The disco era and the girl group era had many similarities. Both launched the careers of many virtual unknowns, and both became formulaic at times. And both were producer driven at points with the components of the product being interchangeable.
"Lipstique" was one of these products, a non-exsistent group of studio musicians and singers brought together by Jurgen Korduletsch (Mr. Claudja Barry).
Jurgen was himself a product of the "Munich Sound Machine" and has contributed greatly to the whole disco genre. In 1977 he was still living and working in his native homeland and disco had broken through thanks in large part to Giorgio Moroder and Harold Faltermeyer. Korduletsch assembled a group of friends and musicians for the basic tracks of the four songs that would be included on this project. He then took those tapes to London where he employed an unknown list of vocalists to flesh out the project. Jurgen bravely did the mixdown for the original release (on Ensign Records) but when Salsoul (i.e. Tom 'N' Jerry Records) licensed the four tracks for domestic release they turned them over to Tom Moulton for remixing.
Moulton passed on remixing "Mah-Nah Mah Nah" and instead chose to remix "Venus/Light My Fire" a natural coupling of two rock standards, "I Wanna Play With You/Funny Games" a Frederick Knight tune linked with a Jorg Evers original and the sure-fire winner "At The Discotheque." The side-long medley used the title track to weave together two Jorg Evers originals and a Van McCoy/J. Cobb classic. The 17:20 medley was a summer classic of 1978. The songs included in the medley were so hook-ladened that it was hard to forget them, "Discotheque," "Our Song Of Love" and "I'm Still Dancing" were so well crafted that one could forget that it was all just a studio concoction.
Despite the success both here and abroad of the album Korduletsch and arranger/writer Jorg Evers moved on to other projects and additional disco classics. So for the brief moment we honor the "group" Lipstique for this the only release from Koduletsch and Evers under this banner. |
