Over at Cuepoint, the cocaine-fueled history of Casablanca records, the 1970s label that embodied decadence, debauchery, and disco, where Donna Summer, George Clinton, and the Village People reigned supreme. From Cuepoint:
By the late 1970s, Casablanca Records had reached an era of unrivaled gluttony. Says (label co-founder) Larry Harris: "There was blow everywhere. It was like some sort of condiment that had to be brushed away by the waitstaff before the next party was seated. Cocaine dusted everything. It was on fingertips, tabletops, upper lips, and the floor."
Indeed, such rampant substance abuse seemed to fuel the label's overall aesthetic and ethos. Harris claims George Clinton and his "assistant" Archie Ivy would frequent the Casablanca offices, meeting with executives and rambling "for hours about how they were going to develop Parliament's stage show into an otherworldly display of pageantry and pomp and how they needed half a zillion dollars to do it." On one occasion, Clinton showed up with "some uncut and very potent coke, declaring that anyone who tried it would speak Spanish, as the stuff 'hadn't cleared customs yet.'" The P-Funk frontman, insists Harris, "would ramble on, giving voice to every thought that came into his head, stream-of-consciousness style, like William Faulkner gone jive."
"From Cocaine Disco to Electronic Dance: the Loaded Legacy of Casablanca Records"
