6. "BLUE SYSTEM" AND OTHER SINGERS

While Thomas Anders is singing Dieter's songs in the USSR, Dieter is presenting his new project, called Blue System. On 1 Oct. 1987, he appears in the programm Tele Ass. The first Blue System single released is Sorry little Sarah. With this samba number, Dieter shows that he wants to put forward a totally different sound. This single wasn't a number one hit, but the song was still a top ten entry. The weird thing is that Dieter was a concurrent of his own at this period : In the garden of Venus had still to be released ! Dieter Bohlen had to manage that the earlier Modern Talking fans would become Blue System fans ... In November was the first Blue System album released : Walking on a rainbow. From this album the first Blue System single was released : Sorry little Sarah. Dieter about this song : "After Modern Talking, I thought a long time what could I do now, and we never had a samba-hit in Germany. So it was for me a big challenge to write a samba title." Around Christmas, Dieter received a telephone call from the manager from Sylvester Stallone's wife, called Briggite Nielsen. Mister Stallone offered Dieter about 600.000 $ to convince Dieter of his wife's voice-quality. Dieter flew to the Spiama studio in L.A. After recording some demotapes with Brigitte, Dieter went back to Germany and improved the demos. The project fell to the ground, because Brigitte's lawyers decided that Dieter might only wrote three songs for her. After this news, Dieter wasn't anymore interested ... In the beginning of 1988, Dieter moved to Ohlstedt, near Hamburg. Dieter fitted a 40 m square large studio up. This shows that Dieter likes to work alone, before others hear the result. With the help of synthesizers, sequencers and drummachines, he can deliver an almost ready-made production. Because the result isn't perfect to his standards, he finishes the product in an other studio where there are more possibilities. The studio in his home has also the advantage that he's near to his family. In Mars '88, the second Blue System, My bed is too big, was released. The video was made in Death Valley (California). At the same time, a video was shot in Las Vegas for the song House of mystic lights by C.C.Catch. This track is available on the album Diamonds, which is in fact a greatest hits album. But the interesting fact of this album, is that there were three tracks never released before : House of mystic lights, Don't shoot my sheriff tonight and Do you love as you look. The same year, Dieter wrote the fifth album for Caro : Big fun. In 1989, the album Classics was released : again a compilation album. All of a sudden comes the news that C.C.Catch broke a contract with Dieter. Nobody expected that such a good and fuitful co-operation through all those years, would change into a quarrel between the two. The quarrel resulted even in a court : it went about Caro's nickname : C.C.Catch and the right to use it. Dieter claimed that just he had created Caro's scenic name and required her to change it, since she left him. Dieter lost the case and Caro M?ller is still allowed to use the name. The real reason of the quarrel ? Caroline wanted to change her musicstyle and image. So she just turned to an English composer and resigned the work with Dieter. Needles to say that all this facts have hurt Dieter a lot ... And not only Caroline leaves him, but also Chris Norman, who made his comeback with Dieter's help. However, the sorrow is dispelled by Dieter's second child Marvin Benjamin. ( 21 dec. 1988). Okay, back to Blue System again .... Around Christmas, the second Blue System album was released : Body Heat. The lp is preced by the naughty song My bed is too big. Apart from this hit on the album are songs as Under my skin, Love suite and the ballad Silent water. This song was also used in an episode of the German serial Tatort, which gave Dieter the opportunity to play a role as a murderer. On 26 Mars, Blue System appeared for the first time live on stage. This happened in the Alstendorfer sports hall, Hamburg. The radiostation Radio Schleswig Holstein organised this, because they wanted to give Dieter a distinction. It was very clear that Dieter was emotional when he received this price. He thanked the radiostation and the public with the words : "Thanks to my fans who were faithful to me." Blue System sang the songs Sorry little Sarah and an acoustic version of My bed is too big. In October, the third video Under my skin, got some headlines in the papers like 'Dieter's horror video' or 'Dieter's torture-chamber'. The German ZDF-channel found the video too randy and they required a new video for Ronny's Pop Show. The crew had to work a whole night on a new, 'cleaner' version. So, in Ronny's Pop Show there was another video played than in Formel Eins on the ARD-channel. The video for the single When Sarah smiles contains some material from the videos My bed is too big and Sorry little Sarah. Furthermore, there are scenes where Dieter stand on reefs. These shots were made on Ibiza. In the autumn 1989, the third album was released Twilight, with the magnificent number 1 hit Magic Symphony. This song was presented for the first time in the tv-show Start ins Gl?ck. After three weeks been released, Magic Symhony was already in the top 10 ! The second track on the album is Love me on the rocks, a very dynamic song. Moscow was used as decor for the video of this song. In this video, scenes are showed how it went on on the first live appearance in Moscow. On 28.10.89 Dieter received a title for the most succesful German composer and producer. This happened in the show Tag des Deutschen Schlagers. At the time, Blue System is formed by Dieter Bohlen. Achim Vogel (guitar) and Michael Rollin (drums). Let's just remind that at first beside Dieter the members of Blue System were Achim Vogel (guitar), Frank Otto (Drums), sonnyboy Snoopy (keyboards) and Carribean girl Jeanne Dupuy (backing vocals). At the end of 1989, Dieter starts to produce no less a person than Engelbert Humperdinck. The result is the album Ich denk an dich. It's very curious that Dieter adjusted to the style of Engelbert. His songs on this record do not resemble those he wrote for Modern Talking, Blue System or his other artists.The songs for Engelbert are rather destined for an older generation of listeners, but it doesn't mean of course that they aren't listenable. On the contrary, they are very good and perhaps it's great when a music producer can change his style so easily ! At the same time, Dieter wrote also a song for Lory Bonnie Bianco : A cry in the night. Dieter revives also the group Smokie with the song Young hearts. And so we reach February 1990, when Dieter becomes again father. This time it's a girl. Her name is Marielin.(23 Febr. 1990) In August 1990, Blue System released a new album called Obsession. Several singles were released from this album. As for When Sarah smiles, Ibiza was also used for the video Love is such a lonely sword. In this video, you see also his friend Nadja abd el Farrag. (She's Sudanese/German and was born on 5 Febr. 1965 in Hamburg. Dieter met her in the Hamburg disco Mezzanotte.) The crew filmed in Cala Comte. The location was a huge, white villa, facing to the rockisle Es Vedra. In this video, Dieter plays the grand piano. The piano stands varied on a sailer (the Midnight Merlin), or under water or on the breakers of a beach. For the video was an extra budget of 10.000 $ to keep the grand piano floating. For the aerial shots, a cameraman was hanging on a paraglider. In April 1990, Dieter flew to Kenia to make the video for the single 48 hours. In the video, Dieter drives a jeep through the Travo Wildpark, where he meets the beautiful Nadja in a 'Massai' village. After the return to Germany, Blue System was reinforced by Joe Koli (bass), Achim Strieben (keyboards) and two girls Afro & Sandra (background vocals, dance). At that time, Dieter and Nadja lived in a huge, white house in Quickborn (10 km from Hamburg), so that Dieter could see more often his children, who stay with Erika in Hamburg. The year 1990 comes to an end with the video All around the world. This video includes all the hits from 1987 till 1990. In the summer of 1991, another Blue System is been released : Seeds of heaven, with a none too heavenly single called Lucifer. One of Dieter's greatest wishes came out on 21 Aug. 1991, when he sang a duet with Dionne Warwick in a L.A. studio. Dieter was already thinking on a duet with her, when he saw a concert of her in Las Vegas in 1989. When he was back in Germany, he started to made a demo-tape of It's all over and sended the tape. The tape landed on the desk of her manager Clive Davis, who listened to the tape. He was enthousiastic about the tape and so did Dionne. On 20 Aug., they called Dieter if he could fly to L.A. The song was recorded in the Lion's Share Studio I en II. The song and video were made in one day !


7. THE TOURS

Begin 1989, Dieter got an award from the Soviet artist-union. This award means that Dieter was the most successful artist in the USSR. Even the Beatles, Abba and Michael Jackson have never achieved this award. Dieter thanked the USSR on his manner by placing his incomes from the albums Twilight and Obsession to the disposal of the support against famine in the USSR. During this presentation, there were also some plans made of a coming tour through the USSR. This tour would start in November. When Dieter arrived at the airport in Moscow, there was an unexpected surprise for him. 15.000 fans were waiting for him. In the period between 3 and 16 Nov., Blue System gave 13 concerts. A lot of weeks before, these concerts were already sold out. About 400.000 fans went through the concerts. Only with the help of the police, Dieter managed to get in his car. Every floor of his hotel is filled with fans and at night his fans are waiting outside, while it's about -15C. On the end of the tour, Dieter Bohlen was entitled as 'the hero of the Russian youth'. It's one of the few titles conferred on international artists, before the USSR was official disbanded. In May 1990, Dieter started with a second tour through the USSR. 21 concerts were on the programm and between 20 ? 45.000 fans were at each concert. After this tour, Blue System went to the DDR where they gave seven concerts. On 21 July, Blue System appeared in Leipzig as mainattraction on the 'Leipziger Tanzhouse festival', where 60.000 people saw the show. Almost one year after, on 1 and 2 June, Dieter appeared at the Moscow Olympia stadium together with other German groups. The initiator of this event was Jurgen Miller, who is also the tourmanager of Blue System. This man is also the father of C.C.Catch ! About 50.000 spectators watched the two-days during concert. Also C.C.Catch did her appearance, although her latest single appeared in 1989. The proceeds of these benefit-concerts were in favour of the victims of Tsjernobyl. After these concerts, Dieter stayed until 14 June in the USSR and toured for the third time. The tour ended in some other countries of the former Eastern bloc.