91Èȱ¬

Grammy-winning composer, musician and producer Nile Rodgers is castaway by Lauren Laverne

With his own band, Chic, Nile has been enticing people on to the dance floor since the mid-1970s with hits like Le Freak and Good Times. With over 200 production credits to his name, he has worked on many highly successful albums from Sister Sledge’s We Are Family to David Bowie’s Let’s Dance and Madonna’s Like a Virgin.

Born in New York City in 1952 to a teenage mother, he spent his early life immersed in his parents’ bohemian, beatnik, and drug-dominated lifestyle. Drugs played a part in Nile's life too from an early age, and he took his first acid trip with Timothy Leary at the age of 15. After learning to play the guitar, he got his musical break touring with the Sesame Street stage show and playing in the house band of Harlem’s Apollo Theatre, where he met bassist Bernard Edwards with whom he developed a productive musical partnership and went on to found Chic.

Following the Disco Sucks movement of the late 1970s, Nile and Bernard turned to production, and sprinkled their magic dust on Sister Sledge and Diana Ross. When Nile and Bernard went their separate ways in the early 1980s, Nile forged ahead on his own, working with, among others, Madonna, Michael Jackson, David Bowie and Duran Duran.

Nile went into rehab in 1994 and has been clean and sober for the past 24 years and has received successful treatment for cancer twice.

He won three Grammys for his 2013 collaboration with the French electronic music duo Daft Punk, and has recently released the first Chic album in 26 years.

DISC ONE: Chic - Le Freak
DISC TWO: The Beatles - A Day In The Life
DISC THREE: The Doors - The End
DISC FOUR: The Jimi Hendrix Experience - Are You Experienced?
DISC FIVE: Sister Sledge - We Are Family
DISC SIX: David Bowie - Let's Dance
DISC SEVEN: Daft Punk - Get Lucky
DISC EIGHT: Chic - Good Times

BOOK CHOICE: Moby-Dick by Herman Melville
LUXURY CHOICE: His ‘Hitmaker’ guitar and an amp
CASTAWAY'S FAVOURITE: The Doors - The End

Desert Island Discs was created by Roy Plomley

Producer: Cathy Drysdale

First broadcast on 91Èȱ¬ Radio 4 in October 2018.

Show less