Terry Noel It was the early minutes of the dawn of Disco, Mel Cheren’s ‘pre-disco’, when the first few fingers of light stretched across the soundscape and touched the turntables. Terry Noel was a member of the Wild One’s, a house band which played at the club that would first embody the standards of the American disco—a cornucopia of dancing, drugs, sex, and alcohol—the Arthur. Known for precisely reproducing recorded hits live, the Wild One’s, not unlike many bands to this day, specialized in covering other artists’ songs. Simulating previous works by other artists remains the established starting point for most musical performers, if not all; however, Noel’s band purposely imitated the originals so completely, it was difficult to discern whether they were actually playing, or, if it was simply a record turning behind the stage playing through the speakers. Naturally, Noel made the change to the turntables, allowing him to exactly reproduce and manipulate the latest tracks, devoid of the assistance of a human ensemble. Noel would start his set by playing the track that the Wild One’s were playing live. Mixing in the pre-recorded sound as the band died down, Noel would turn up the volume and the night’s music would take a different turn. He would specifically choose records the Wild One’s had mastered, so his introduction of turntable music was smooth and creamy, evading the notice of unsuspecting listeners, unaware of the imminent musical inebriation. This idea of combining the sound encoded in the records with the output of a live band foreshadowed the number of djs in ‘rock’ bands today, where the traditional four member group in top40 has swollen to five members. Noel demanded complete control of the audience. During one famous confrontation, a celebrity demanded he play a certain tune, Noel responded by breaking the requested record emphasizing his dominion over the turntables and, in turn, the music funneling to his audience’s eardrums. Despite any star status, no one would tell Noel what to play. The majority of jazz artists and many other bands typically deny requests, seeing them as a degradation and dilution of their musical solution; the fact Noel shared this view, is a vivid portrayal of the role change he was effecting on the dj species. Noel was making music and building atmosphere, to bring in another tune would offset the cadence that he dictated throughout the evening, prudently determining which record the crowd would hear next. Casual observers might see Noel as simply playing the records, however, he was more than a human jukebox, he was a musician. And a great musician at that, capable of controlling the mood of the crowd like no one had before, with permanent impressions of musical information in opposition to the tradition of keys, strings, and reeds, replacing the control of vibration and air movement with regulated releases of encoded musical data. Noel deployed a set system of working over the crowd, cultivating and polishing the established French standard. He would play a French ballad, a faster American soul tune, an Italian ballad, then play another fast track. Applying numerous tempos and volumes, Noel perfected the style of the discaire and became the first recognizable American dj, with revelers attending the discos he performed at simply to be awed by his musical accomplishment. He was always conscious of the different tempos embedded in the records that lay at his disposal; despite his method of changing from one musical style to another in sequence, Noel’s intimate knowledge of his records ensured that no great discrepancies in tempo or rhythm arose. Of course, there were times when he would surprise the audience by switching directly to a fast track, shocking them and awakening their senses. This alone, testifies to his firm grasp on which records could raise, maintain, or lower the energy in the club; the onset of a fast track surprising the dancers, would also serve to show Noel typically would build upwards towards the faster tempos. That is to say, what wouldn’t be surprising for his audience was a sequence of records which grew towards a crescendo, a record in this sequence would be preceded by a slower rhythm and followed by a faster one until the music reached a dizzying level in comparison to the seemingly slow tune Noel had showcased only thirty minutes before. As a member of Noel’s audience if you weren’t aware of this process you would fine yourself rocking out to the Stones, when only a short time earlier you had been listlessly crooning along with Frank or Dean. Although no one had perfected a truly seamless style of combining records yet, Noel’s unique record selection set him apart from his contemporaries. Unlike the discaires and DJs who proceeded him, Noel was not satisfied with only playing tracks that adhered to the jazz motif. He was an avid collector of: Rock n’ Roll, Soul, Folk, R&B, and kept his ear to the ground for newly pressed material suited to the disco atmosphere. A certifiable vinyl junkie, he collected a variety of flavorful records for the crowd’s listening and dancing enjoyment. As Albert Goldman notes: The mix was totally eclectic. It ranged from Frank Sinatra to Bob Dylan to Otis Redding to the Mamas and the Papas. Amidst the familiar standards, he would sling ringers that nobody had ever heard before. One of the first DJs to concentrate on ‘breaking’ new records, he was soon working through hundreds of new sides every week seeking fresh material. Noel reproved that the music a dj played was just as important as how the dj played the music. The early American discaires had concentrated on playing popular music, but Noel eagerly sought out the tracks that would make people dance; he didn’t want his audience to listen to the music, he wanted them to feel the music. This demand for hot new dance tracks would eventually lead DJs into the production studio, creating Disco, specifically for the dancers on their floors. Noel also insisted upon using two turntables at once, although the French had initiated the pairing of two decks, they did not see that as a necessary coupling. He would switch so swiftly from the end of the sound data on one disc, to, the onset of sound on the next, that the dancers in his audience were never given a break, an impossibility if the owner did not provide for a second turntable. Noel sought to invade the club-goers’ visual senses as well, using a system of different colored lights, later combined with adjustable mirrors and a smoke generator, he would encourage the audience into a frenzied state. For Noel the green lights had the most intense effect on the crowd, “the more I got green in, the more they would go ape”. Noel presented a multimedia experience to the audience, a degree of entertainment surpassing a traditional night of music. The increased prevalence of mind and mood altering drugs in the discos elevated the entertainment to a psychodelic level—in fact, Noel might have taken the idea from the acid test parties at the time. When Noel added visual information to the audio stream, the audio was enhanced in an indescribable way; however, one thing that can be said with certainty is, that whatever the power of the audio stream was, the addition of pulsing lights increased this power exponentially, furthering the audience’s trance-like state. This combination of lights and music would become the trademark of popular Disco, idealized in Saturday Night Fever. Noel’s total sensory experience was a predecessor of touring a/v dj collectives today, such as the Orb, who combine movie style screens of streaming images with digital and vinyl sound recipes, taking the audience to higher planes of consciousness. Noel’s ability to control auditory and visual sensation is also the concept showcased in Coldcut’s Vjamm software, which seeks to mesh both forms seamlessly, all under the dj’s control. This incredible vision, represented by Noel’s attempts to push the limits of djing at the time, set him apart from his contemporaries. Far from resting on his laurels, Noel was constantly searching for new ways to electrify the audience. Terry Noel had perfected the traditional forms of the discaire and created an overwhelming experience capable of uplifting and energizing club-goers, becoming the first true American DJ. However, to progress further beyond the innate dj forms would require one of the most innovative musicians to ever manipulate discs, Francis Grasso