The Ghosts of Discos Past

Everybody knows that before First Ave was an iconic live music venue it was a Greyhound bus station. But fewer know the history of the in-between years. Britt Aamodt turns back to the early 1970s when First Ave was Uncle Sam’s and the dance beat was disco.

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Producer: Britt AamodtEditorial support: Emily KrumbergerMixing & mastering: Chris Harwood

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Transcript

MN90 Intro: Welcome to MN90: Minnesota History in 90 Seconds.

Disco, it was the music rock fans loved to hate, but it was also the music at the heart of 1970s dance culture. In 1972 the old Greyhound bus station in Minneapolis installed a neon lit dance floor, and became Uncle Sam's, where vinyl records spun four on the floor disco beats, and trouser legs were flared across the river in St. Paul. The basement of the old Lowry Hotel was converted to a disco club, the Oz. That's where, in 1979, Minnesota DJ Steve Greenberg tested his group's new single on the sound system. July 12, 1979 has gone down as the day disco died, when rock fans burned disco records at Comiskey Park in Chicago. Minneapolis' Uncle Sam's lost its neon floor. Then, on November 28 ,1979 the Ramones blasted away the last ghost of disco when its punk set heralded the venue's rebirth as First Ave.

MN90 Outro: MN90 is produced by AMPERS, diverse radio for Minnesota's communities, made possible by funding from the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund. Online at mn90.org.