In the 1980s, a big night out meant my brothers and mates donning our shiny shirts, necking several pints of Tennent’s, then shuffling around the dancefloor of Pier 39 nightclub in Cleethorpes to the sound of George Benson’s Give Me the Night.
Decades later I found out that the person who wrote this song, Rod Temperton, was a former fish filleter, born down the road from that now-defunct nightspot. He also played in the band Heatwave, wrote on Michael Jackson’s Thriller album and has a back catalogue that puts him in the pantheon of great songwriters. I love the pictures of Rod next to Quincy Jones in the studios of LA or hearing his Lincolnshire accent talking about writing for Donna Summer. Despite his monumental success, he was known as The Invisible Man in the music industry owing to his low profile.
