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My son is 14 years old and has started to attend youth discos for the first time. You might say it’s the start of a new era in our house but it’s been an unsettling time too. I have fond, but very distant, memories of my own arrival on the dance floor as a teenager at a very parochial country hall in the midlands over 50 years ago, and I can tell you it was nothing like the experience we have had recently.
Parish discos were a very different animal in the 1970s and 80s. For starters, the venues were local village halls, not nightclubs. If we were lucky, there might also have been a mineral bar open at the back of the hall. Coke or Fanta, and maybe a Timeout chocolate bar, was about all that was on the menu. And we certainly were not allowed to wander off to the nearby large town to take part in the pageant, which was our son’s first taste of the new teen disco scene.
Denim and rock
The other very different thing about those days was the dress code for the night out. Maybe my memory is not so good, but I can only remember events where the girls wore ‘respectable’ long skirts and we were heavily laden with denim jeans and jackets.
This was the glorious era of AC/DC and Angus Young and we were usually covered from cuff to collar with badges and emblems. We would spend most of the night in various stages of head gyrations in a circle in the middle of the parish hall as we imitated our hero with imaginary guitars.
Whole Lotta Rosie was our anthem and it never failed to get the place hopping. Significantly, there was always a slow set dance on the floor at some point in the night too – but more of that later.
As I got older, my interest in the weekly parish disco took on more of an impresario role. After sitting the exams for the Inter Certificate, as it was in those days, I decided with two of my friends to become the new promoters with a snazzy brand logo, a fresh set of posters, a brand-new DJ and a Thursday night summer booking of the hall, which promised to be an attractive business proposition.
Teenage discos in 2024 have little to do with chocolate bars and denim jackets and much more to do with short skirts, make-up and hormones
Well, at least until the weekly mineral bar supplies started to dwindle and my brothers and I began to eat the assets, namely, the large supply of chocolate bars bought from the nearby cash-and-carry foolishly stored in our ‘good room’ at home. We had initially stocked up enough to last all summer long, but by July the disco profits were also heavily eaten into – if you will excuse the pun.
Modern disco
Teenage discos in 2024 have little to do with chocolate bars and denim jackets and much more to do with short skirts, make-up and hormones. Dropping my son off in the car park outside the nightclub, the first thing that hit me was the incredible line queuing to get into the venue. Also, the endless amounts of freezing-looking girls with one outfit skimpier than the next, and the shoes all looking cripplingly uncomfortable.
Black was the universal colour for the lads’ costumes and T-shirts with short sleeves were standard. Some guy called Jack Jones seemed to be the new entrepreneur in town with his brand on almost all the gear and no more than the girls, these teenage boys risked the distinct possibility of getting pneumonia in the cold, wet and windy night of February.
Inside the snazzy new nightclub, I am reliably informed that the atmosphere has just one key ingredient – being very loud. So loud, in fact, that little or no conversation is either possible or encouraged and, even though the lads still seem to circle the hall in search of a partner to dance with, the slow set is a thing of the past.
Disco and dinosaurs
“Dad, you’re just not cool anymore,” was my son’s predictable reaction when I told him I was writing this piece for Irish Country Living. “That’s the way everyone dresses in 2024. You’re a prude, and you’re out of date.” The truth is, maybe I am.
Dropping the lads off and picking them up afterwards is making me feel older by the day and equally perplexed about the way teenage culture has developed in the last 50 years. This dinosaur is still trying to work it all out in his head and wondering, at this rate, what will it be like in another 50 years?
In the meantime, I’m off to book the tickets for AC/DC’s return next summer. Life was so much simpler in those days, or at least that’s what we thought. Roll on Croke Park!
The glitz and glamour of the Oscars ceremony last weekend is a far cry from the reality of the film production sector in this country. I met two young producers in the midlands last week who talked about the ‘dog-eat-dog’ nature of the business when it comes to winning commissions and getting their feet on the first ring of the ladder. It would be great if Cillian Murphy were to take up a hands-on role on the ground here and ensure the next generation can muscle their way into the trade just a little bit easier. Lights! Camera! Action!
Follow Ciaran on X Twitter at @ciaranmullooly
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