Friday, February 10, 2012

Cheesy Disco!

Well, not every EasyTV show has to be tasteful or culturally interesting, does it? Take it as your opportunity to vote "Kitsch" or "Lame" on this post without feeling guilty. Today I reminisce about disco songs that I used to hear when I was a kid in the late 70s and that are mostly forgotten by now, usually for a good reason.

It all started when I heard Tina Turner's version of "I Can't Stand the Rain" on my 80's specialty channel, which prompted me to find out who it was who sang a disco version a few earlier (the original is a beautiful song by Ann Peebles). So it turns out it's a band called Eruption. Eruption was produced by Frank Farian, the same German guy who also produced Boney M, as well as, as EasyTV viewer Shasha points out, the infamous duo Milli Vanilli. The video is worth watching if only because the singer, Precious Wilson, has an amazing voice, and the outfits are... erm... unbelievable:



(there was a video where the synth player has an outfit with 6 arms, but just couldn't find it again. A challenge for EasyTV viewers!)

Initially I thought maybe that song was by Amii Stewart, who had a big hit at the time with Knock on Wood. You'll see why I wasn't entirely off-base with my guess. Watch the video just to be amazed at Amy's stage presence (and let's face it, she's pretty hot) :



Then of course I got sucked into YouTube surfing, looking for similar songs of that era. There was that one song I once saw, around 1980, with a woman singing and dancing surrounded by a circle of fans, in high heels and looking incredibly tall. The song went "S.O.S. to the rescue". MmeEasy didn't know the song, but the fine researcher that she is, she managed to find it for me. !!!UPDATE!!! I even found the video I saw at the time!



But then out of curiosity I looked at what other hits Dee D. Jackson had at the time, and I stumbled upon a song that I used to love as a 8-10 year old kid. I must admit that even now I don't find it all that bad. Judge for yourself:



You basically can't go wrong with a big fake robot on stage, can you?