A very funky evening with Chic/Nile Rogers opening with Everybody Dance until finishing with Le Freak and a party on-stage to Good Times!
Having seen and enjoyed Chic at V Festival at Weston Park in 2014, we were excited to get some last-minute tickets for this and thought if they were as good as at V Festival then I would be happy. They were much better then they were at V Festival and enjoyed it with a more appreciative crowd of attendees and it was a privilege to watch a more personal performance in a ‘small’ venue sucvh as the O2 Academy, for which we visited for the first and (based on our experience) not last time!
The show was a non-stop extravaganza of funk with all the classics such as Le Freak and hits that Chic/Nile Rogers have written and occasionally produced for some of the biggest names around over the years. Such as Sister Sledge’s Lost in Music, Thinking Of You and of course We Are Family; Madonna’s Like A Virgin; Diana Ross’s Upside Down and I’m Coming Out; David Bowie’s Let’s Dance; B52s Roam; Birmingham’s own Duran Duran’s The Reflex; and most recently (except their own new single) Daft Punk’s (with Nile Rodgers and Pharrell Williams) Get Lucky. The list goes on… showcasing both Chic’s song writing and achievements and a producer and a reminder of how some of Chic’s riffs have been adapted and used by many other artists.
Refreshingly we got some revamped versions of some of the classic Let’s Dance, Like A Virgin and Notorious. Lets Dance was punctuated with the vocals of drummer Ralph and really got the room going!
With his synonymous white beret, Rogers was centre stage throughout the show flanked by singers Folami and Kimberly Davis – and what an amazing vocals they both treated us to!
With the crowd already in a frenzy of funk we were subjected to an amazing rendition of Daft Punks Get Lucky sending the crowd even more wild.
Just when you thought the show couldn’t get any better, Nile served up Get Lucky, the 2013 world-wide smash he wrote and recorded with Daft Punk and Pharrell Williams, sending the crowd delirious.
The night was closed with Le Freak and a couple of dozen fans joining the band on-stage for the closing number …. and it was Good Times indeed!
Chic’s new single I’ll Be There and new album are out in July 2015 read this to see the video for the single and an interview about the album featuring some long lost material from the original Chic line-up.
To sum up our Chic/Nile Rodgers review – O2 Academy Birmingham 25/03/2015, what an amazing night of disco and funk and we were given a taste of what it would have been like at NYC’s Studio 54 back in the 1970’s.