How Bryan Adams started his career by making... disco !
How Bryan Adams started his career by making... disco !
The Twelve Inch 112 : "Let Me Take You Dancing" (Bryan Adams)
Diving into Dance Music History: Bryan Adams' 'Let Me Take You Dancing' and the Disco Influence
Welcome back to my weekly exploration of dance music history, one Twelve Inch record at a time. Thrilled to have you join me! In last week's discussion on New Beat, I explored the technique of “pitch control”, used by Dj’s to seamlessly blend two records. However, remixers also commonly used techniques like “speeding up” or “slowing down” songs to craft the perfect beat. The twelve inch we’ll discuss this week is proof of that.
Now there’s a good chance that you will not be familiar with “Let Me Take You Dancing” and you are certainly not the only one. The reason is that Bryan Adams would prefer that this song be forgotten, much to his chagrin. Apparently he even engaged the help of a company actively looking for postings of the song on the different platforms in order to make those platform remove it immediately. By now you know that every episode of this newsletter is accompanied by a 1 hour beatmix that always starts with the song we discuss. So it could very well be that the mix of this week is removed faster than I can publish it. So I have devised a plan B (and even a plan C). I’ll explain all about it in the section “so what’s in this week’s mix” below.
But how did it get this far ?
The remix that went wrong
In early 1978, amid the vibrant Vancouver music scene, Bryan Adams met his future collaborator Jim Vallance, the co-writer of “Let Me Take You Dancing”. This meeting would be the start of a very fruitful cooperation that would last decades. Together they wrote a lot of the songs for Bryan Adams but also for numerous other artists like Tina Turner, Roger Daltrey, Rod Stewart, Bonnie Tyler, Bonnie Raitt, Kiss, Joe Cocker, Carly Simon, Neil Diamond…
“Let Me Take You Dancing” was composed and recorded in February ‘78 and was based on a ragtime piano riff that Vallance had written. In its original version it was a disco influenced pop song but the style of the song is not the only element that made it different from the Bryan Adams repertoire you might know. On his website Jim Vallance explains : In 1978 Bryan hadn't yet "found" his voice. He was still singing in a high, fragile vocal range, a hold-over from his time with "Sweeney Todd" (his former band) where he'd been expected to emulate former singer Nick Gilder.
In 1978 Bryan Adams signed to A&M records for 1 dollar (talking about an investment that paid of 😁). “Let Me Take You Dancing” was one of Adams’ first releases. Its success was crucial to secure further investment from the record label. Although the single enjoyed modest radio success in Canada, it needed a remix to break into the American market, where disco was dominating. They engaged John Luongo for the task.
In an interview on Disco-Disco.com, John explains what happened next : "I flew to Vancouver,BC to meet with both Bryan and his wonderful co-writer Jim Vallance. I took a taxi to Little Mountain Studio on a foggy evening and went in to hear the track and do the overdubs to be mixed. I clapped on the track along with Jim and Bryan. I added a sax solo from a local saxophonist and then had Jim play a part on the Vibes that I came up with. The overdubs went great and we had a ball. I took the tape back with me to NY to mix at Media Sound with my engineer, Michael Barbiero, upon listening down felt that the tempo had to be picked up to make the song the true hit it could be.”
He wanted to speed up the song to get it into the Hi-nrg range (130+ Beats Per Minute) The problem was that the original was quite a bit slower and they did not (yet) have the time-compression or pitch-compensation programs (let alone computers in the studio) to compensate the speeding up. He had to make a decision on the spot and choose to go ahead. The result was that the high vocal range got pitched even higher. If you don’t know it’s a Bryan Adams record, you will never guess it’s him. You rather think it is a female singer. To say Bryan Adams wasn’t pleased with the result is probably an understatement.
Exploring the Disco Influence in Rock
As the original version of “Let Me Take You Dancing” was already disco influenced and knowing that Bryan Adams was singing/making rock music before and after “Let Me Take You Dancing” raises a compelling question: Why did rock musicians like Adams dabble in disco?
The period from late 1977 through 1979, dominated by "Saturday Night Fever" and disco music, saw rapid growth in the disco industry, largely centered in major cities. Music professionals anticipated a breakthrough with mainstream (predominantly white) audiences across America. Disco’s upbeat, danceable rhythms offered an appealing contrast during a time of socio-economic challenges, providing much-needed escapism and suggesting a promising future for the music industry.
The Disco-Rock Crossover
So for most rock artists, the transition into disco was not merely a musical experiment; it was also a strategic move to stay relevant in an ever-evolving music industry. Disco dominated the charts. Almost every number one in the US charts in 1979 was a disco record. So it’s not difficult to see why so many rock musicians wanted an opportunity to tap into the widespread commercial appeal of disco music. This crossover was often met, though, with mixed reactions from fans and critics alike. The impression that everybody wanted & liked disco after Saturday Night Fever was far from the reality in suburban America. The young white Anglo American wasn’t a fan of disco at all. It was seen as fake & synthetic.
A notable example are The Beach Boys who released their disco reworking of an older song “Here Comes The Night” in 1979. It was to be the first single for CBS, their new record label who just payed 8 million USD to get The Beach Boys signed. The single wanted to re-invent The Beach Boys for a new era but it had an opposite effect. It did not even reach the Top 40 and the album was a flop. The then big boss of CBS, Walter Yetnikov was heard saying “I think I’ve been fucked”. The fans hated it so much that The Beach Boys felt obliged to excuse themselves at every concert and, finally, stopped playing the song all together
But also a risky gamble !
As I’ve mentioned before (and will go into in more details in one of the future episodes) disco was on its way out in 1979. Poor sales, the “disco sucks” backlash and the poor quality of a lot of discosongs, released that year, were among the reasons. The reaction was especially noticeable in the record industry. Most major record companies closed their disco department instantly and investment/distribution contracts with the small (disco) labels were not renewed, creating a cycle of busts. The believers of yesterday became opponents overnight.
Making records takes time. So, a number of rock artists only just released their “disco” contribution to find that the world, meanwhile, had changed dramatically. It is not surprising that the rock artists that took the gamble to experiment with a 4 on the floor beat, mostly ignored those releases afterwards. At best they were mocked because of it but some fans were angry and considered these releases as aberrations.
Furthermore, not all experiments“delivered” became big hits like “Miss You” (The Rolling Stones), “Do You Think I’m Sexy” (Rod Stewart) or “I Was Made For Loving You” (Kiss). Some artists, like Kiss’ Paul Stanley, claimed that writing a disco song was quite easy, but the results of some labour by rock artists, do tell another story.
Another problem was the fact that none of the influential clubs wouldn’t play this material so you, invariably, ended up, like one critic said : on the dance floor of the Rainbow Room of a Holiday Inn, inbetween six times YMCA and with dancing salesmen beside you.
Bryan Adams’ Disco Experiment !
“Let Me Take You Dancing” was released in 1979 in the US and, although it was a respectable hit on the dance floors (also in the influential clubs) it wasn’t the major hit that the record company (and remixer) expected. But Bryan Adams wasn’t dropped by A&M and would go on to become one the most successful artists in history with more than 100 million records sold worldwide.
When the discocraze faded at the end of 1979 and the illuminating dance floors disappeared, the nightlife of the urban centers of America flourished as never before. People kept on going out and dance music would re-invent itself with influences of (among others) Punk & New Wave. A whole new generation of rock artists would start using dance rhythms in their music. Only a few years later every rock artist would be releasing dance music again. No special dance songs this time, but remixes of their big hits. One of the exceptions was Bryan Adams. You will not find any of his songs receiving a remix treatment and he would never ever work with John Luongo again.
So You Wanna Hear More ?
I thought you would !
It’s fun to write about music but let’s be honest. Music is made to listen to.
So I prepared two options for you this week. There is the “minimalist” option. A small beat mixed taster of the twelve inch of the week and two other dance songs of the era. You’ll find it on my Soundcloud page.
The ideal soundtrack for…. Well whatever you like to do when you listen to dance music.
And then there is the “maximalist” option 🕺💃 : The full 1 hour of beatmixed dance music of the period, starting with the song we talked about in this weeks newsletter and followed by 10/15 songs of the era. That one you’ll find on Mixcloud. If you are up for a deep dive into the clublife of the period, then my mixcloud page is your n°1 go-to.
Go To The Mixcloud Mix Of The Week
Both options dissapear after a while. The Soundcloud mix because I have limited space to publish on Soundcloud and the Mixcloud mix will, eventually, turn into a Subscriber exclusive mix.
I’m currently working on the Youtube page. The aim is to have it up and running this week. Go and check it out !
So what’s in this week’s mix ?
Let Me Take You Dancing kicks off this week’s mix. At least, I hope it will :-) When researching this episode I did remark that on some platforms you could not find any postings with the Bryan Adams song in original or remixed form. So I guess the “Let Me Take You Dancing” police is still active. As my newsletter is only starting up and not (yet 😄) servicing half of the world population, I guess we will not, immediately, get noticed. But in case the mix has been taken down, there are two alternatives standing ready.
So it could be that you start with the instrumental version of “Let Me Take You Dancing” or, ultimately, with the second song of this week’s set : “Shame” by Evelyn “Champaign” King.
The rest of this week’s mix is a deep dive in the Hi-nrg clubtracks you could hear in 1979/1980. A mix between US & Eurodisco. And I’ve included two Belgian productions this week : “Born To Be Alive” by Patrick Hernandez enjoyed a run of three weeks on the US club chart and Two Man Sound’s fantastic “Capital Tropical” was also a considerable clubhit in the US.
Enjoy !
What I listened to this week :
I’m in the middle of reading the wonderful second Tim Lawrence book on New York’s nightlife at the start of the eighties “Life And Death On The New York Dance Floor” Tim tells the story of the incredible melting pot the dance music became at the end of the seventies. Clubs like the Mudd club or CBGB’s programmed a lot of English acts. One of those artists was Lene Lovich which made listening to this box again.
Toy Box is a retrospective of the work she released on Stiff records and contains much of her best work. We all remember “Lucky Number” and “New Toy” and the marketing story of a new artist of the “eastern block” that made it to the west. The fact that she looked somewhat eccentric helped to make the story believable. But in fact Lene Lovich (née Lili-Marlene Premilovich) was born & raised in Detroit. Her father was of Serbian descent so not everything of the marketing story was “thin air”. She moved to the UK when she was 13 and would be starting up her career in the nascent New-Wave scene of the late seventies.
The box contains the 3 albums she made for Stiff records. The first one was released in two different versions, one especially for the US market. Both versions are included. It’s a Wonderfull deep-dive in the early eighties UK new-wave with a range of influences and some weird stuff.
Next week, I’ll tell the story of one of the important artists and songwriters of the early eighties US dance music that started his career with one of the best known disco songs of all time.