic register imaginable…

Somebody play this guy some Barry White, STAT.
posted by flapjax at midnite at 5:20 AM on March 5, 2015 [1 favorite]

Does this one work?
posted by MartinWisse at 5:21 AM on March 5, 2015

This one, just music, and this one, live, do.
posted by josher71 at 5:23 AM on March 5, 2015

my favorite italio disco band is sally shapiro'

What's the "hit"?
posted by josher71 at 5:25 AM on March 5, 2015

Who knew Italians were keen on rap from the start

What, are you kidding? An Italian invented rap. What, you don't believe me?
posted by flapjax at midnite at 5:28 AM on March 5, 2015 [1 favorite]

Paul Lekakis intoned: “Boom boom boom/

... boom I want you in my room
posted by Going To Maine at 5:34 AM on March 5, 2015 [3 favorites]

Fascinating stuff; I now understand why SCTV's Poochare is a highly regarded parody. Flapjax, thanks for that; not only did that Italian invent rap, Shaggy is involved as well.
posted by Schadenfreude at 5:47 AM on March 5, 2015 [3 favorites]

That Boom Boom Boom song is also featured in one of the best tracks of the second wave of Europop, FreezePop's Seven Boom Medley.
posted by Potomac Avenue at 6:48 AM on March 5, 2015 [1 favorite]

I first encountered Italo Disco as one of about two genres that Ishkur seemed to approve of.

It's definitely making a comeback recently.

Albert One's For Your Love is, for me, the pinnacle of the genre.
posted by ropeladder at 6:49 AM on March 5, 2015 [1 favorite]

italo disco might be the only genre that actually sounds better on pirated VHS uploaded to Youtube.
posted by Potomac Avenue at 6:56 AM on March 5, 2015 [4 favorites]

Oh Italodisco. Or as I like to call it, "protoeurobeat".

I'm not sure how you can have a thread about it without any references to the Italodisco godfather, Ken Laszlo. Most people know him for Hey Hey Guy or Tonight. But my favorite will always be his duet with Jenny, For a Day.
posted by Talez at 7:12 AM on March 5, 2015 [1 favorite]

If you keep listing good tracks I'll make the Mefi Italo playlist on Spotify.
posted by josher71 at 7:15 AM on March 5, 2015 [3 favorites]

YESSS ITALO. If you like this stuff and are not following Beat Electric, you should immediately rectify this.
posted by capricorn at 7:16 AM on March 5, 2015 [1 favorite]

Way ahead of you sucka. (Just copied the Pitchfork one but added a bunch of these too)
posted by Potomac Avenue at 7:16 AM on March 5, 2015 [2 favorites]

Way ahead of you sucka.

Hell yes
posted by josher71 at 7:18 AM on March 5, 2015

Also I now feel the need to clarify that I am not the creator of Todd Terje's favorite Italo Disco song (per the Medley Mega-Mix at the footer of the article) but damn do I wish I was!
posted by capricorn at 7:20 AM on March 5, 2015

Also to act like this music just came back is very ridiculous. Early Gaga was super super Italo influenced, and she was just copying gay hipster clubs from throughout the mid-late 00s who had been spinning both remixes, originals, and new groups that borrow ID sounds like Black Strobe and Glass Candy.
posted by Potomac Avenue at 7:32 AM on March 5, 2015

i made an essentials list for a friend a month back - it's just my personal favorites but it's a pretty good set of songs

Radiorama - Yeti
Albert One - For Your Love
Baltimora - Tarzan Boy
Denise and Baby's Gang - Disco Maniac
Laura Branigan - Self Control (I like this better than the RAF version)
Matia Bazar - Ti Sento (I can't tell if this is strictly italodisco, but it has a lot of the indicators of the genre)
posted by LSK at 9:21 AM on March 5, 2015 [3 favorites]

Includes Raf's original version of "Self Control" and Kano's "Another Life" (see the video) ---- I approve.
posted by wittgenstein at 9:33 AM on March 5, 2015

What surprises me most about Italo Disco in retrospect is that the genre produced essentially zero acts that have had their popularity endure to the present day. For all the hits, all the catchy songs, none of the artists who worked in the genre seem to have kept at it. I'm honestly baffled.
posted by LSK at 9:39 AM on March 5, 2015 [1 favorite]

Spacer Woman by Charlie has been stuck in my head for at least 10 years.
posted by functionequalsform at 11:29 AM on March 5, 2015

Italo disco is fine and good (...and Potomac, the article does address that this phenomenon really cracked in the year 2000), but if you go just a few years earlier, you'll find the trump card that beats them all. (More)
posted by mykescipark at 11:49 AM on March 5, 2015 [1 favorite]

LSK: "What surprises me most about Italo Disco in retrospect is that the genre produced essentially zero acts that have had their popularity endure to the present day. For all the hits, all the catchy songs, none of the artists who worked in the genre seem to have kept at it. I'm honestly baffled."

Giorgio Moroder, maybe, but he was never limited to just Italo Disco.
posted by Joakim Ziegler at 12:02 PM on March 5, 2015 [1 favorite]

I am not ashamed to say how much I love "Boom Boom."
posted by SisterHavana at 12:16 PM on March 5, 2015 [1 favorite]

I was about to say that, AFAICT, as defined here "Italo Disco" seems to be just about any Italian dance music producer/writer/artist who isn't Giorgio Moroder, who has three Oscars (Midnight Cowboy, Flashdance, Top Gun) and is tied for 80s soundtrack king with Kenny Loggins.
posted by Halloween Jack at 12:23 PM on March 5, 2015

I-f often plays the entire first side of Automat, which is just an incredible suite.
posted by rhizome at 3:54 PM on March 5, 2015

any Italian dance music producer/writer/artist who isn't Giorgio Moroder

Isn't he too German to count as strictly Italian?
posted by acb at 4:13 PM on March 5, 2015

Also, there is overlap with other things happening in continental Europe during the 1980s; Alexander Robotnick appears on one of the Disco Not Disco compilations (alongside Ian Dury's Compass Point smooth-groove classic Spasticus Autisticus and Laid Back's proto-R&B White Horse), and I suspect that the link between Italo-disco and the coldwave/electro-industrial/EBM/vaguely post-Kraftwerkian sounds a bit further north would not be too distant.
posted by acb at 4:21 PM on March 5, 2015

I seem to remember something like 2002 or '03 or maybe even '04 being the "year of italo disco" on the East Coast. I think it gets revived every so often as most dance styles do. I don't know about singles, but the genre certainly did produce some memorable movie scores, even beyond Moroder.
posted by feloniousmonk at 6:21 PM on March 5, 2015

Here are two of my favorites that I think fall under the Italo Disco umbrella. If they don't, then please tell me what umbrella they are under because wow!

Casco - Cybernetic Love
Roland Bocquet - Epsilove
posted by One Second Before Awakening at 9:05 AM on March 6, 2015

I was trying to get people into italodisco about a half decade ago. Unforturnatley, there were only Gumptions, Kuro Di skates, and Spamlods. They called me a hipster and I was trying to impress my GFs friends. What can you do?
posted by coolxcool=rad at 12:12 AM on March 7, 2015