It seems to me that 1976 and 1977 were, at least musically, a year of transition. You see a lot of the bands who were huge or untouchable early or in the middle of in the decade--such as the Rolling Stones, Aerosmith, Led Zeppelin, etc, releasing a lot of poorly reviewed and in some cases poorly sold albums--The empires which the Stones and Led Zeppelin had in the early-mid 70s began to crumble, while Disco really began to break out into the mainstream, becoming a huge phenomenon by the end of 1977. You see Metal falling down for a while, with for example Black Sabbath declining in both critical review and popularity, while Prog Rock arguably hits it's peak of popularity in 1976 with bands like Rush and Yes and others releasing popular that year and then declining by the next year--And in 1976 soft rock like Peter Frampton exploded into popularity. You can also Funk being a pretty big force in some areas.
You also see what would eventually become Glam Metal beginning to formulate and gain popularity in bands like KISS, and in the UK at least, Punk Rock explodes and rolls over the older generation of rock bands, while Punk was confined more to the big cities in America--for example New York having it's own burgeoning Punk scene in '76 and '77.

....and in December 1976 The Eagles released the hugely successful album Hotel California...

Don't know about 'transition', more like same old, same old...if the top selling British LPs of 1977 were anything to go by!

That year, there were chart toppers by...

Slim Whitman, Frank Sinatra, The Shadows, The Beatles, Johnny Mathis, Connie Francis, Diana Ross, Cliff Richard and of course, Elvis Presley...

...all of which were not exactly synonymous with the mid-70s at all!

If that's not eclectic enough, there were also big sellers from Bread, The Muppets (!) and The Sex Pistols!

It seems to me that 1976 and 1977 were, at least musically, a year of transition.


As someone who vividly remembers how things went then, your assessment is pretty right on.  To a certain extent it's a normal evolution - but the unabashed explosion of Disco, which eventually skewed most everything, was not "normal".  It's as if the powers that be decided "here is the elusive fountain of youth - Disco" at the time it got really big.  Had Disco evolved more gradually, who knows, maybe there would've never been the contempt for it that developed just before the turn of the decade.

I blame Disco for "damaging" other viable styles at the time, if for no other reason than making it harder to get exposure.  (With the exception of "slow jams" which coexisted nicely with Disco.)  That may sound extreme, but I'm sticking to my story.

As someone who vividly remembers how things went then, your assessment is pretty right on.  To a certain extent it's a normal evolution - but the unabashed explosion of Disco, which eventually skewed most everything, was not "normal".  It's as if the powers that be decided "here is the elusive fountain of youth - Disco" at the time it got really big.  Had Disco evolved more gradually, who knows, maybe there would've never been the contempt for it that developed just before the turn of the decade.

I blame Disco for "damaging" other viable styles at the time, if for no other reason than making it harder to get exposure.  (With the exception of "slow jams" which coexisted nicely with Disco.)  That may sound extreme, but I'm sticking to my story.


And it seems to me when society at large thinks of the 70s, they don't think of the early 70s (1970-1973) in terms of music, pop culture and styles--the ''70s'' in modern pop culture is really just the 1974-1978 period--The Aerosmith, Disco, Grease and Welcome Back Kotter era.

  The bands you mentioned were starting to fade by 76/77. The Stones hadn't had a great album since "Exile On Main Street" in '72, but they had long since reached iconic status where they could put out an album every few years, mount a huge tour, make gadzillions of dollars, then retreat back to their Carribean estates.  Zeppelin's glory days were behind them too. "Physical Graffiti" in '75 was their last really good album. Aerosmith went through a cocaine-fueled dissolution in the late seventies, but got an unusual second chance in the '80s and reached their peak of popularity.
  The two big stories of '76/'77 were obviously Punk and Disco.
    Punk was a reaction to the rather bloated state rock had found itself in. Especially "prog rock"...Emerson Lake and Palmer, Yes,...any album that featured "fugues" and "movements" pissed them off. The idea was that rock and roll is supposed to be angry, anarchist noise, not carefully crafted music. The Sex Pistols were the most obvious example...unlistenable mayhem that somehow became the critics favorite. The good thing about "punk" is that it started the whole "New Wave" movement...stripped down bands (the Clash, Tom Petty, Elvis Costello, Talking Heads, Rockpile, the Ramones etc...that didn't feel the need to have a symphony behind them.
    Disco was a great form of music, as long as it remained in the clubs and dance bars. It became problematic when it started appearing on the radio. Soul music was some of the best stuff on the radio in the early '70s...Earth, Wind and Fire, Al Green, Isaac Hayes, the OJays, Rufus, Barry White,... Disco pretty much tossed that out the window. Now if you were a black band, you had to have a loud rhythm section...big drums and bass...and sing inane lyrics like "Boogie Oogie Oogie till you just can't Boogie No More" In a dance club, this was OK, but coming through your car radio, well, let's just say there is a reason for the whole "Disco Sucks" phenomena.

  Don't know about all that, but there was some really good soul and R&B in the late 1970s...

As someone who vividly remembers how things went then, your assessment is pretty right on.  To a certain extent it's a normal evolution - but the unabashed explosion of Disco, which eventually skewed most everything, was not "normal".  It's as if the powers that be decided "here is the elusive fountain of youth - Disco" at the time it got really big.  Had Disco evolved more gradually, who knows, maybe there would've never been the contempt for it that developed just before the turn of the decade.

I blame Disco for "damaging" other viable styles at the time, if for no other reason than making it harder to get exposure.  (With the exception of "slow jams" which coexisted nicely with Disco.)  That may sound extreme, but I'm sticking to my story.


I have concluded the whole "Disco Sucks" backlash came from the music industry forcing it into genres (such as CW or hard rock) where it didn't belong.  A lot of people hated disco, but I think the hostility would have been tempered if it was easier to ignore.

   Don't know about all that, but there was some really good soul and R&B in the late 1970s...


Quiet Storm R&B developed around this time, which was basically the black answer to soft rock music (think of stuff like George Benson, this era's Smokey Robinson, plus Stevie Wonder's Songs In The Key Of Life was big in '76/'77. Diana Ross' last three albums of the '70s are underappreciated as well, and Rufus/Chaka and Natalie Cole were putting out some great albums then. It just became increasingly constrained to black radio as disco took off and wouldn't re-merge until the mid/late '80s.