Le Freak: An Upside Down Story of Family, Disco and Destiny

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This is an intelligent, thoughtful book free of the egomania that you'd expect from a man with his extraordinary CV. After the disbanding of NYC, they'd soon become involved with Tony Thompson, and the Chic trio formed. After a difficult upbringing, which he details on particularly, he found his love for the guitar as a teenager and began a part hippie, homeless beatnik life panhandling and playing music for money. As Rodgers well knows, the best music is the music is the stuff we feel, the stuff that speaks to us and won't let go.

Nile Rodgers is currently experiencing a sort of late career renaissance, with his work with Daft Punk and that song with Pharrell, which I don't really care for, but I imagine might generate some interest in this book. So it seems a good time to revisit ‘Le Freak’, Nile’s 2011 memoir (and it accords nicely with my current early-’80s NYC obsession). His life has been extraordinary - his mother was just 13 when she had him, and he was brought up surrounded by a ragged assortment of artists, drop outs and junkies. Born to a hip 14-year-old beauty in 1952, Rodgers was raised among bohemians, criminals and drug addicts in Lower Manhattan, the Bronx and Los Angeles by his African-American mother, his white Jewish stepfather and both biological grandmothers.This book is an absolute knockout: exhilarating, warm, and courageous, deeply moving and deeply funny. After Chic reformed in the mid-90s, Bernard Edwards fell ill before a gig in Japan, but insisted on playing. From 50's era nuclear family, through 60's counter-culture, social unrest, 70's excess, and 80's greed - this book describes it in a manner you'll rarely find. This is truly one of the best books ever written about art, music, life, and the way we grow to be exactly who we are.

However, that hasn’t stopped Rodgers from providing one of the most well-thought-out and thorough lists on music books we’ve ever seen, even if he does think the whole idea of writing about music is a little pointless. His sporadic relationship with his biological father, an addict first and a musician second who died before reaching 40, also made its mark. By 1968 he was a street hippie whose professional base was Greenwich Village — a practiced panhandler who slept in crash pads and on the subway.As I started reading this book and understanding the kind of hard work, thought, and musical expertise that went into the making of hits such as "Everybody Dance" and "Le Freak", I listened again to them and several more with an open mind, and that did it for me. Yet beyond the hit man who fell for his mom and a few incestuous child abusers scattered among his relatives, he radiates love and respect for his family, and gratitude to random benefactors now long gone. Le Freak: An Upside Down Story of Family, Disco, and Destiny is one of the most engaging, entertaining, profound, and relatable memoirs that I've yet read. mas que, diferentemente de como se organizam em minha mente as imagens de cada uma dessas épocas, apresenta um continuum entre as décadas. He tells only one drug-related story which names names, and he notes that he did so with permission.