Fiona Scott-Norman’s new comedy show, Disco: The Vinyl Solution, is as much a fledgling thesis as it is a comic performance. “It’s a bit like Freakonomics, where the authors take two disparate facts, like the number of drug dealers who live at home, and try and prove the link between them using economics,” Scott-Norman says.
“I’m looking at the rise in street violence and the decline of partner dancing and the playing of electronic dance music in pubs and clubs and asking whether there’s a connection.” Part humour, part sociological analysis, Disco: The Vinyl Solution is a lateral consideration of the tabloid topic of street violence. “Every approach they’ve come up with a way to deal with street violence it hasn’t worked – they’re all just variations on theme of ‘send in the cops’. It’s time to look at some of the underlying causes instead,” Scott-Norman opines.
It was during Scott-Norman’s previous Melbourne Comedy Festival Show, The Needle And The Damage Done that the Melbourne writer, satirist and comedian hit upon the idea of Disco: The Vinyl Solution. “You’d be in the venue after the show having a drink, and there would be this awful, cookie-cutter music being played – it’s absolutely soul-destroying,” Scott-Norman says.
With 20 years of experience as a DJ and playing to a variety of demographic groupings, Scott-Norman was already keenly attuned into the influence of music on the average punter’s mood. “When you’re DJing you really see how different music can change people’s moods,” Scott-Norman says. “There’s a line in the show where I say that no-one ever went and glassed someone after listening to It’s Raining Men, and it’s true.” Reasoning that people forced to listen to repetitive electronic dance music devoid of spirit and soul are not inclined to be happy, functional members of society, Scott-Norman started to join a few dots together.
The final link in the analytical and comic chain came when Scott-Norman decided to take swing dance classes. “I’ve been learning to do swing dancing over the last couple of years, and the more I’ve done it, the more I’ve realised how fun and enjoyable it is. You can dance and touch people, in a non-sexual way,” Scott-Norman says. “It’s really fun, and it’s social – you’ll always have a good night.” Swing dancing, and partner music more generally, provides the opportunity for socialisation and intimacy that’s absent in electronic dance music. “The opportunity for intimacy and communication is being eroded – when everyone in the pubs and clubs are playing electronic dance music, then you’re losing the ability to connect,“ Scott-Norman says.
As with everything wrong in the world these days, the finger must be pointed at the baby-boomer generation. “In the 1960s the baby boomers mislaid partner music, because they were distracted by acid and studying the inside of their belly button. It was a cultural turning point, but nobody noticed because it coincided with feminism, the contraceptive pill and the sexual revolution.” Scott-Norman is, however, optimistic about what’s happening in younger generations. “In the show I do a bit of dancing, and I have a different lead each night. I’m learning dance with Swing Patrol, and it’s huge – they’re getting bigger all the time,” Scott-Norman says. “There’s people about 20 years old in the classes, and I asked some of them why they weren’t in the pubs and clubs, and they looked at me like they’d rather eat their own poo!”
