Dance to the Beat Boeing

The Brits like to call a record like this "boogie."  It reminds me a lot of the classic We got the Funk by Positive Force.  In any case it's made in Italy disco music before the whole italo thing had taken hold.  There are a few examples of this sound from 1982, 1983 and some are great.
BOEING
I sold my import Good Vibes record copy for a pretty penny back in the day.  There's a Full Time records Italy version that was released in 2018 with an edit by a D.J. from Perugia called Moplen who has a big presence on SoundCloud.  It's a limited edition pressing with three other great Italian classics on it.

Fun Fun Italo Disco Divas

In typical Italian disco style the faces of Fun Fun were not the voices.  They used two models.

Ironically one of the original vocalists Ivana Spagna became a huge star both on her own with hits like Easy Lady and Call Me and as a chanteuse with feats such as winning the San Remo festival

The debut single Happy Station was a solid dance hit throughout the world.  It went beyond the limits of the typical Italo Disco hit.  The follow-up Color my Love was even bigger and got a lot of play in clubs where Hi Nrg ruled like The Saint in New York and Badlands in D.C.

Give me Your Love (sounded like an Italian Bananarama) and Living in Japan were also successful.   Color in fact went all the way up to #9 on the U.S. Dance Charts.

Their second album wasn't quite as successful as their first and then they stopped recording under that name.  By then Ivana Spagna had had more success then Fun Fun ever did.

There's actually an earlier Ivana Spagna dance record from before Fun Fun that I'll add the post later. It's obscure but quite nice.  

BONUS SPAGNA

FUN

SUCH FUN

SO MUCH FUN

IVANA SPAGNA FACEBOOK

IVANA SPAGNA INSTAGRAM

How Classy was Scritti Politti? My 80's idol

  REFRESHEDGreg Wilson Edit LINKS FROM A 2010 BLOG, REFRESHED EVEN FURTHER JULY 2016

                                                                                                         photo credit Steve Elm






photo credit Furio Andreotti

CABARET TIME!
AN ABSOLUTE ZIP
BIG SCRITTI ZIP
I'll admit I've always had a weakness for a falsetto, from the soulful Stylistics to the disco pop of the Bee Gees. But there was one singer that took it to the max for me and became my idol in the process.

Wales born, Paul Julian Strohmeyer recorded under the alias Green Gartside as the lead vocalist for Scritti Politti. Scritti began recording in 1978 as a post punk band and reached their peak in 1984 as a synth heavy, sampling and midi-sequencing electronic dance pop act. They were active even as  recently as 2006 with the l.p. White Bread and Black Beer. Though only Green Gartside remained from the original incarnation.


Scritti Politti seemed to have their hands in many bags, influenced by many genres of music from soul and reggae to disco, funk and synth. Using super high quality experimental production techniques and getting a hand from the legendary Arif Mardin (Bee Gees and Chaka Khan to name a few) they were able to capitalize on the Synth Pop that was hot in the early 80's and still hold onto to enough of a disco sound to make music that was supremely danceable.

They also featured superb graphics and marketing. A new Scritti Politti 12" was bound to have a beautiful picture cover and many of their fans became collector's who wanted to have the latest pressing even if they already had the song in their collections. Not unlike the rabid Smiths fans of the time.

They broke in a big way with their double A side of Wood Beez (pray like Aretha Franklin) and Absolute. What does it mean that each night he goes to bed he prays like Aretha Franklin? Damned if I knew but it sounded great. The song also includes one of my favorite lines from a song:

"there's nothing I wouldn't do including doing nothing."

Green's voice was just perfect. It seemed to caress the music.  Falsetto but not fem. Lyrics full of irony and mock philosophy. Intelligent pop.

The music was synth but not techno. Danceable but not agressive. Kraftwerk meets Abba.

Fred Maher of the band Material joined Scritti Politti as a drummer and this is when they catapulted to fame.
Cupid and Psyche 85 sold as an l.p. in America because Perfect Way became a pop hit in 1985. It went all the way to #11 pop and for two seconds a few people knew who Scritti Politti were. The mix by the legendary Francois K. didn't hurt. Though this sort of disappointed me cause they felt so English import to me and furthermore Perfect Way was one of the worst songs on the l.p. But alas it coined them a one hit wonder destined for inclusion in one of those VH1 run-downs on whatever happened to thems.

They should have made it big with Hypnotize.  But at least it was their most attractive 12" cover.  The Word Girl is also genius, pure reggae in falsetto.

By this time I was growing out my hair to look more like my idol Green. At one point I succeded though I had more of a natural wave that made my locks fall into curls at the bottom. By the time I moved to New York City in 1988 and became a club monster I started incorporating extensions and what had been curly interspersed with straight hair became more like dread locks. Hey the look worked for a while there. Now it kind of looks silly in retrospect but doesn't everything twenty years later?

By the time Provision came out in 1988 I didn't care about Scritti Politti much anymore. But once in my heart always in my heart so here I post a more recent picture of Green Gartside and I can always wish for some major triumphant come-back that will make me worship at the temple of Green once again.

Stay with me Tonight

Wow this quarantine situation has definitely reflected a great increase in traffic to my blog.  Though i may be partly responsible since I've been posting so excessively these past few days.

Today's offering is a German record.  A blatant attempt by ZYX to cash in on the Italo Disco trend while certainly giving it a Euro Dance taste too.  Stay with me Tonight even starts out with an introduction in Italian and rap so we could say they were throwing in everything but the kitchen sink with this one.

What can I say about it other then it's pure cheese, and you know that just means I love it!
HER OFFICIAL WEBSITE
STAY WITH ME TONIGHT
Patty Ryan followed up Stay with me Tonight with the Europa dance single You're my Love, You're my Life both released 1986.   HER OTHER OFFICIAL WEBSITE

She has also occasionally collaborated with Modern Talking's Dieter Bohlen.  Some of her songs are actually based upon Modern Talking melodies.