At the time of Let’s Dance’s arrival in April 1983, David Bowie hadn’t released an album in two-andhalf years. His first long-player since parting ways with RCA, the Nile Rodgers-produced Let’s Dance would become Bowie’s biggest-selling album, shifting more than 10 million copies worldwide. But while he won many new fans with the LP, its super-polished, commercial dance-rock sound alarmed many of his older followers. The record was the first in seven years not to be produced by long-time cohort Tony Visconti and Rodgers revealed Bowie had approached him, telling the Chic guitarist, “You make hits”. It was said that Bowie showed Rodgers a photograph of a long-haired, red-suited Little Richard, getting into a red Cadillac convertible. “Nile, darling,” Bowie told him, “that’s what I want my album to sound like.”