AS the man behind Chic’s Le Freak, I Want Your Love, and Everybody Dance, Madonna's Like A Virgin, David Bowie’s Let’s Dance and Daft Punk's Get Lucky, Nile Rodgers knows a thing or two about what makes a hit record.

But he claims to have secretly made not one, but ten, with the late DJ Avicii after they formed a close friendship.

11 Avicii secretly recorded ten tracks before he died Credit: AP:Associated Press

Nile and Avicii, real name Tim Bergling, collaborated on 2013 song Lay Me Down, but Nile has now revealed they held a series of sessions in which they recorded an album’s-worth of content shortly before the Swede’s sudden death in April, aged 28.

Taking over my Bizarre column for the first time, Nile explained: “Between Avicii and me, there’s at least ten, at least.

“We laughed all the time. I used to say, ‘You put Tim and I in a room and we can do the entire Top 20 in, like, two or three weeks’.

“I’ve just been contacted about putting out my stuff, but I’ve got to see how it is because I was very close to Tim and the music we didn’t put out was extraordinary. He was blown away, as was I.

11 Music producer Nile Rodgers reveals he recorded music with the DJ Credit: Dan Jones - The Sun

11 The pair worked together on the 2013 track Lay Me Down Credit: Rex Features

“But, because of what I know, which I will not talk about, I want to make sure that whatever work I do would be to the benefit of the people Tim would want that project to benefit.”

It isn’t the only collection of tunes Nile has his mind on, though, as his band Chic have today released their album It’s About Time — appropriately titled as it’s their first in 26 years.

And as the most well-connected man in showbiz, he revealed he has an eye-watering 13,847 numbers in his phone book, so it’s no surprise he managed to get all-star collaborators including Lady Gaga, Craig David, Emeli Sande and Stefflon Don on board for the record. Nile explained: “Most of the time I make other people’s records, so what I did with this was a lot of those other people made my record with me.

“Then, as the album starts to get to a certain place, you start to see those people slowly disappear then it becomes more of my base unit, my people.

11 Avicii with Nile and Mike Einziger Credit: Rex Features

The most shocking moments from Avicii's now deleted documentary after his tragic death aged 28

“Then there’s this happy ending like, ‘Hey we’re rolling in the same town together’.”

And while it has taken a quarter of a century to make this album, Nile teased a second one will follow early next year, featuring the likes of Haim and Debbie Harry.

He turned 66 last week, but there’s certainly no stopping him.

READ ON FOR MORE OF NILE RODGERS' BIZARRE COLUMN

Hair we go again, Cher

NILE waited 26 years to release an album then his pal Cher dropped hers on the same day.

She kicked off the Australian leg of her Here We Go Again Tour with this kooky look on Wednesday night, ahead of the release of her Abba-themed album Dancing Queen today.

11 Cher dropped her new album on the same day as Nile Credit: EPA

Talking about Cher, who Nile and Chic will tour the US with next spring, he said: “I haven’t worked with her on a record. We’ve just hung out, so this is gonna be fun because I’ve known Cher a long time. She is a real entertainer and her show is like a spectacle. We’re exactly the opposite, we’re like the Grateful Dead of dance music.

“We just go out and play the song. There’s no spectacle, no dancers, no robots.”

Good Morning Britain's Richard Arnold makes awkward blunder during Cher interview

Nile's Bit

THE superstar is so busy he totally forgot he worked with actor and model Cara Delevingne three years ago. He said: “I do so many projects that it’s really difficult to keep track of them. I ask my assistant, ‘Hey man, what did we do last week?’”

Emeli is Queen of the disco

EMELI Sande’s known for her soppy ballads but Nile has made it his mission to change that – and turned other modern singers into disco stars too.

After he and Emeli worked together on a track entitled Queen for Chic’s album, she was so bowled over that she enlisted Nile to work on her third album.

11 Nile is working on changing Emeli Sande's style of music Credit: INSTAGRAM/NILE RODGERS

11 The producer has been working with Olly Murs Credit: INSTAGRAM/NILE RODGERS

11 Nile is also working the Shotgun singer George Ezra Credit: INSTAGRAM/NILE RODGERS

Nile explained: “I was working on her stuff and that’s how we got to the song on the album.

“I was like, ‘Yo Emeli, do you want to sing this?’ She was like, ‘Oh, OK cool’. Now I’m doing Emeli’s whole album. I did the one song and she said to her manager, ‘I want him to do my whole album’.”

He has also been recording with plenty of others, including George Ezra, since being named Chief Creative Adviser of London’s iconic Abbey Road Studios.

Nile said: “He came in with a song that’s very George Ezra-like and he started playing it and I started playing along with him. He went, ‘Wow, that’s cool, I like that’.” On a track he made with Olly Murs Nile said: “That s*** is smokin’. You aren’t going to believe it, like, ‘Wow, this is Olly?’

Olly Murs flexes his toned muscles as he sends luck to UFC contestant

“It’s so funky it’s unbelievable.”

Asked who else Nile has been working with, he explained: “Jorja Smith, Nao, Craig David was killer. I always do stuff with Disclosure, so I’ve got, like, five things pending with them now.

“I’ve got to get back to it, I love those dudes.”

They clearly love him, too.

Nile's Bit

NILE has worked with everyone from Sister Sledge to Duran Duran but now he wants to team up with some of the best of British talent. He revealed: “I love Stormzy. I haven’t done anything with him but I love him.”

Watching show not on my list

LOUIS TOMLINSON has signed Nile as his guest judge on The X Factor, as I revealed on Wednesday.

But the producer probably wasn’t entirely sure what was going on at the judges’ houses stage of the competition when they filmed in Ibiza this week.

11 Louis Tomlinson has signed Nile as his guest judge on The X Factor Credit: Getty - Contributor

Nile admitted he has never seen an episode of the ITV talent show, which last weekend saw singer Thomas Pound wow the judges as drag queen Lady Freida Wylde.

Asked about his thoughts on the programme,Nile said: “I can’t tell you because I’ve only done it as a performer, I’ve never watched it.

“But I was a performer, we had fun, we had a blast.

“As a matter of fact, when the acts were off set we did our own little skit called The Malcolm X Factor and I stood there and I played Malcolm X.

11 Drag queen Lady Freida Wylde wowed the judges on the show last weekend Credit: Rex Features

“I recited (his famous speech) Message To The Grass Roots to my band, they were trying to see which words I got right.”

I think that may have gone over judge Louis Walsh’s head.

Welsh cleaner Thomas returns to The X Factor as his alter ego Lady Freyda Wild

Nile's bit

NILE turned down the chance to produce DNCE’s 2015 hit Cake By The Ocean. He said: “I was supposed to do that but I just wasn’t available. Now I always make a joke and say, ‘Don’t worry dudes I’ve got it next time’.”

The UK tour CHIC will start their UK arena tour in December – and Nile insists fans can expect only good vibes. The group will play five dates across the country and he said: “Our repertoire is so deep that we could go any one of a million ways but we’ve chosen, after all these years, to be super positive.” He said the shows used to have a more “dynamic element” and sometimes go “darker” where the group would take people “up and down and up and down”. He added: “Then we found that what seems to feel better is if we start here and then go up and up.”

Fall brain scare

NILE has revealed he suffered yet another life-threatening health scare this year following his 2010 cancer diagnosis.

The hitmaker narrowly avoided potentially fatal brain damage in April when he tripped in his studio and bashed his head.

11 Nile revealed the Bizarre that he suffered yet another life-threatening health scare Credit: Dan Jones - The Sun

Nile, who broke his nose in the fall, said: “That was almost deadly. When I got to the doctor he said, ‘An inch higher, you could have been brain dead or certainly damaged for life’, and they said, ‘An inch lower, you’d have no teeth’.”

He also got the all-clear from the cancer in 2013.

At the time he feared it might kill him – or at the very least bring his career to a premature end.

Having quit drink and drugs in the Nineties, Nile is now fighting fit.

He might just want to be more careful next time he gets excited in the studio.

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