There’s a piece in the current Vanity Fair that makes the early days of disco sound, well, awesome: This was the decade disco got cred. In the 90s, it was still just Travolta poses and fat-Elvis costumes and Polly-Esther’s. Then, with enough distance, we got disco savants, talking deep cuts and source materials and talking disgustedly about its commercialization. Also, it became acceptable to make dance music. All this is great, and no one can deny that nothing whips you out of a blue funk faster than Thelma Houston. But what’s so striking, reading the piece, is the extent to which, in the early, days, it really was countercultural: a soundtrack to a new era, and then, as popular music does, sliding new mores into mainstream society. Says Felipe Rose (the “Indian” from the Village People), “Being bi-racial …
