Alphaville is a German
synthpop group which gained popularity in the
1980s. The founding members were Marian Gold (real name Hartwig
Schierbaum, born May 26, 1954 in Herford
), Bernhard Lloyd (real name Bernhard
Gößling, born June 6, 1960 in Enger
, North
Rhine-Westphalia
), and Frank Mertens
(real name Frank Sorgatz, born October 26, 1961 in Enger, North
Rhine-Westphalia). The band was at first named
Forever Young before changing to Alphaville. They
are best known for their two biggest hits, "
Big in Japan" and "
Forever Young".
Beginnings
Alphaville was born in early 1982, when Marian Gold and Bernhard
Lloyd met each other at the music project
Nelson
Community. Some months later, Frank Mertens joined the
project. Together the three wrote
Forever Young and
recorded their first demo of the same name. In 1984, the
newly-renamed Alphaville released their debut single, "Big in
Japan", which Gold wrote in 1979 after hearing the music of
Holly Johnson's band
Big in Japan. In autumn 1984, they
released their debut album,
Forever Young. Despite
its success, Frank Mertens left the band that year and was replaced
in January 1985 by
Ricky Echolette
(born Wolfgang Neucaus, in
Cologne on 7
August 1960), who was credited on the
Forever Young
album.
"Big In
Japan" was Alphaville's biggest hit, topping the charts in Germany, Greece
, Switzerland
, Sweden
, Venezuela
and the U.S.
Billboard Dance Chart (the group's
only Top 10 on any Billboard chart).
The single also
reached the Top Five in Italy
, the
Netherlands
, Norway
, Austria
, Ireland
and South Africa. It became the group's
only Top 20 single in the UK
, peaking at
#8.
The band's next two singles, "
Sounds Like a Melody" and "
Forever Young," were also
both
European Top 5 successes, although the
former track failed to make an impression on the American
charts.
Amid
reports that pop star Laura Branigan
was featuring the song on her next album, Hold Me, Alphaville's
"Forever Young" was re-released as a single in the US
, but it did not prove to be massively
popular. Branigan's version, though promoted on stickers
adorning the album, subsequently remained an album cut in the US.
She would go on to perform the song as an encore at nearly every
concert she performed, until her death in 2004. The Alphaville
version was released a third time in the US in 1988, to promote
Alphaville: The Singles Collection, and peaked at #65,
their highest charting (and also last) single on the
Billboard Hot 100. International
re-releases of Alphaville's "Forever Young" followed in 1989, 1993,
1996, 1999, 2001 and 2005. Several covers have been recorded and
remixed, featuring male or female vocalists often erroneously
attributed to be Alphaville's Marian Gold or Laura Branigan.
Afternoons in Utopia
In 1986,
their second album, Afternoons
in Utopia, was successfully released and its first single
"Dance with Me" was a Top 20 hit in Germany, France
, Norway,
Sweden, Switzerland, South Africa and in the US Hot Maxi, and reached the Top 30
in Austria, Italy and in the US Hot
Dance. The
LP was followed up in
1989 with
The Breathtaking
Blue, including the acclaimed (if not so successful)
singles "Romeos" and "Mysteries of Love". The album was released as
a
CD+G, including black & white stills with
original lyrics and German translation. As an alternative to
individual
music videos, the band
enlisted nine directors, among them
Godfrey Reggio (
Koyaanisqatsi), to create a film entitled
Songlines
based on the album's tracks.
The next album,
Prostitute, was not
released until 1994. In 1996, Ricky Echolette left the band.
Salvation, a
back-to-the-roots opus, followed in 1997.
Stark Naked and Absolutely
Live was released in 2000, followed by the remix album
Forever Pop the following year.
A DVD—Little America—was released in 2001,
documenting two concerts performed in Salt Lake
City, Utah
.
Bernhard Lloyd did not contribute to the 2003
CrazyShow album, and shortly after its
release on March 18 of that year, he officially left the group. The
current core stage members of Alphaville are Marian Gold (vocals),
Martin Lister (keyboards), David Goodes (guitars) and Pierson
Grange (drums).
Projects
Gold has released two solo albums (
So Long Celeste, 1992, and
United, 1996, both mixing
personal creations and covers), alongside his work in the
band.
Lloyd also worked on a project named
Atlantic Popes with
singer
Max Holler, a 13-track CD. In
1996, Frank Mertens started a musical project called
Maelstrom, which was a combination of
ambient-style music, impressionistic and
colorful art in the form of paintings and sculptures, and etheric
poetry. This project seems now to have been
abandoned, though, as Mertens has not been visibly active with
it.
At present the band is still touring and working on new material
and have re-signed with WEA. Song titles for the next release
include "Gallery", "Around the Universe", "My Very Blood", and
"Sweet Dreams".
Discography
Alphaville in popular culture
Alphaville's song "
Forever Young" was featured
in the movie
Listen to Me
(1989) featuring
Kirk Cameron in one of
his first film roles. It appeared also in an episode of the sitcom
It's Always Sunny
in Philadelphia entitled
Underage
Drinking: A National Concern during a scene in which the
main characters attend a high-school prom. Additionally, "Forever
Young" was played in a high school prom-related scene in the 2004
film
Napoleon
Dynamite.
Swedish Melodic Metal Band
Embraced did a
cover of "
Big in Japan" on their
1998 Album
Amorous
Anathema. In 2000,
Guano Apes
also covered "Big in Japan" in their second full-length album,
Don't Give Me Names. A
puppet version of
Wayne Rooney sings a
karaoke version of "Big in Japan" on an episode of
I'm on Setanta Sports. Rooney's
team, Manchester United was in Japan that week for the FIFA World
Club Championship.
Oakley's 2005
snowboarding DVD entitled
The Community Project featured
Alphaville's "Big in Japan" in the Japan sequence. In 2008, "Big in
Japan" was featured in the commercial for the Swedish TV show
Stor i Japan (Translated:
Big in Japan) and was also used several times within the
show, using different cover versions as the opening theme.
VH1 Classic's show
120 Minutes often features the song.
In the first part of 2006, Australian guitar band
Youth Group took their remake of "Forever Young"
to #1 in the Official Australian Charts, thanks in part to exposure
the track had received from being on popular US TV series
The O.C. and its fifth TV
soundtrack CD,
Music from
the OC: Mix 5. In 2007 and 2008, "Forever Young" was used
in a commercial for
Tourism New Zealand in their Worldwide "100%
Pure New Zealand" Campaign. In 2009, "Forever Young" was featured
in
HBO's
Big
Love episode #27 after
Sarah
Henrickson tells her brother Ben in the sunrise after prom that
she is pregnant.
In 2009,
Jay-Z sampled the song "Forever
Young" for the chorus of his song "Young Forever", which appeared
as the final track on
The Blueprint
3. The chorus is sung by
Mr
Hudson.
References
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