Four Seasons Of Love

Winter Melody, Spring Affair, Summer Fever, Autumn Changes…the four seasons of love.
One of our all time favorite Donna Summer Concept albums, it’s disco perfection.

Le Freak C’est Chic

Our Open House Radio Disco Spotlight for the next few remaining days will shine upon Nile Rodgers, super producer and musician who has produced and been a hit maker for numerous artists such as Madonna, David Bowie, Diana Ross and Duran Duran, just to name a few. His group Chic was a Disco era Dynamo producing several top ten hits. Since then he’s barely slowed down. Still producing relevant music for contemporary artists such as Adam Lambert and Daft Punk.
I read his autobiography, “Le Freak: An Upside Down Story of Family, Disco, and Destiny” and was truly inspired by this amazing man.
Since we only have a few days of broadcasting left I will focus on the album “C’est Chic” from 1978 as it features many of the disco songs we know and love.

She’s Every Woman

It’s been long over due, but here we are with only a few days left of broadcasting and I wanted to feature one of my favorite DIVAS, Chaka Khan.
Chaka Khan (born Yvette Marie Stevens on March 23, 1953) is an American singer-songwriter whose career has spanned four decades, beginning in the 1970s as the frontwoman and focal point of the funk band Rufus. Often cited as the Queen of Funk, Khan has won ten Grammys and has sold an estimated 200 million records worldwide (Wikipedia)
She is without a doubt one of my favorite female vocalists (I seem to have so many!)
Tune in over the next few days as I will put her in regular rotation.

So long, farewell, auf Wiedersehen, goodbye

Yes it’s true, just after our 4th year of broadcasting we will be saying goodbye.  Our last day of broadcasting http://www.lovedisco.fm will be this Friday, February 28th, 2014.

It comes down to time and money.  It is very time consuming and costly to operate an internet radio station and update the blog, especially for a “one-man” operation.  Even though the basic cost of operating the station now is about $60 per month that cost can go up drastically with greater numbers of listeners. 

I’m thankful for the time and effort I’ve put into the station, it’s been fun and challenging and brought me so much joy, especially when I see the flags of various countries from around the world tuning in.  Besides the Antarctic and Greenland, I think every other continent has tuned in at some point or another!

Thank-you to the regular listeners who have tuned in faithfully and appreciated the programming. 

au revoir

P.S. – I may keep this blog going and updated, and who knows the station may return in the future.

 

We got to make …

We got to make this land a better land
Than the world in which we live
And we got to help each man be a better man
With the kindness that we give
– lyrics by Allen Toussaint (Pointer Sisters “Yes We Can Can”)

Cut Loose

This week’s featured album is the 1979 LP from Hamilton Bohannon, “Cut Loose“

Stick It To The Man

We are pleased to feature the Curtis Mayfield soundtrack to the movie “Super Fly” as our movie soundtrack of the week. It is one of our all-time favorites. Considered an important album of the 70’s it was a critical and commercial success.

“Super Fly is the third studio album by American soul and funk musician Curtis Mayfield, released in July 1972 on Curtom Records. It was released as the soundtrack for the Blaxploitation film of the same name. Widely considered a classic of 1970s soul and funk music, Super Fly was a nearly immediate hit. Its sales were bolstered by two million-selling singles, “Freddie’s Dead” (#2 R&B, #4 Pop) and the title track (#5 R&B, #8 Pop). Super Fly is one of the few soundtracks to out-gross the film it accompanied.
Super Fly, along with Marvin Gaye’s What’s Going On, was one of the pioneering soul concept albums, with its then-unique socially aware lyrics about poverty and drug abuse making the album stand out.  The film and the soundtrack may be perceived as dissonant, since the Super Fly film holds rather ambiguous views on drug dealers, whereas Curtis Mayfield’s position is far more critical. Like What’s Going On, the album was a surprise hit that record executives felt had little chance at significant sales. Due to its success, Mayfield was tapped for several film soundtracks over the course of the decade.” (Wikipedia)

Superfly ignited an entire genre of music, the blaxploitation soundtrack, and influenced everyone from soul singers to television-music composers for decades to come. It stands alongside Saturday Night Fever and Never Mind the Bollocks Here’s the Sex Pistols as one of the most vivid touchstones of ’70s pop music.

—John Bush

Yes We Can Can

As I became more musically aware as a teenager in the 80’s, The Pointer Sisters, became one of my favorite girl groups with their hits such as Automatic, Dare Me, Jump (For My Love) and Neutron Dance.
One of my earliest memories of one of their songs came from 1980, I think I was in grade 6 and our class went on a school trip to the city (I was living in Saskatchewan at the time and the field trip was to the city of Prince Albert) among the activities of the day was a visit to a Roller Disco! I was so excited, I had my permed hair, velour striped pull over and a black satin jacket!
Along with hearing the popular disco tracks of the time, I remember hearing “He’s So Shy” for the first time and loved it so much, it had the perfect roller skating tempo in my opinion and that was the first time the Pointer Sisters entered my consciousness.
Fast forward to now and I look back and appreciate the music from these sisters now more than ever, especially some of their 70’s music including one of my all time favorites “Yes We Can Can” from their 1973 self titled album.

I’ve Got So Much To Give

Following Valentine’s Day week, I wanted to keep the romance going. When I think of romantic, soulful music one name instantly comes to mind, and that is Barry White. From his lush, slow-building orchestral arrangements, romantic delivery and sexy backing vocals of Love Unlimited it’s a combination that can’t be beat. With the help of my friends at Open House Radio, DJ Alex Guttierez and DJ Lewis Martinee, who put together a “Disco Spotlight” introduction to Barry White we will be featuring Barry’s Greatest Hits as well as his 1973 album “I’ve Got So Much To Give”

She Works Hard For The Money

I had to follow the “B” side “I Do Believe (I Fell In Love) with the other side, which is “She Works Hard For The Money” from the album with the same name from 1983 which became her biggest hit since 1979 and put Donna Summer back in the spotlight as a Dance/Pop Diva.