1984 · Behind the Songs
A New York electro-funk duo wrote it; HBO aired it; the dance floor claimed it.
By 1984, Chaka Khan was deep into her most electronic era. “This Is My Night,” from the album I Feel for You, was written by Mic Murphy and David Frank — the duo behind the New York electro-funk act The System — and produced by Arif Mardin, the veteran who had guided her solo debut six years earlier. Issued as a single in January 1985 with “Caught in the Act” on the flip side, it arrived in several shapes: a 3:56 seven-inch, a 6:11 twelve-inch, the 4:38 album cut, and later a 5:07 remix for the 1989 remix album.
The charts told a split story. The song spent a week at No. 1 on Billboard’s Dance Club Songs chart and reached No. 11 on the R&B chart, yet stalled at No. 60 on the Hot 100 — the sound of a record that belonged to the clubs more than to pop radio. Abroad it fared better in places: No. 14 in Britain, No. 7 in Ireland, No. 12 in Belgium and No. 20 in the Netherlands.
Then came the stranger afterlives. From May to November 1985, a variation of the track served as the theme for HBO’s “Next On” bumpers and promos during the network’s “Make the Magic Shine” campaign — meaning millions heard Khan’s voice without ever buying the single. Decades later, the song walked onto the runway of RuPaul’s Drag Race, where Widow Von’Du and Jan lip-synced to it in season twelve with Khan herself watching as a guest judge.