Day 411: Macho – I’m a Man
It’s once again Disco Friday, the best night of the week. I’ve somehow had simultaneously a good week and a bad week and I need to whip out the big guns to get myself in the spirit tonight, and by “big guns”, I obviously mean Italo disco. I know I said last week that I want to listen to more Giorgio Moroder, but once I heard of Macho, I just couldn’t resist – let’s listen to I’m a Man.
Album cover courtesy of Goody Music
Macho was a disco group formed by by disco tycoon and businessman Jacques Fred Petrus and musician Mauro Malavasi in the mid-70s. They had their own label called Goody Music Records and decided to put on an act fronted by Italian singer Marzio Vincenti, who they met when he was frequently perusing the Goody Music shop for vinyls. They then decided to collaborate on a version of “I'm a Man” by the Spencer Davis Group. I’m a Man was released in October 1978 as Macho’s debut studio album, and it reached huge commercial success, largely driven by the titular track, which reached number one on the Billboard disco charts and became very popular at the clubs.
This was such a fun album to listen to that I listened to it twice. It has the form of hypermasculinity and machismo that still I find to be very chic, you listen to “I’m a Man” or “Macho Man” by the Village People and immediately your mind goes to leather-clad Tom of Finland-type moustachioed macho men, not the current more unfortunate form of social media masculinity influencers like the Tate brothers and their ilk. I also genuinely can’t believe how “Macho Man” has been co-opted at political rallies these days, but that’s surely a topic for another day — arguably, though, it is very funny that straight men are now using a disco song about gay sex to showcase how manly they are.
Disco suffers a bit from not really being an album genre, so the records tend to be a bit hit or miss, but I loved I’m a Man. It’s half an hour of extremely solid disco which just has that effect where it makes you feel good. And vocalist Marzio Vincenti’s gruff and powerful voice is fun to listen to, when he yells “LET’S GOOOO”, you truly believe that it’s time to go. The 17-minute behemoth that the album was named after is a stonker, but my personal favourite was “Hear Me Calling”, which made its way to some of my playlists.
Macho rules, it’s a very successful Disco Friday. I’m a Man gets a well-deserved 8.5/10.