Freak, Freak, Freak, Freak, Freak, FREAKOUT FRANKFURT STYLE!

We just had a wonderful trip to Frankfurt to gig for an event called Hewlett Packard Discovery. I believe these pictures show the kind of set we had. We did a two-hour show of many of the biggest hits of my career. I continue to have many brushes with death, and my moment may come on stage, but I've discovered - sometimes I feel like the luckiest man in the world. Music puts Life and Death In Perspective.

"Good Times" - CHIC: Live at the Budokan

I've been playing with some of my demos from the 80's lately and it's been exciting jamming along with my old band mates. I love to play guitar and I could do this every day for the rest of my life just for the fun of it.

While taking a lunch break I jumped onto twitter for a few minutes and someone had posted "Good Times," from CHIC: Live at the Budokan. I loved it. Just like I could play along with my old demos forever, I could watch this video forever because I'll always see something new.

Today, I saw this performance from a completely different point of view. While watching it I said to myself, "Here's the last time I played "Good Times" with Bernard Edwards." He played brilliantly, even though his body, mind, and spirit were already transitioning. A few hours after this song he'd be Declared Officially Dead.

For the last few days I've been working on a track that I salvaged from demos for what would become my first solo album back in the 80's

For the last few days I've been working on a track that I salvaged from demos for what would become my first solo album back in the 80's. These are some of the ideas I played for Bowie when we had our first Let's Dance meetings. Two days ago I dreamed I was playing with Bernard Edwards and Tony Thompson, my ex-CHIC bandmates who've both died long ago. I realized my dream could come true by playing with them on these old demos. I had played guitar on the demos in the 80's so I jammed along with myself too! It sounded pretty amazing.

I'm going to Japan soon, which always makes think about Bernard Edwards, he passed away there after our last concert together. Maybe that's why I had this music dream? Today, I listened to what I had played and it blended with my original guitar perfectly. The guitar I'd used was given to me by Johnny Marr of the Smiths, because my Fender Stratocaster called The Hitmaker is being repaired. Today I had a phone call with Johnny. I had no idea he was in New York or that I would wind up recording with his signature guitar. I Don't Believe in Voodoo But...

I got home from Vegas today and ran out to get my verified driver license after 3 months of trying

When I got home from Thanksgiving with my family in Las Vegas, I knew something unusual was going to happen. It did. I got my driver's license renewed and verified. If you've not read my last two blog posts you wouldn't know why I call this seemingly simple act "unusual."

Allow me to explain: On September 6, 2012, I went to exchange my old license for a new one because it was about to expire on September 19. They issued me a new one but told me it was no longer good as a federal ID. This basically means I'd need a passport to fly domestically and that I'd be subjected to higher scrutiny and more searches. This translates to more delays and possibly missed flights in my active travel life. Without reliving this whole absurd story again, I'll just tell you what I had to do to acquire this new license with the gold star in the upper right hand corner, which lets officials know I'm verified.

Over the last three months I've made at least 20 calls and have spent countless hours on the phone. I've visited the office that issues driver's licenses in Westport, Connecticut a total of four times, the Social Security Agency in Bridgeport, Connecticut twice, and the New York City Department of Vital Records in lower Manhattan once, but had to wait two weeks until it reopened after hurricane Sandy, because it's located in a part of New York that was flooded and without power.

The state where I reside decided they'd enact this law years before December 1, 2017, when it becomes national law. My life has no lack of irony in it. Look at the date my new verified license expires, a mere ten months after the law becomes valid. At that point I'll have to get Another F-ing Driver License.

The driver's license they issued me a week before my last birthday that no longer allows be to board a domestic flight

On September 6, 2012, I went to renew my driver's license and that was The Beginning of A Nightmare. I turned in my old license early because ten years prior, while trying to board a domestic flight, my license had expired but they let me go and said, "No problem, this happens a lot." Remember, that was after the September 11th tragedies, when the nation's airports were still on high alert, but we were also still more like America, the country I was born in, land of the free, from sea to shining sea and all that stuff we used to hold dear - the country that taught civics in classes that I hear no longer exist.

It may sound like I'm straying but this will contextualize what follows.

After receiving my new license the woman casually says, "That's not good for domestic air travel" "What do you mean?," was my response as I was halfway out the door. I came back inside and she said, "You need to have two letters that were mailed to your home, and a social security card, as well as your old license to get a verified license."

She explained that six years ago a national law had been passed that becomes law by 2017, but Connecticut enacted it early. Really? I told her I haven't physically had my social security card since I was 13 years old, and I clearly remember one of the first things they told me was to put it in a safe place and not carry the card because I could lose it. It's exactly where I left it in 1963, but of course, like every other American I know the pertinent information, my number and my name. She told me, "Knowing isn't good enough, I'd have to show it to her." Of course I couldn't, so I asked, "What else could I do?" She said, "Get an original document that has my social security number printed on it." I told her okay and I'll see you in a few days. I was a little angry but on some level I understood.

I returned in a few days with my unverified driver's license, my passport, the document with my social security number, and the required two pieces of mail. She did some work on the computer and came back to me and said, "I can't proceed. The computer won't let me go forward." I asked, "What does that mean?" She explained that my social security information doesn't match their computer records and the program won't allow her to go to the next step in the process. After repeatedly questioning her she gave me the most information allowable, "You have two things that don't match on your social security information." I said, "This is easy because it happens all the time, they've misspelled one of my two names, either it says Niles with an s, or Rogers without a d?" She said, "That's one of the problems but there's an even bigger one!" I asked how big and she said, "I can't tell you."

At that point it gets semi-hostile and she said that I must go to the hospital where I was born and get a copy of my original birth certificate. I explained that I was given up for adoption at birth. When they recorded this birth I was called Baby Boy Goodman. I tell her, "There's no document with the name Rodgers on it but I've had a passport since I was 19 years old. The government agency that issued it required better documentation than my birth certificate, so shouldn't this be good enough?" "I'm sorry," she says, "but that's what you have to do!" At that point I didn't realize the hellish trip that I was about to embark upon.

I made the first part of this blog post a week ago because I thought there'd be a happy ending by now. Today is Thanksgiving Day and I'm in Las Vegas, Nevada visiting my mother. I travelled here with my unverified driver's license and a birth certificate. I had to apply for a Japanese work visa and had to submit my passport. As of now I'm Still in Limbo WTF?

My memoir, "Le Freak"

If you've read my biography Le Freak, you may remember that my maternal grandfather fled Georgia after he'd beaten a white man he'd caught raping his sister. Upon arriving in New Jersey, he saw a Goodman's Egg Noodle billboard outside the Holland Tunnel and appropriated the name believing that people would see him as a "good man." At the time he had no idea who Jewish people were and that Goodman was primarily a Jewish name.

In New York City the black and Jewish communities were closely aligned, especially because of working together in the garment business. My stepfather Bobby was Jewish, worked in the clothing business, and was best friends with my mother's friends as well as my biological father, Nile Rodgers. Bobby's surname was Glanzrock, and my mom's was Goodman.

Around her thirteenth birthday Mom had sex with Nile, and became pregnant. The school system pressured her into giving me up for adoption at birth. I became a ward of the state named Baby Boy Goodman. (Sounds like a blues guitarist.) Within a few months, my mother's maternal instinct got the better of her, she reclaimed me, and named me after my biological father Nile Rodgers.

On September 6, 2012, I went to renew my driver's license and that was The Beginning of A Nightmare.

(To be continued...)

Montreux Jazz CEO Claude Nobs was also my first European Tour Manager in 1978

This past summer I had the extreme pleasure of playing the Montreux Jazz Festival once again. They wanted to honor me but I wanted to honor the music that changed my life - dance music. I started out playing classical music as a child primarily, became a jazz session-player / club-date musician as a young adult - until I evolved into a dance music composer / producer / performer.

I named my all-night festival within a festival: FREAKOUT MONTREUX! The Evolution of Dance Music - and I used this night to tell the story of my personal evolution. Almost everyone on the program has played An Important Role In My Life.

Explaining why I love vinyl in a BBC TV Special on vinyl recordings

I've just finished shooting a BBC TV Special on vinyl recordings. I still make vinyl recordings on every record that I can. I went into my basement and found some amazing recordings. Everything from my very first CHIC record all the way up to my current video game soundtracks. There's Nothing Like Vinyl.

It's a week after hurricane Sandy struck the northeast coast of the USA

It's a week after hurricane Sandy struck the northeast coast of the USA. Though I'll have to do a lot of cleaning up and repairs, my home is relatively unscathed.

Today, I was asked by people whom I work with to come out to Staten Island, the 5th borough of New York City, to see their devastation first hand. What I saw was unbelievable. Boats, houses, trucks, and cars where thrown around like toy pieces. I can only imagine the nightly horror when it's cold and dark as this area is still without power.

I saw and heard about acts of sacrifice and overwhelming kindness as well as many stories of Heartbreak, Death and Destruction.

It's Halloween night and Lower Manhattan is still blacked-out in the aftermath of hurricane Sandy

To say this has been an unusual week could be the understatement of the year. As I write this it's Halloween night and Lower Manhattan is still blacked-out in the aftermath of hurricane Sandy, my assistant Sooze, has been trapped in her high-rise apartment building for the last two days because her lobby is underwater (she'll be rescued tomorrow).

I still have many friends stranded here from around the world because the airports are closed, and we were forced to reschedule our annual We Are Family Foundation gala. Three days later the Ballroom still has no electricity.

Though it's Halloween, which is usually festive and my ex-partner Bernard Edwards' birthday, I feel helpless because all the things I've just mentioned are beyond my control. I've accepted my situation and tried to make the best of it. At least the kids had a good Halloween Party in My Building.