Dancehalls, Glitterballs and DJs - From the Pleasure Garden to the Discotheque - Bruce Lindsay

Dancehalls, Glitterballs and DJs - From the Pleasure Garden to the Discotheque - Bruce Lindsay

A Land of a Thousand Dances

Dancehalls, Glitterballs and DJs - From the Pleasure Garden to the Discotheque - Bruce Lindsay

Bruce Lindsay [+-]
Music Journalist and Social Historian
Bruce Lindsay is a freelance music journalist and social history researcher. He is the author of Shellac and Swing: A Social History of the Gramophone in Britain (Fonthill Media, 2020), Two Bold Singermen and the English Folk Revival: The Lives, Song Traditions and Legacies of Sam Larner and Harry Cox (Equinox Publishing, 2020) and Ivor Cutler: A Life Outside the Sitting Room (Equinox, 2023).

Description

These new entertainment venues soon drew the attention of the authorities and the mainstream press. Soon after it opened, La Discotheque was accused of being the centre of London’s trade in amphetamines and a haven for runaways and other undesirable types. Perceptions of La Discotheque were soon being applied by a ‘shocked’ press to any other venue that offered the nation’s youth a place to dance to the new style of music: discos had barely arrived on British streets before they were being seen by some as a debauched threat to the moral and physical well-being of Britain’s youth, just like the Pleasure Gardens and Penny Gaffes before them. On the other hand, the fashionable set, including members of the Royal Family and the aristocracy, took the discotheque scene to its heart and mobile DJ setups arrived in their thousands, some run by minor aristocracy, others by apprentice electricians, all devoted to music for dancing.

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Citation

Lindsay, Bruce. A Land of a Thousand Dances. Dancehalls, Glitterballs and DJs - From the Pleasure Garden to the Discotheque. Equinox eBooks Publishing, United Kingdom. Feb 2025. ISBN 9781800505971. https://www.equinoxpub.com/home/view-chapter/?id=44958. Date accessed: 11 Dec 2024 doi: 10.1558/equinox.44958. Feb 2025

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