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Post-Disco

Overview

While it's entirely accurate to say that disco led to house, there's a distinct era between the dissolution of the former and the solidification of the latter -- covering roughly half a decade, between the late '70s and early '80s -- that is often termed post-disco. Though it makes sense to classify any form of dance music made since disco as post-disco, each successive movement has had its own characteristics to make it significantly different from the initial post-disco era, whether it's dance-pop or techno or trance. There's no exact point where the original disco era ended and post-disco began, but as drum machines, synthesizers and programming became common studio tools, disco took on some radically different sounds while remaining similar in rhythmic structure and purpose. Post-disco was just as singles-driven as disco, with many of its most essential tracks coming from one-off projects and short-lived collaborations. Like disco and house, the most significant figures in post-disco were its architects -- producers, remixers, and DJs, many of which had been active in club music since the early '70s -- rather than the names on the fronts of the sleeves. Some variants of post-disco include boogie (midtempo tracks steeped in funk) and early Italo-disco (electronic tracks with heavy traces of Giorgio Moroder), as well as the beginnings of alternative dance (which often took cues from Italo-disco).