But to two suburban white kids whose only late-teen role models were substance-abusing rednecks who cranked Lynryd Skynyrd and drank cheap beer as often as they used racial slurs, Manero seemed like the KING: He was good-looking, a great dancer, and all the ladies loved him. In retrospect, Travolta’s Tony Manero comes across as an immature lout. Classic songs such as “ You Should Be Dancing,” “ More Than A Woman” and, of course, “ Stayin’ Alive” were in constant rotation on my record player, and my best friend Dennis and I must have snuck in to see the movie’s R-rated version a half-dozen times over the course of a summer.
When the Bee Gees’ Saturday Night Fever soundtrack came out in 1977, it immediately became my favorite album ever (years later, during my career as a celebrity interviewer, I had John Travolta sign my double vinyl album). As a result, the sounds of disco and funk were HUGE at my school, and I listened to artists like Chic, KC & the Sunshine Band and Donna Summer religiously. But by the time I graduated in 1979 I was in the vast minority (my high school was 98% black, 1.5% Asian, and. I grew up in Atlanta, in a suburban neighborhood afflicted by post-integration “ white flight.” When I started at Snapfinger Elementary School (where, coincidentally, comedian Chris Tucker went a few years later), the racial mix was around 50/50. I must admit, this transition in my child’s life has me a little emotional about the reality that my daughter is gradually growing up, which led to reflections upon my own graduation. The past few weeks have been filled with preparations for this major life event, from a field trip to her new middle school and an orientation session for parents to planning details of our forthcoming celebratory dinner. The conversation was inspired by a major rite of passage my daughter will be going through on Thursday: Graduating elementary school. Weird not only because, as a child of the ’70s, the Bee Gees provided the hip-shaking soundtrack to to my pre-adolescence, but also because Mary and I had just been talking about the weight of their influence on me earlier in the day. It was weird to learn last night that Robin Gibb had died after a long and difficult battle with cancer. 109 Shares The Bee Gees circa Saturday Night Fever The Bee Gees, Rites of Passage & Staying Alive
0 kommentar(er)
