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Alex Gutierrez Blog

Top 40 Disco Tracks

Top 40 Lists of Disco music are so very different in every city where they are compiled. Miami is unique because we embraced alot of the more energetic tracks like my #1 Romeo and Juliette which to my surprise doesn’t even scratch the Top 10 of other lists I’ve seen. I have seen some lists with Cheryl Lynn’s ” Got to be Real” as their #1 , great song but really wasn’t a nightclub favorite down here ( assuming you are located above me ) Miami was a city whose Disco music was not defined by radio hits . We created our own hits. Each club had that particular track that could not be heard in any other nightclub. The DJ prided himself in being unique. 9 times out of 10 when the song hit the radio the track would immediately be removed from the club playlist. The ” cool” factor was gone. The song would belong to the fickle masses who would consume it, burn it out and move on the next song FM radio would feed them. Djs protected their music. Cultivated an artist. Grace Jones was an excellent example of an artist that DJ’s slowly eased into the dancefloor. Her music was appreciated by the jocks, but the crowds had to be trained to accept her arrangements and unique abrasive vocal style. Djs would champion artists and groups and slowly train their audiences into accepting new sounds. Today’s DJs follow radio’s cookie cutter patterns and it is not unusual to hear the same artist or song for that matter 2 and 3 times per night .Blasphemy in the 70s and early 80s. It is difficult to compile such a list,without discussion. I have spoken to a variety of local jocks of the era asked them to give me their opinion based on audience reaction and not so much personal tastes. We would have had alot of obscure tracks in the list .In many cases my number 10 was their number 12 and so on but overall the unanimous #1 was in fact Alec R. Costandino’s ” Romeo and Juliette” considered by all of us a ” Disco Masterpiece” Comment below with your thoughts.
TOP 40 Miami Nightclub Disco Tracks
Compiled by DJ Alex Gutierrez
Based on Club Play from a select sampling of South Florida’s Nightclub DJs 1975- 1981 members of The South Florida DJ Association
1. Romeo And Juliet (Acts 1 &2) – Alec R. Costandinos
2. Heaven must be Missing an Angel -Tavares
3. I’ve Found Love (Now That I’ve Found You) – Love And Kisses (Alec R Costandinos)
4. Come to Me – France Joli
4. Souvenirs – Voyage
5. If There’s Love – Amant
6. Babe we’re Gonna Love Tonight- Lime
7. Gonna Get along without You – Viola Wills
8. Supernature – Cerrone
9. Zodiacs – Roberta Kelly
10. McArthur Park – Donna Summer
11. Mandolay – La Flavour
12. Give Me Love – Cerrone
13. Love Disco Style – Erotic Drum Band
14. Jungle DJ – Kikrokos
15. Honeymoon in Puerto Rico – Paul Jabarra
16. You’ll never Find- Lou Rawls
17. Woman – Barrabas
18. You Make me Feel ( Mighty Real) – Sylvester
19. Forbidden Love – Madleen Kane
20. Everybody Get Dancin- The Bombers
21. Never Gonna Say Goodbye- Poussez
22. Mongouse Ye – Black Brother
23. Devil’s Gun – C J & Co
24. From Here To Eternity- Giorgio Moroder
25. Feels like I’m in Love – Kelly Marie
26. Ten Percent- Double Exposure\
27. That’s Where The Happy People Go- Trammps
28. No Romance Just Wanna Dance – Theo Vaness
29. Best Part Of Breaking Up – Roni Griffith
30. In New York- Passion
31. I’m Ready- Kano
32. Love in C Minor – Cerrone
33. Instant Replay – Dan Hartman
34. Can’t Get Enough of Your Love Babe – Barry White
35. La La Peace Song – OC Smith
36. Swear To God – Frankie Valli
37. Disco Nights – GQ
38. Love Insurance – Front Page
39. Move on up – Destination
40. The Break – Kat Mandu
Look for The Fever, Disco reunion Club on Facebook

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Alex Gutierrez Blog

Put a Little Disco in your Holidays

It’s the holidays, everyone’s over the house when suddenly somebody yells ” Put on some Christmas music !!” Instead of the usual Elvis ” Blue Christmas ” or the Bing Crosby standards we usually hear around this time why don’t you take them back ,way back to the 70s ,when even Christmas wasn’t immune to the Disco fever !! ( after all you are wearing a polyester sweater) So here are some of your choices when you want to put a little Disco in your Holidays !!salsoul-orchestra-the-LP51bcMrAyF9L._SY355_
Probably THE most popular choice to ” Discofy” any party is ” Salsoul’s Christmas Jollies” released in 1976 Produced by Vince Montana Jr and even includes vocals by Denise Montana who sang ” You’re My Number 1 DJ” on Goody Goody’s LP. If you are lucky to find the vinyl version snatch it up as the CD Re-Issue appears to be Edited and even includes “remixes” of certain tracks. “Some of the arrangements on the tracks were also changed, and not for the better. In fact, some of them sound pretty bad. The new Silent Night is just one example–with that awful acoustic piano drowning out everything else. That piano piece is an overdub. It was not in the original recording. Overall, the timbral quality of the sound on this CD is ‘tinny’, as though they had held up a transistor radio to a tape recorder to re-record the music. Somebody attempted to re-engineer the original and messed up the sound quality pretty badly. This CD lacks the heavy, throbbing rhythm and bass that the vinyl LP had. Yet another example of a classic ruined by some fool’s attempt to modernize it.” JohnFTL
Overall though both volumes provide the most ” Disco Christmas ” Bang for the buck.The Rest are pretty standard Christmas fare with a disco beat backing up the tracks. Nice background music for the beginning of a holiday party but that’s it! Not rockin’ disco like I thought it should be.
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Of course Wham’s Last Christmas released on Epic Records in 1984,is a modern day Christmas Classic worthy of a mention ( although not Disco) but my favorite in capturing the mood and on the laid back side as opposed to the more energetic ” Christmas Jollies’ Is the Whisper’s Christmas Album . All the standard Holiday hits but with that soulful feel that only The Whispers could have delivered. I personally, strongly recommend this one in addition to the Salsoul one, those two should give you that old school holiday feel you desire. Happy Holidays !!

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Alex Gutierrez Blog

Happy Birthday Jermaine Jackson

Jermaine Jackson had some pretty big shoes to fill when he ventured off by himself . Bassist for one of the most famous musical families in the world (he was the fourth of ten children) He also produced and recorded duets with American singer Whitney Houston in her early years as a recording artist and was a producer for Bobby De Barge’s band Switch.
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his 1980 album Let’s Get Serious was nominated for a Grammy Award, “Let’s Get Serious” the single charted at the top of Billboard’s Hot 100. Jermaine left Motown in 1983 for Arista Records, where he had one of his most notable “Do What You Do”
In 1984, he re-joined the Jackson Family to perform in the extremely succesful Victory tour.
Victory He currently lives in Los Angeles and has 8 Children. Happy Birthday.

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Alex Gutierrez Blog

DISCO: YES or NO? Queen " Another One Bites the Dust"

The Bass line on Queen’s 1980 single ” Another One Bites The Dust” ( written by Queen’s Bass player John Deacon) is clearly a variation of the one used in Chic’s ” Good Times” which was released a full year before.The percussion track and the hand claps were looped continuously repeating throughout the track.The vocals provided by Freddie Mercury were thought to be from a black vocalist since many were not familiar with Queen before this track hit the United States. It was even rumored that when played backward it’s message was ” It’s Fun to Smoke Marijuana” The track definitely had a ” funky” feel , a nice ” bounce” but Disco? You decide.

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Alex Gutierrez Blog

DISCO: YES or NO? Blondie " Heart of Glass"

Blondie was mostly known as a punk/new wave band formed by Deborah Harry and Chris Stein in the early 70s. The release of their Parallel Lines LP in 1978 had many fans calling them a “sellout” as the hit single ” Heart of Glass” was picked up by radio and classified as Disco, but was it really? Was this a dance floor filler at nightclubs at the height of Disco’s popularity in 1979?The song released in January 1979,reached number one in both the United States and the UK .Rolandcr78
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The production team made use of cutting edge technology at the time by creating it’s drum pattern on a Roland CR-78 drum machine, first introduced the year the track was recorded. Some DJs of the period would use this as an early evening opening track but in my experiences I never heard anyone program this track to a packed house accustomed to a more energetic style. So what’s the verdict? Disco: YES or NO?Parallel_Lines

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Alex Gutierrez Blog

Happy Birthday… Paul Hardcastle…Electronic Music Pioneer

Born December 10, 1957 Paul Hardcastle is cosidered one of the early electronic music pioneers. He had some success on the underground dance scene in the early 80s before his mainstream hit “19” an anti-war track, about America’s involvement in the Vietnam War and the effect it had on the soldiers who served using snippets from a documentary.His manager at the time was Simon Fuller who named his future production company “19 entertainment” The song’s use of samples from the documentary set legal precedents.
In my opinion the track was groundbreaking when it came out and can still be played today with the renewed interest in break dancing.I am surprised that no contemporary artist has utilized this technique in their musical story telling. Would love to hear new Paul Hardcastle utilizing issues in today’s world. Genius.


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Where to go on New Years Eve in Miami

Back in the Day it was a “NO Brainer “. New Years Eve you were going out to your favorite club,buying a bottle and ringing in the New Year with a bunch of friends. Over the years as our generation became older alot of us just settled for staying home and celebrating with the family, by 12:05 we were seriously considering calling it a night. There were many reasons to stay home too far to drive, too expensive, music was changing and we didn’t want to hear Hip Hop all night many other reasons of course. So we settled and stayed at home. 12 grapes, a glass of ” Cidra” and another slice of ” Brazo Gitano” when no one was looking So we decided to evaluate what it was that people were looking for to motivate them to go out on this the last night of the year. Our particular demographic target was ages 47 through 60 ,those of us that had been here from the very beginning, the Open Houses, The Pete and Lenny’s , The Limelight a select crowd of well dressed , well behaved individuals we no longer thought were out there. We had been able to duplicate this at our November 1st event. The chemistry of those that attended was ” magical” as if we had stepped back in time to 1979.Open Stageopen-stage-club-miami_617d
” Everything fell into place that night,the energy level was exhilarating, the music , the people as well as the visuals on the monitors around the club. Our bodies were in 2014, our senses were in 1979. It was incredible ” remembers Lizzie Valencia of West Miami. On Wednesday December 31 Veteran DJs Mr.Q 305 from Miami Landmark night spots such as Alexandre’s at the Omni Hotel and Daphne’s at the Sheraton River house along side of DJ Alex Gutierrez from clubs of the past such as Alcazaba at the Coral Gables Hyatt Regency, 609 , Mezzanotte in South Beach and Coconut Grove as well as Club Mystique at the airport Hilton once again bring you the perfect combination of style and sounds. ” We know you have many choices ,but our venue stands out for it’s quality and location. Award Winning Chef and an extremely friendly staff, not to mention the music you won’t hear anywhere else” states Mr. Q Miaster Q andDJ  Alex Gutierrez
” We enjoy entertaining audiences of our generation. We share a bond with them, a connection to that era that allows us to enjoy the experience together, To recreate a long lost time for just a few short hours” DJ Alex Gutierrez
We invite you to come and share with us.
A variety of packages are available to enjoy the evening. Call 305 441 7902
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Happy Birthday Sheila E.

sheilaBorn in California on December 12, 1957 Sheila Escovedo better known by her stage name Sheila E. was best known for her 1984 hit “The Glamorous Life” She is the niece of Coke Escovedo who was in Santana. She played percussion on Micheal Jackson’s 1979 track ” Dont Stop Til You get Enough” as well as on Gloria Estafan’s Latin album ” Mi Tierra”
She was ranked #88 on VH1’s 100 Greatest Women of Rock & Roll.The erratic style of the track kept it of the playlists of most club DJs of the time but the cut was immensely popular on FM radio and MTV.sheila princer
Her heavy percussive hit single “The Glamorous Life” was a song written by Prince in 1984.She toured with artists such as Ringo Starr, Lionel Richie, Diana Ross and Marvin Gaye .Prince pushed her to sing and become a solo artist and her image at the time was directly influenced by Prince’s persona. The record was released June 4, 1984 on Warner Brothers Records.

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Who is August Darnell?

When I first heard Dr.Buzzard’s Original Savannah Band in 1976 I felt that I was being tricked into liking my parents or maybe even their parent’s music. This strange mixture Forties big-band sounds with the disco flavors of the time confused many young DJs who didn’t know if they should like it or give it to their grandparents as a Christmas present. (Tuxedo Junction, Manhattan Transfer and others would later ” Trick” me as well.) The album would become a Gold Selling record the single ” Sunshower” would be sampled by a variety of artists. His band would catapult vocalist Cory Daye into the Disco limelight, and this unique sound would open the door to other artists who would explore this era and interpret it in their own Disco way.-kid-creole
August Darnell whose real name was Thomas August Darnell Browder would undergo a variety of incarnations eventually reinventing himself and scoring big as Kid Creole and the Coconuts in the early 80s which would combine all his previous styles as well as infusing some Caribbean rhythms. Co-founded by Darnell and his Savannah Band mate vibraphone player Andy Hernandez.Darnell presently lives in Sweden and occasionally tours with original members.
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John Davis & The Monster Orchestra " Night and Day"

While listening to some old unlabeled Cds I had in my car, I came across a track I had not heard in a while. I was surprised that in all the recent Disco nights and Concerts I had played at , I had totally overlooked this ” Gem” . The Track was ” Night and Day” by John Davis and The Monster Orchestra released in 1976. As I listened to this ” Disco Masterpiece” I wondered why John Davis was not a name that popped up more frequently when discussing the Disco Masters such as Giorgio, Alec R. Costandinos and Cerrone.Up Jumped the Devil
John Davis is an arranger, producer and musician (playing keyboards, sax and flute)he had been working in Philedelphia, with groups like First Choice, The Intruders,and artists like William DeVaughn. Davis first came to the attention of DJs with his ” Discofied” version of Cole Porter’s ” Night and Day” (written for the 1932 musical play Gay Divorce ) The track opens with Davis’ signature percussion intro, focusing heavily on the conga work of Larry Washington followed by an infectious bass line that hooks in the listener as well as the dancer. The familiar Disco standard incorporated in many songs of the time such as ” Brazil ” Salsoul Orchestra , the female chorus yelling ” WOOOOOO!!!” greets the listener into a pure Disco experience utilizing all the elements of the genre. It is no coincidence that we hear Salsoul influences in this track since John was a part of Salsoul Orchestra.
For all of you ” Disco Heads” out there it is worth adding this classic to your music library allowing in to surprise you one day when you least expect it. It is one of those tracks that will instantly transport you back to the club where you first heard it.John Davis2
John Davis and the Monster Orchestra without doubt, were one of the best Disco orchestras of it’s time earning a well deserved spot among Disco royalty.JD