NICKY SIANO, dance music pioneer who DJed at New York nightclubs The Gallery and Studio 54
When did you first start clubbing and what record inspired you to become a DJ?I started clubbing in the early 1970s, when I was about 14 years old. I had a girlfriend in high school who took me to a lot of clubs in Manhattan. There were two records in particular, Rain by Dorothy Morrison, and You're The Oneby Little Sister, that just connected with my soul and moved me like nothing I had ever heard before.
The nascent disco scene fused rock, soul and R&B with African and Latin rhythms. But the most ingenious innovation, which you introduced, was playing consecutive records without interruption on twin turntables.Well, I wasn't the first DJ to use twin turntables. But I was the first to match the beats on successive records. I had no headphones, so I would put the next record on very low and mix it in with the one that was playing. That's when the scene really began to take off. My friend David Mancuso ran The Loft, which was a gay nightclub. My idea was to replicate The Loft experience for straight people.
You opened The Gallery in 1973. What was your philosophy there?Getting the sound right was by far our biggest priority. We opened the club with a budget of $7,000. About $5,500 of that went on the sound system.
Studio 54 was notoriously difficult to get into, famously turning away the likes of Frank Sinatra and Woody Allen. Was The Gallery as picky about who it allowed in?No, there was a procedure and, once you followed the procedure, you would be allowed in. A friend would recommend you. You were then given a business card. As long as you maintained that membership, there wouldn't be a problem. Calvin Klein was a regular in the early days, so were Mick Jagger and David Bowie. Patti LaBelle did her first show there. Ditto Grace Jones.
At the same The Gallery was open, punk rock was fermenting in downtown Manhattan. Hip-hop was emerging in the Bronx.Sure.
But at that precise moment, popular music had not yet splintered into all of the genres and subgenres that we have today. It was still remarkably unified.That's right. There just wasn't as much music around in those days, people weren't producing this huge abundance of music that you have today. As a matter of fact, if you went to a club in those days, you would most likely know all of the records that you heard played.
The rise of disco was meteoric. What is less remembered is the backlash against it. What was behind that?The greed of the record companies. They realised that, if they put the word disco on any record at all, it would sell 100,000 copies right out of the box. So they started putting it on every piece of crap they wanted to sell and people were getting burned. The other thing, I think, is that straight men just don't like to dance. All of the women were going out with their male gay friends and that caused a rift.
You opened The Gallery at 17, by 21 you were the king of New York. After that came two decades overcoming drug addiction and watching friends die of Aids.Right.
It sounds like a great party but one hell of a hangover. Well, you know, nothing could compare to being there for the birth of disco. It was like witnessing the invention of film and watching a movie for the first time. The drug problems came towards the end of my career. In about 1983, I stopped DJing altogether. Aids was all around me at the time. I beat drugs but I couldn't go into another nightclub. There was too much temptation. Someone invited me to work as an Aids counsellor and it felt like God was calling me. The door opened and I walked through it.
What convinced you to return to DJing in the late 1990s?Serendipity. I couldn't work with Aids sufferers any more. I couldn't watch another person die. I couldn't see another person not getting the services they required. I was burned out. Then, by chance, I was asked to DJ at Larry Levan's birthday. That one night was my reintroduction to the business.
Finally, you've already been asked to contribute to disco exhibits in various museums. Is disco music now a relic of times past or does it live in any meaningful way?Ten years ago, I'd have said it still lives on. Now I'm afraid it's gotten to the point where, yeah, it's moving towards the Smithsonian. (Laughs.) But you know, to make good music, you have to know good music.
For a long time, I was considered the best. And I still think I’m a great DJ.
Nicky Siano’s documentary
The Gallery
will be screened at Block T in Smithfield, Dublin on October 1st, with a Q&A session to follow
