There was a kid in my school who used to wear a raincoat buckled up and flick his (died orange) hair in an attempt to look like this:
 

To say he got a bit of a kicking was an understatement. Frankly we didn’t really understand his Thin White Duke references, his visionary seeing that Gary Numan was the future, and his interest in Kraftwerk. But more significantly we didn’t know what he was talking about when he painted CHIC on his school bag.

I think its fair to say that notwithstanding their contribution to this abomination:

it really was our narrow mindedness rather than his visionary worldview, but he definitely had the jump on us.

Chic was the creation of wicked guitarist and updater of the James Brown funky scratch Nile Rodgers and his bass playing sidekick Bernard (Ber-nard to rhyme with hard) Edwards. Later they added a brilliant drummer Tony Thompson and became the best rhythm section in town for a bit. But when they started they were (apparently) trying to form a punk band of sorts. It makes sense in an odd way when you listen. Rodgers unique flavour of melody laden rhythmic guitar parts locked into Edwards massive and funky bass lines to give the Chic Organisation an instantly distinctive sound of their own. Everything they touched turned to gold even when it started with the working title of “Fuck Off” (catchy original title for the below written as a tribute to an uncooperative and racist doorman at archly hip nightspot Studio 54).

“Freak Out” as it finally became titled became one of the biggest selling singles of all time. It remains Atlantic Records only TRIPLE platinum single to this day. Chic married a little bit of R&B with a little bit of jazz fusion and a deep and natural understanding of the groove and made the hits. Lots of them.

And in keeping with this spirit the music of Chic wasn’t neutral at all; The lyrics were always one step beyond pop clichés and it was clear they were having fun with it. Rodgers was a child of post-Vietnam America (and, incidentally, a veteran of the Black Panthers) and saw Disco as a meeting of the tribes (gay meets black power meets punk meets women’s lib meets anti-everything counter-culturists) - a place where protest turned to celebration and as he explained to Blender magazine Chic’s music contained “DHM-Deep Hidden Meaning” if you only knew where to look. The frankly preposterous “Dance, Dance, Dance – Yowsah, Yowsah, Yowsah” was an example: it made sense if you knew the story of depression era dance marathons where couples danced until they fell desperate for prize money. Yowsah was a cryptic reference to Sydney Pollack’s film about the dances “They Shoot Horses Don’t they?”.

So it was sort of fitting when the greatest of all Edwards basslines became the staple of early samples – powering first the brilliant “Bounce, Skate, Rock”, then the seminal rap record “Rappers Delight” (as performed on Soul Train with an edit but make sure you hear the full joint) and then cut to shreds by the famous Flash “Adventures on the Wheels of Steel” as rap turned the beat political.

And whilst they set rap off onto its route to domination Chic beat the “disco sucks” backlash movement and took “Good Times” to US #1, whilst also producing some of my favourite records for their protégés Sister Sledge (We Are Family is maybe the best wedding party record of all time according to me, and according to Lloyd Cole the We Are Family album “is their masterpiece. “He’s The Greatest Dancer,” the title cut and the exquisite “Thinking Of You” make this The Greatest Disco Album”). And that’s also them chugging away behind the best post-Motown Diana Ross album, producing Like A Virgin for Madonna, and crafting beats for Duran Duran Notorious and offside project The Power Station (which Tony Thompson drummed in). And maybe best of all is Bowie’s Let’s Dance which is Rodgers too as if to justify that high school graffiti, wicked, wicked record and the most amazing funky guitar part.

Chic are sort of back now in spirit (RIP Bernard) as Rogers’ guitar dances all over the new Daft Punk joint “Get Lucky”. Which is a tune. And to be fair to the Robot duo they are careful to post a little tribute to Nile who in turn pays homage to the groove and to Donna Summer. And its properly good to hear his sly groove make the song come to life. For mine it’s the best bit of the tune.

I think maybe Hugo Davenport and Martin Nixon knew something the rest of us didn’t.
 

-Tony H
 

(btw – as an afterthought I cant help but compare and contrast the nimble lightness of Get Lucky with the leaden deadness of most of Bowie’s charmless return The Next Day. Maybe for once Bowie chose the wrong collaborators?)