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Tuesday, December 22, 2015

Merry Christmas!!


Christmas is coming and we know what it means. Some singers take this chance for release their special songs dedicated to this season. This time we have to our dear Gina T., who sent us this christmas present to all her loyal followers, a nice song with a reggae touch that she sings with her brother, warm enough for the european winter and even perfect for enjoy in the summer time of South America. You can support Gina and buy the song here.




Another singer who wanted to give us her christmas wishes with her music is Lian Ross, she also released this song as present to all her fans.  The song is called Everything is Possible from her upcoming new album "And the Beat Goes On", produced by the Team 33.




Finally we have this nice surprise from Germany. Systems In Blue announced a special Christmas song that they will also release for free as present to all their fans. The song "Christmas In Blue" will be available as free download since 24th December 2015 till 14 January 2016.






Interview about Back In Blue

The french producer Johann Perrier aka. MS Project, the producer from Israel, Itamar Moraz and Detlef Wiedeke (producer and member of Systems In Blue), gave us a special Interview regarding the EP "Back In Blue", the more anticipated release of Systems In Blue.
For read this interview you can enter here

Happy holidays - Merry Christmas!! 





Friday, December 18, 2015

Talking with Fred Ventura (Part I)


Fred Ventura was in Perú some weeks ago. During his visit and after his show in Lima, he took a moment for talk with us. Here this special interview done by Talking Forever Fanclub, from Perú to the world.





How was your concert on last Saturday? How did you find the peruvian people?

The show was nice because the people was very warn and nice, like most of the Latin American people and Central American people. These people are real italo-lovers, so they really appreciated my music, the atmosphere was very nice.

You are now for the first time in Perú, we know you have a lot of fans in Mexico. Have you visited other Latin American countries?
 
Actually I only went to Mexico before. This is the first time I came to southern, so is the first time in South America, here in Perú. I was in Mexico several times, I started to go to Mexico in 1994, since then, I’ve been there maybe six times.
 
Your first song was in german, in how many languages did you sing? Have you try to sing in Spanish for example?
 
No, I’ve never tried to sing in Spanish. Actually, this record, “Zeit” was a big mistake, because I tried to be and sound like a german, but was impossible for an Italian, so this song was a tribute to my love for some german electronic music, but I think this was not a very good idea, thinking now from my point of view of today. But I never know, maybe I will sing one song in French but I never will try in Spanish, never. Not even Italian, Because I don’t like Italian language for my music.
 
How many languages can you speak?
 
I only speak, Italian, English and a little bit of Spanish
I also understand a bit French, but I don’t speak French.
 
Come you from a family of musicians or you are the first?
 
My family in certain way, is a family where music was always present, because my father was a very passionated musician, he had a job but he liked music, playing piano and guitar, and he was also a singer when he was very young, so music was always in my home. This is maybe the reason, at the time I was rejecting the imposition of learning music. I prefer to be free to decide what to do, if I like or not to play music or to play instruments
 
How did you start your musical career? Is true that you started as a drummer?
 
Yes is true, I started as a drummer in a local band, but it was too heavy for me to play drums, my idea was always to be a singer. So when I had the opportunity to switch from a drum to vocals, I took it immediately because the drummer was not for me, is too heavy.
 
...and how did you discover that you can sing?
 
I know, I was singing on top of other artist records, when you try to sing somebody else records, you understand if you have a voice that can be serious or not. It was almost a joke, for fun. I noticed that my voice could reach the same tones of the singer, it was very good for me, so had this idea to me, why not?,  why not the idea of be singer,  I was very young, I was 18.

Last year you released The Years (Go By), for the 30 anniversary of this song. Which are your impressions after all this time and what brings you this song with its popularity?
 
The song is in certain way, my most popular song, everywhere in the world I go is the same. I thought that was nice to pay respect to the people who I made the song with my producers of that time Turatti-Chieregato, so it was very nice,  to try to make something new out of it. It was not an easy thing to do because all of my fan djs and producers wanted to be part, the first idea was to make 4 versions, then it became 8, then became 12, so it was more like a tribute to the song and to my friends DJs and producers I collaborated since many years.
 
What do you think about the new productions of some of your old producers?, for example you just mentioned Miki Chieregato
 
Chieregato is an old time producer, he was my producer music in 1983- 1984. I know what he is doing now, but I don’t think anything about, I don’t listen to his music in nowadays.
We are not in a bad touch, but we don’t see each other since more than 25 years, he lives in United States, I live in Italy.
 
What do you think is the main reason the italodisco never dies?
 
Because the italodisco has a lot of melody and good rhytms, this is the most important part of the italodisco. Once you can dance and sing together, with one song, you have everything, so this is the main ingredient about italodisco, because usually the good italodisco records, have a lot of melodies, but also very good pomping rhytms.
 
We saw you together Ken Laszlo and TQ singing a song produced by Mirko Hirsh, Mirko belongs to the New Generation of Italo Disco producers. What is your opinion about the work of people like Mirko? and what do you think about the Italodisco of nowadays?
 
I don’t have an opinion, because actually Mirko is not so young anyway, he likes italodisco and he tries to make his own version of italodisco, but he sounds very german to me, he is actually german, so he sounds really german, you can make quality italo, you can make quality eurodisco, but it’s the same.    For me now, the more important thing, is that when I listen a song, a new italodisco song that was made now, I need to feel that there’s something fresh, this is why I like Andy Romano for example, because he is a very talented producer, his new music sounds are pretty fresh, even in his very 80’s influence.

Have you any favorite italodisco band or record now?
 
My favorite bands are not italodisco, where is italodisco now?, who are the producers of italodisco now?, there are not so many, there are, but more of the records that come out now, are old records that were released 30 years ago. So the producers of italodisco now are just a few here and there. So I mostly prefer to listen different music. My favorite bands are New Order, Pet Shop Boys from 80’s, these were my real influences, Yazoo, Dépêche Mode. About the italo, my favorite records, my sort of playlist can be like Gaznevada - I. C. Love Affair, Joy Yellow - Lover To Lover, Den Harrow - Mad Desire, Gazebo - Masterpiece. I am more fan of back to those days, but about today, I don’t have any favorite italo records.

And from general music?, maybe is there anybody with whom you would like to work?
 
I like some songs of contemporaries artists, the british records are the first, but there is a lot of good music now. So I really would like to work with some artists that belong to the best as, Billie Ray Martin from Electribe 101, or the singer of the Human League, Philip Oakey, or Paul Haig, I have some favorite artist with whom I would like to collaborate, but is not easy.

This next question, I am very interested in your opinion. Disco music has been always undervalued and even margined in the mainstream music. However singers as Donna Summer and composers like Giorgio Moroder have influenced a lot marking complete chapters in the story of music. What do you think is the more important reason that the disco style and its variations still don’t get enough respect?
 
Because people know the disco was music for fun, very easy to do, that is not true, but this is the opinion of people that like rock music. There are many people that don’t care about rock, just care about disco, it’s about an attitude that we have in life. If you like to go to clubs to dance, you like disco, you are in love with disco and you respect the producers of disco. If you don’t like to go to clubs, you don’t respect the music, you don’t respect the producers, you consider that they are inferior to other musicians. 
I think that in the disco field there were many genious in the past, people like Giorgio Moroder, Gino Soccio, Bobby Orlando, people like Patrick Cowley, this people really made, they invented, they created something. Now we are still all dependent on these people's music, because this music is an influence also for the producers of today like Daft Punk, it’s a bit like... the history of electronic disco is being made already 30 years ago.  What we do now, it is just to repeat, what was done before. I would like to try to do, and produce with good quality, but is very difficult to be totally innovating now, because technology is not giving you new sounds, or new technology.  You still can't make a revolution with the electronic music, we are still using the same sounds, that we were using in the 80’s, the synthetizer, the drumb machine, to produce the sort similar music.

What do you think about latin music?

I don’t have a catch about that latin music in general, it’s just music that sometimes I hear  in the streets or in the clubs, also in Italy because many Italian people love to go to dance latin music, but honestly I am more interested in the latin electronic, or rock, alternative rock side of the music. I know when I go to Mexico, I found, there is a lot of very good  electronic or alternative rock, this is what I usually try to check when I go abroad.

The media offers many advantages for the release of new music projects, it also improve the communication between the artists with their fans and viceversa; however it also has a negative side that has been damaging the music industry, when a new record is released, the songs can be easily pirated. Which is your opinion regarding the illegal downloads that can be spread by the network?
 
The problem now is not the illegal downloads anymore for me, the problem is that people don’t buy music anymore, because they can stream it, on Spotify or on Youtube, and it’s for free, not even pirated, so this is not giving back the right amount of royalties to the producers and to the artists. When we think we sold the soul of musicians to new technologies, mp3 players, computers, laptops or i-pads, this is the new rock’n’ roll, and I don’t like. 
I think technology is very important to us, is giving us the promotion, the image to make people know about that, but that is also taking our art, our production, our music.  People just play a song on Spotify, thinking that they are also respecting the artists, but this people don’t know that behind there is a machine working that is not giving the right payment to the artists, this is why more artists have to find a new job or they quit from music, because they can’t survive anymore.
 
Continuing with this subject and regarding the distribution of new releases. The production of physical records is not the same than before since many years already. It made more popular the digital releases. But also some options like the streaming platforms don’t bring the right retribution to musicians. How do you think should be the music distribution and purchase process in nowadays?

This is  the reason, the record label only release in vinyls, because the market for vinyls in Europe or USA, is going bigger and bigger, every year. So for me is very important to release vinyls because the people who love italodisco music, love to buy vinyls. They are into collecting the music, they are collectors. So this is the best way for release music, because once you have the record out, people buy and then other people check on Spotify on Youtube. First I release in vinyls and then after a couple of months I release the digital.
To release in physical form is better, this is part of the history of making music, I am not into digital release, digital for me is just something that you know is there but then you forget about it, is not part of your life, is not in your room, it’s virtual, you never know what can happen, maybe you lost everything and what you would do then.

Currently we have many young enthusiastic generations in all continents trying to produce their own music based in italodisco 80’s sounds and to continue with this legacy. What you would say to them?
 
I would say to them, to try to forget about the past and to try to think in something new in their music, in the music. I think you can listen the italodisco, get the influence, but then make something new, because if you just make simple italodisco, or exactly how was made 30 years ago, there is not point, nobody will notice you, people will always look for the original...
 

The second part will be published in the next months. We thanks to Fred Ventura and Discomania Perú for allow us to do this interview.

Friday, December 4, 2015

TQ & Linda Jo Rizzo

The new videoclip produced by Ian Bpm Nguyen team is available now. The song is "Life Is A Story", performed by TQ and Linda Jo Rizzo.

- English lyrics: Linda Jo Rizzo (Germany)
- Original song by Setus (Poland)
- Produced by Master Of Dreams (Russia)


Wednesday, December 2, 2015

Italodisco singers in Peru



Lima, main city of Peru, also known as "all bloods land", always has been a place with music for all tastes, but eurodisco music is one of the more hidden and difficult to find. Its popularity is even significantly less than other related styles like eurodance and synthpop, but not for be considered something of bad taste, the problem is due to the ignorance of its existence. In a market strongly dominated by latin music and where people has not any problem in listen the same exactly salsas and merengues from 30 years ago, the groups of people who meet and celebrate the eurodisco music are fewer and isolated. Those followers are mainly people over 30 years old, and people who still keep the nostalgy for those eighties hits like Sabrina with Boys Boys Boys, Lou Sern with Swiss Boy, Tarzan Boy from Baltimora or Brother Louie by Modern Talking. Music that nowadays is only possible to get throught internet or special contacts.

Suddenly we were caught by surprise when in a remote place in Lima and thanks to an independent promoter under the name of Discomania Perú, some posters announcing a show of Ken Laszlo, cult star for fans of Italo disco 80's appeared. Many got to see those posters but they could not believe it, it had to be fake or perhaps a local imitator. But in fact, was the same Ken Laszlo who for the first time arrived to Peru for have a show on 17 September.


  

Certainly we could prefer the show happened in a more centric place, accessible for everybody, because Lima is inmense and the eurodisco fans live so disperse, but we have to recognize that we are not Russia or Poland, nor even Mexico, we have not the media, not the budget, but we had to find a way for start it. And this is how this historical performing had to happen. Ken Laszlo himself gave us an unforgettable night singing his more famous hits to all his Peruvians followers, a dream come true for many of us. 
But the dream was not over with that. On 28 november was the show of Fred Ventura who in same way than Ken, he came for the first time to South America and Perú. 


Of course, our Talking Forever Eurodisco Fanclub had to be present, but our time with Ken Laszlo was really short, after his show we only got to find him in the airport before his departure. We had more chances with Fred, despite was not possible to cover his concert, he got to give me an interesting interview that I will publish soon.

Next year will continue bringing us more surprises for all eurodisco lovers from Peru and we hope that with the time we can reach the level of the great festivals, because South America deserves it too.   




 
 

Tuesday, November 17, 2015

Go Systems Go!!

Finally the long waited new EP of Systems In Blue was released!!. 
On July of this year we were informed about the collaboration between the french producer Johann Perrier and Systems In Blue. Since then, the expectation started to grow and with that, the pressure, we cannot avoid to comment that maybe the record is a result of a fast production, but the long silence of SIB was making their fans crazy, specially after the cancelation of their third album production. This fact was a sad new for the fans, however it didn't make to decrease their enthusiasm because they knew already that there were two new songs that SIB wished to share with them
So, thanks to the support of MS Project and Mr. Perrier, this production came to light now. The record include a radio version of "Go Systems Go" and "Children Of The Night" (the first formal two songs post-Rolf Köhler and with the voice of Olaf Senkbeil), the radio mix and extended versions from MS Project, two special "Point Of No Return" 10 anniversary mix versions, and two other special mix versions with the clear reference done in homage to Alex F. and Popcorn sounds, (a quote of Erich Honeker is included in the Axel F Mix, "Vorwärts immer, rückwärts nimmer!). Besides that, this release include the special participation of Itamar Moraz with two tracks. Itamar is a 80s purist producer and he put his part in this record (while we still wait for his own productions). So here is the new release, the EP "Back In Blue". You can get it in digital format here.

Other links:
 .
01   Go Systems Go (Radio Version)    3:18   
02   Children of the Night (Radio Version)    4:22   
03   Go Systems Go (MS Project Radio Edit)    3:38   
04   Children of the Night (MS Project Radio Edit)    4:34   
05   Children of the Night (Itamar Moraz Pure 80's Mix)    4:05   
06   Go Systems Go (Pop Corn Mix)    5:47   
07   Children of the Night (Axel F. Mix)    5:35   
08   Go Systems Go (MS Project Extended Mix)    6:43   
09   Children of the Night (MS Project Extended Mix)    7:21   
10   Point of No Return (MS Project 10th Anniversary Mix)    4:09   
11   Point of No Return (MS Project 10th Anniversary Extended Mix)    6:11   
12   Children of the Night (Itamar Moraz Pure 80's Karaoke Mix)  4:03 


Saturday, October 31, 2015

New Song of Tam Harrow

Tom Hooker performs a new song for Tam Harrow. The song is called Vodka Kaboom, another Tomik production and here you can enjoy the new videoclip.

MP3 HD 320kb available here: http://bit.ly/1PXVGvH
FLAC available here: http://bit.ly/1NEaBZE

Friday, October 30, 2015

Gazebo new album

The new album of Gazebo, "Reset", is available since now in his page
http://www.gazebo.info/Reset.html
In this video you can hear a gimpse of every song.


Tuesday, October 13, 2015

CCC & BBB Concert in Los Angeles, CA




The first show announced for CCCatch and Bad Boys Blue, took place on 10 October in the Hollywood Palladium. It was a wonderful show and here you can enjoy some of the impressions.







First came Bad Boys Blue and here's the tracklist they shared

01. Intro + A Train To Nowhere
02. You're A Woman
03. A World Without You (Michelle)
04. I Wanna Hear Your Heartbeat (Sunday Girl)
05. Lady In Black
06. I Totally Miss You
07. Pretty Young Girl
08. Kisses And Tears (My One And Only)
09. Gimme Gimme Your Lovin' (Little Lady)
10. Queen Of Hearts
11. Come Back And Stay
12. Baby Blue
13. A Bridge Of Heartaches
14. Owner Of My Dreams
15. Heavenly
16. Keep You Up All Night
17. Jungle In My Heart
18. Hungry For Love
19. Don't Walk Away, Suzanne
20. House Of Silence




The next show was CC Catch, she sang her classical hit songs like "Cause You Are Young", "Jump In My Car", "Heaven & Hell", "Nothing But A Heartache" and some rap megamixes. It was very celebrated but also created a bit discomfort in the audience because the public prefered the new wave sound and no rap songs.


There are still two shows coming in Dallas and Chicago.
*Thanks to Daniel Ma for the videos

Wednesday, July 15, 2015

CC Catch And Bad Boys Blue 30th Anniversary USA Tour

CC Catch and Bad Boys Blue are celebrating their 30th anniversary and for this special ocasion, they are announcing a tour together in USA.

The shows will be in the following dates and places: 

10/10/15- Los Angeles at The Hollywood Palladium

10/16/15- Dallas, TX at The Majestic Theatre  

10/17- Chicago at the Copernicus Center. Ticketing site http://copernicuscenter.org/c-c-catch-bad-boys-blue/


You can get more info about the tickets here.  


 

Friday, June 19, 2015

The comeback of Mark Ashley

Mark Ashley was always a big promise for the discofox in english, he called the attention of Modern Talking fans because his voice had a similar sound to the voice of Thomas Anders, then in 2008 he was produced by Systems In Blue for create the album Heartbreak Boulevard which in the opinion of many people was the higher point of his music career and made him internationally known and followed, but since 2011, after his participation in the RTL Super Talent where Dieter Bohlen was jury, his career almost collapsed, he signed an agreement that didn't allow him to make new songs, in this way we only had some covers and minor songs that make his image as "king od discofox" almost be forgotten. But this silence seems that is over now and for make his fans happy, he has announced his comeback with a new single that will be produced this time by Ronny Jentzsch from Fresh Fox



The single is announced for the next 26 June and his new album would come on november of this year. We can enjoy a live version of Baby Blue in this video.



You can follow his news by this new facebook site or visit the old one. We are looking forward to hear more about this new beginning of Mark Ashley, and wish him good luck!.

Monday, May 4, 2015

Tam Harrow, Italodisco never dies


Italodisco is a musical style that has refused to disappear despite the years. Actually it seems it is getting more fans over time, and we not only talk about an underground group of nostalgic people who continues listening the same music from 30 years ago. Currently there are numerous bands and musical projects which are trying to give a new face to this music and satisfy fans of all generations. It is true that this blog is dedicated to the German discofox music, but we also wrote about Retronic Voice, Italove and TQ before. Italodisco is closely related to discofox, actually the second is a german version and both are considered Eurodisco.

This year's surprise was Tam Harrow, a project that apparantly was born as a joke to Den Harrow by the same people who created him in 80s. The legendary team Chieregato-Hooker that in past produced a lot of hits for Den Harrow, Albert One, Tom Hooker, Fred Ventura, Eddy Huntington, and many more, reunited again to give life to this new character who they named Tam Harrow. Tom Hooker is responsible for the vocals and Miki for the music. And how this started?. While Hooker and Chieregato were experimenting between their own projects and some remakes of old hits from Den Harrow, they suddenly announced a new old track "Idiot" from a 80's famous singer called Tam Harrow that it seems is coming from an alternate reality. The song was promoted by a funny video where Tom parodied the more ridiculous dance movements of Den Harrow. 

In retrospect, is well known that Den, (Stefano Zandri), was only the image, the real voice was Tom Hooker and other singers, (similar to the story of our Dieter Bohlen from Modern Talking who only made lip sync in every show of MT), but the joke to Den did not end there. Few time later was released "Incredible", a song that had the same success of the previous one, making us wish for more and little by little we got this more. Although this duo were also trying to keep up with other simultaneous productions, they seemed to be forced to give more attention to Tam Harrow. In this way the first new came some days before the new year, a full album of 12 songs was going to be released soon. Was at the beginning of this year that the digital version was available. Each song is a tribute to Italodisco classics and we even have a tribute song to the Modern Talking style, with its characteristic high pitch choir which was made by the same Hooker. Can you Imagine if Systems In Blue collaborated with it?, we are not sure if they would be able to work together, as their personalities and styles seem opposites, but SIB always needs a vocal leader and dreams are not forbidden.



Hooker's voice always suited well with this style, it is manly enough and not cloying at all for enjoy to listen an album from the beginning to the end without pausing. The CD version is definitely better than the digital, and not only for the quality but also because the digital version of the track "I'm Hunger" includes a spasmodic and irritating try of crying that can give you the willies, although it could also be compared with the groans of "Je t'aime ... moi non plus" from Serge Gainsbourg, fortunately the video and CD version does not include it.
  

No doubt this is an album that is worth having, the only downside is that it was released in limited edition, only 100 items to a bit higher price of $ 50, expensive for the average, but that seems the only way for deal with a physic release in nowadays. If you are lucky you can still get it by Las Vegas Records.
 

Tam Harrow ‎– Incredible Idiot
Tracklist:
01.  I Look Into Your Eyes     5:26
02.  Not Today Not Tonight     4:16
03.  Toledo     4:58
04.  Fixation     4:26
05.  It Won't Happen Again     4:08
06.  Incredible     3:42
07.  I Won't Let You Down     4:34
08.  I Love You So     3:56
09.  I Was Hungry     4:06
10.  You Dj You Rock     5:20
11.  Kept Boy     4:52
12.  Idiot     4:16



Label: Las Vegas Records ‎– LVR CD 1501
Format: CD, Album, Limited Edition
Country: US
Released: 01 Apr 2015
Style: Italo-Disco, Eurobeat

Cover – Tam Harrow
Instruments, Programmed By, Recorded By – Miki Chieregato
Mixed By – DJ Paul Petta
Songwriter – Chieregato, Hooker
Vocals, Lyrics By – Tom Hooker