NYE 1977

New years eve, December 31 1977: Nile Rodgers and Bernard Edwards of the band Chic are invited by Grace Jones to join her at Studio 54. When they get there, they are refused entry. They were annoyed, but they went back to Rodgers'apartment and channelled their anger into energy, and came up with a hit... happy new years, folks!


"... Having settled on the name Chic, and after months of peddling their demo of "Dance Dance Dance (Yowsah, Yowsah, Yowsah)" unsuccessfully around the New York record companies, the band signed to Atlantic Records. The single was released in October 1977 and raced into the US Top 5.

Still, Chic's initial success did not immediately elevate them to the top of every list. It was snowing in New York when Rodgers and Edwards stepped up to Studio 54's fabled doorway on 31 December 1977. The pair had been asked to join Grace Jones, who was partying inside the legendary club. Already they were sporting clothes commensurate with the fact that their debut single had sold a million copies within a month: Rodgers was wearing a Cerutti dinner jacket, Edwards was in Armani.

They went to the club's back door and attempted to get in. Their names weren't down. While the club rocked to "Dance Dance Dance", they were outside being denied admission.

Back at Rodgers' apartment, they started to jam. As Rodgers recounted to Anthony Haden-Guest in his book The Last Party: Studio 54, Disco and the Culture of the Night, "We were just yelling obscenities ... fuck Studio 54 ... fuck those scumbags." Suddenly, the music began to coalesce. The guitar and bass part locked in and a repeated refrain of "Aaaaaaaah, fuck off!" became the jam's focal point. Eventually, the "fuck" became "freak". "Off "became "out".

The resulting song, "Le Freak", is what Chic did in the Vietnam war; it is why 25 years later, books are being written about them. It is the epitome of the Chic sound, effortlessly crafted. The ultimate irony of turning the hatred that Rodgers and Edwards had felt toward Studio 54's door policy out on to the dancefloor and making it positive was fantastic.

Entering the US charts on 18 November 1978, the record went platinum and became the biggest-selling record in Atlantic's history. It hit No 1 in America, where it remained for six weeks. It went gold in Belgium, Italy, South Africa, Great Britain, France, Brazil, and most of the rest of the world. In Canada, it became the best-selling song in the nation's history. At Christmas 1978, Chic had the No 1 single in America. No self-respecting party of the 1978 festive season was complete without it..."

Source: from The Independent, 2004