Modern Talking Solo careers
 The songs before the first split were produced in a style that can be vaguely described as Euro Disco. At the time (mid 80s) central/east and southern Europeans, used to call this music style Italo-disco. Also, many dance schools in Eastern Europe, used to teach this music style in a discofox way, so some remember it as discofox. In 1998 Bohlen quoted the hit single Precious Little Diamond by Fox the Fox as his inspiration for using falsetto choruses. Further influences include German-language Schlager music, disco pop (Bee Gees) and romantic English-language songs of Italian and French origin, like Gazebo's I Like Chopin. Some of the lyrics were reminiscent of Hot Chocolate. After the 1998 reunion Bohlen produced Eurodance (with heavy mid 90s euro-house influences), as well as American-style MOR ballads.
The songs where originally recorded using up to five background singers; in live situations the songs were performed using playback. Anders did begin to perform the songs live when he toured the world shortly after the break-up. In the late 90's Bohlen and Anders went on their first official tours under the band name.
Global sales of Modern Talking records were 120 million units, according to BMG in June 2003, and they have become the biggest-selling German music act in history, so far outselling even Frank Farian's projects Boney M and Milli Vanilli, Michael Cretu's Enigma, Sandra, the Scorpions, Snap! and Rammstein.
Dieter Bohlen also worked with other artists even while Modern Talking existed, among them Chris Norman of Smokie fame whose song Midnight Lady (1986) remains Bohlen's most popular composition. He also wrote a large number of disco tracks for C.C.Catch (House of Mystic Lights) using an accelerated, less romantic sound. Some English Bohlen songs like You're My Heart, You're My Soul were also recorded with German lyrics by Mary Roos using the same playback tracks. When Modern Talking split up in 1987, a number of tracks written for the last album were instead moved onto Dieter Bohlen's first solo album which appeared almost at the same time, among them his first solo single Sorry Little Sarah. Bohlen's solo project was called Blue System, although it was basically him, Modern Talking co-producer Luis Rodriguez, and the familiar background singers. At the time, a lot of listeners couldn't get used to the voice changing while the music stayed similar. The success of Blue System in Germany declined after the third album and Bohlen later admitted that he lost touch with developments in the music scene. [citation needed]
|
