Cool 1978 Teen Explains Why Music Sucks If You Can't Dance to It

Times Machine dot NYTimes dot com, the archives for the New York Times, has just brought our attention to a 1978 trend piece on disco music, and how “Teen-Agers” were super into it. In a profile of the club Guys and Dolls, where area teens could go get their Hustle on, a then-15-year-old called Thomas Castaglia opined, “Disco music is great. Rock stinks, and it’s outdated because you don’t dance to it and you have to get high to listen to it.” Thirty years on, Castaglia is still: correct!

Castaglia also said he had once been beaten up by schoolmates for his love of disco, which further proves that rock fans were and are vicious, knuckle-headed brutes. In response to this, his colleague, 15-year-old Fern Fladell, retorted, “They’re just jealous because those kids don’t have a place for rock like this.” (Fladell was also wearing what the Times referred to as a “disco scarf,” a “long piece of fabric that looks like a knotted prayer shawl,” which, huh. Learn something every day.)

The point is: teenagers (particularly teen girls) always know what’s best about culture, and even in 1978 they were like “rock is wack and dead cause you can’t dance to it,” and they were right (except for when you can). ROCK IS DEAD! ALL HAIL DISCO AND COMPUTERS!