Showing posts with label Dschinghis Khan. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Dschinghis Khan. Show all posts

Saturday, April 16, 2011

German Classics: Dschinghis Khan - The Royal Sprites

With Eurovision 2011 in Düsseldorf, it's time for some more German Classics at Eurocovers.
This is a version of the 1979 German entry Dschinghis Khan (เจงกิสข่าน) by legendary Thai band The Royal Sprites (รอยัล สไปรท์ส) They made the song popular in Thailand in 1981.  

Older Eurocovers post with Dschinghis Khan:
Joshua (Chinese)
Vladimir Devyatov and Amarhuu Borhuu (Russian)
and some animated Dschinghis Khan offspring (Korean / Finnish).

I have also updated the document on Dschinghis Khan.
Find out all about Dschinghis Khan's own versions and 128 coverversions in this word document.

For all your release news, versions info and chart updates on the 2011 contest, please check out The Düsseldorf Collection.

and... HAPPY RECORD STORE DAY

Friday, May 01, 2009

Чингисхан - The Moscow Weeks - Dschinghis Khan

The Moscow Weeks have finally arrived. The delegations (and Teach In!, more about that later) are arriving in Moscow and the first rehearsals for Eurovision are this weekend. I've been digging for some Russia Related Eurocovers to relieve the unbearable tension and I'll present them here in the coming weeks.

Link-o-rama in Eurovision 2009: Ralph Siegel, German composer has his 19th song in the competition this year. Just Get Out Of My Life by Andrea Demirovic (singing for Montenegro) is written by Siegel with lyricist Bern Meinunger (for whom it is his 12th Eurovision song).

Bye Bye I Love You
Siegels first Eurovision effort was Bye Bye I Love You by Ireen Sheer which ended 4th in 1974 for Luxembourg. Most of his songs were for Germany including the country's only winner and international #1 hit Ein Bisschen Frieden (Nicole 1982) and a few of the biggest German Eurovision hits like Johnny Blue (Lena Valaitis, 1981) and Lass Die Sonne In Dein Herz (Wind, 1987).
Russian lyrics were written for Ein Bisschen Frieden but I don't know if Nicole ever recorded that in the studio. However she did perform the Russian version Nemnogo Mir on a TV show (Der Goldene Einz 1992)

Huh, Hah, Dschinghis Khan
The first one Siegel and Meinunger wrote together was the biggest hit of them all. Dschinghis Khan by Dschinghis Khan (2nd in 1979) was a #1 hit and stayed on the German charts for 29 weeks.
Dschinghis Khan, the band, went on to have a succesful string of hits and hitalbums serenading a colourful collection of historic mostly dead villians and often fictional heroes (and gnomes). Mata Hari, James Bond, Billy The Kid, Rocky Marciano, Tut Ench Amun, Pablo Picasso, Ivanhoe and on….. They were also very fond of their geography with titles like Himalaya, Israel Israel, Madagaskar, Rome, Sahara, Machu Picchu, Goodbye Hawaii and their 2nd biggest hit Moskau. And all this in a 5 year - 5 album span. Tacky? sure, Corny? of course, Fabulous? Yes!!. Do yourself a favour and buy a greatest hits CD.

The circle is round if you check out the remixes of this years Montenegro entry (all versions here at Limark, official). The Moscow remix is spiced up with samples from the old Dschinghis Khan hit about this years Eurovision host city Moscow, Moskau, Москва.

Dschinghis Khan, the song, is currently #19 in the top 20 most covered Eurovision songs with 121 versions listed. Given the subject of the song (check yer wiki) it's no surprise that many of the coverversions are from Asia with versions in Japanese, Mandarin, Cantonese, Korean and Thai. In 2008 a version by Berryz Koubou (see this post) was a hit in Japan)

Чингисхан
Владимир Девятов и Амархуу Борхуу
But it's the Moscow Weeks, so here is a Russian version of Dschinghis Khan. It's by
Vladimir Devyatov & Amarhuu Borhuu. I don't know much about them, but I know they toured performed together in a musictheatre show. Amarhuu Borhuu is from Mongolian descent and has spent some time in Premier Ministr, the band that represented Russia in Eurovision in 2002 with Northern Girl. But Borhuu wasn't in the band at that time.
I don't know if the song was ever released on a CD but it can be found on several Russian mp3 discs like the one pictured.

We Can't Live Without Music
Another Siegel/Meinunger entry that was covered in Russian is I Can't Live Without Music from 2002, originally by Corinna May who ended 21st for Germany.
It was recorded by Anastas!a Stotskaya (Анастасия Стоцкая) who participated in the 2005 Russian preselection with Shadows (Dance All Around Me). The song is titled Музыка и я (Music & Me) and was released on the album Anastas!a Stotskaya from 2003 (limited edition only)

On a personal note: Ralph Siegel and Bernd Meinunger's body of work has made them the absolute top of the who is who of Eurovision. They deserve unconditional respect for all the good stuff. Don't let the cheesy mishaps like Switzerland 2006, Germany 1992 or Luxembourg 1985 stand in the way of the absolute pop-brilliance of Dschinghis Khan, Johnny Blue, Theater, Le Papa Pingouin, Wir Geben 'ne Party and Just Get Out Of My Life.
Extra cudos go to Ralph Siegel for founding Jupiter in 1974, a record label that brought us many Eurovision releases over the past decades often including the not so obvious hits.



More Dschinghis Khan at Eurocovers.
Buy Dschinghis Khan CDs and collectables at BeaRecords
Dschinghis Khan Official site  and fansite

Friday, March 21, 2008

Some Eurocovers CD tips

Kraljevi Ulice (Kings of the street) are this years Croatian entrants to the Eurovision Song Contest in Belgrade. They team up with 75 year old 'rapper' 75 cents on their song Romanca.
The song mixes the sentiments of and old Russian folksong with the coolness of the Buena Vistas. See the video here.

Romanca can be found on their new album Zemlja pleše which also includes a coverversion of Bila Je Tako Lijepa, originally Elle Etait Si Jolie, Alain Barrieres 1963 entry for France.
The Kraljevi Ulice album is distributed by MenArt records.
In the Eurocovers post about Pekinška Patka & Dragan Stojnić you can find find out more about Bila Je Tako Lijepa and hear two older Balkan covers of the song.

Maia Hirasawa
In Sweden Maia Hirasawa has reissued her acclaimed CD Though, I'm Just Me. The new version has some bonus tracks including a stunning coverversion of last years Swedish glam entry by The Ark: The Worrying Kind.
She performed the song in the interval of this years Swedish Melodifestivalen final.
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(CD on BAM / Razzia-0-77)
You can see Maia 'rocking' the Globen with the song at this Youtube.
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http://www.maiahirasawa.com/
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Berryz 工房And with Maia Hirasawa being from Japan and all, a bridge to Berryz Koubou is quickly made. The Hello! Project group (a girl group with ever changing members) has released a new single and it's a Japanese version of Dschinghis Khan, Germany's and Ralph Siegels best ever entry (from 1979).
The single is released in Japan on three formats. A regular cdsingle which also includes the instrumental version, a DVD single and a limited edition CD with two versions and a making of video. (Piccolo Town records)
It's available from CDJapan
See Berryz Koubou's fun version in this Youtube

Sunday, December 17, 2006

The offspring of Dschinghis Khan

Here's some lovely annoying versions of Dschinghis Khan.
It seems the Ralph Siegel classic about the man who gave his genes to 1 in every 200 men living today is still going strong and spreading now beyond the world gene pool into animation and to your cellphones.

We already had the annoying finnish cellphone chipmunk Pikku Orava and now I found two Baby versions from Korea which are equally irritating.

One has the innocent name Bebe Queen and the other is published by Dreamwiz or something (I really haven't got a clue, maybe you do???).
Both versions are just a minute long and made in 2006.
There will be more Dschinghis Khan features in the future with versions from all over the world.
-----------------------That dreamwiz version / Bebe Queen / Pikku Orava

베베퀸 Bebe Queen - 징기스칸쏭 (from cdsingle)
동방공주 Dreamwiz -징기스칸쏭 (from kids CD)
Pikku Orava - Tsingis Khan from CD 'Uusi Ceedee'

Tuesday, December 12, 2006

Edina Pop - Marika Késmárky

Here are some Eurovision coverversions by Dschinghis Khan member Edina Pop.
Way before the success with Dschinghis khan recorded some popular ESC tunes.

Edina Pop was born in Hungary and she made a (now collectable) LP under her own name Marika Késmárky (or Késmárky Marika as the Hungarians like to say).
The 1970 LP includes Kopp, Kopp…, a hungarian version of Knock Knock, who's there, the song made famous by Mary Hopkin.
She also recorded the same song in German as Komm, komm zu mir.

Another song she tackled is the Spanish co-winner Vivo Cantando. Her version, Zwischen Wolga und Don is an odd cover which includes a part that wasnt in the original, but that can be heard in several other covers like the one by Birthe Kjaer (Denmark) or Arie Ribbens (Netherlands).

Was soll ich tun is a coverversion of the number 4 from 1972: Als het om de liefde gaat by Sandra and Andres (Netherlands).

Edina Pop also recorded a German version of La La La, the 1968 winner by Massiel, and it seems she also recorded a solo version of Dschinghis Khan, but I have no details about these.

Edina Pop is still going strong and you can find her website here. http://www.edinapop.de/

Coming soon: 2007 - Year Of The Puppet