on the hunt for rare early disco tracks
I'm currently reading Turn the Beat Around: The Secret History of Disco by Peter Shapiro... I don't remember how I heard about this book, but I looked to see if the library had it, and checked it out, and now I'm hip deep in delicious, delicious 70s music and NYC nightclub history. It is excellent (And I trust I'm not horrifying anybody with my love of disco music; I don't know anybody else who's into it, and certainly not as seriously and academically as I am. It's just another music nerd interest of mine, like freakbeat, Krautrock, baroque, Wendy Carlos and her switched-on classical, or 20th century modern music like Philip Glass and Terry Riley.)
The problem is, I want to hear all the early tracks that Shapiro is talking about, and I have not only never heard of any of the songs or artists, but I barely even know where to start looking. I'm sure there've been compilations released of a lot of these things, but I wouldn't know them. Any tips on tracking down this rare, fascinating-sounding stuff?
On my list so far (and I'm only about 50 pages into the book):
The Marketts, "Out of Limits"
Timebox, "Beggin'"
Elephant's Memory, "Mongoose"
Little Sister, "You're the One"
Olantunji, "Jin-Go-Lo-Ba (Drums of Passion)" (I'm pretty sure I do actually know this track)
Mandre, "Solar Flight"
Fela Kuti, "Expensive Shit" (I do know Fela Kuti, but I've never heard of this song)
any version of "Soul Makossa", original by Manu Dibango
Barabas, "Wild Safari"
Gloria Spencer, "I Got It"
Also, iTunes Store sucks for so many things. They have TWO Naked Eyes tracks - total - and only TWO greatest-hits collections of the Jam, which barely does me any good at all. I've been jonesing for the Jam recently, probably based on the fact that I'm going through a Graham Coxon-listening craze, and all I have is Sound Affects on cassette, but dammit, I love those album tracks and I want to hear it again. The iTunes Music Store is no help whatsoever. Fuckwits and their clumsy crippleware...
The problem is, I want to hear all the early tracks that Shapiro is talking about, and I have not only never heard of any of the songs or artists, but I barely even know where to start looking. I'm sure there've been compilations released of a lot of these things, but I wouldn't know them. Any tips on tracking down this rare, fascinating-sounding stuff?
On my list so far (and I'm only about 50 pages into the book):
The Marketts, "Out of Limits"
Timebox, "Beggin'"
Elephant's Memory, "Mongoose"
Little Sister, "You're the One"
Olantunji, "Jin-Go-Lo-Ba (Drums of Passion)" (I'm pretty sure I do actually know this track)
Mandre, "Solar Flight"
Fela Kuti, "Expensive Shit" (I do know Fela Kuti, but I've never heard of this song)
any version of "Soul Makossa", original by Manu Dibango
Barabas, "Wild Safari"
Gloria Spencer, "I Got It"
Also, iTunes Store sucks for so many things. They have TWO Naked Eyes tracks - total - and only TWO greatest-hits collections of the Jam, which barely does me any good at all. I've been jonesing for the Jam recently, probably based on the fact that I'm going through a Graham Coxon-listening craze, and all I have is Sound Affects on cassette, but dammit, I love those album tracks and I want to hear it again. The iTunes Music Store is no help whatsoever. Fuckwits and their clumsy crippleware...