San Francisco Diaries: DJ Steve Fabus and the surprise farewell for disco legend Sylvester
DJ Steve Fabus has been called “one of the founding fathers of San Francisco’s gay disco scene,” and we were lucky enough to welcome him recently into our podcast studio. In today’s San Francisco Diaries episode, he shares a story many of us have heard or seen secondhand but was 100-percent real life for him. He moved to the city as a young gay man in the 1970s. At the time, he said he and his friends felt there was “power in numbers” as the gay movement gained momentum…to say nothing about “this amazing party going on,” he recalls.
Fabus has enjoyed a long career that spans from the disco era to today. He started DJing parties at his own flat, just around the block from Harvey Milk’s camera store. Harvey Milk, disco legend Sylvester, and other counterculture luminaries like Peter Berlin, the Fabulous Cockettes, and Pristine Condition became regulars at his events.
As Fabus found popularity and success spinning at venues like the Trocadero Transfer and I-Beam, the AIDS crisis also started to affect many people around him. In today’s episode, he describes the evening he found himself in the DJ booth providing the soundtrack to Sylvester’s farewell party.
Listen to his story:
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Photo via Electric Soul