All Asians born from the late 1970s to the
early 1990s know almost all of their hit songs. While Sri Lanka as an insignificant isle in terms of the mainstream music industry does not witness concerts of many top notch musicians, we are indeed privileged
to have these Danish guys rocking Colombo for the second time.
Michael Learns to Rock, was
formed as a foursome in 1988 composed of Jascha Richter, Mikkel Lentz, Kåre
Wanscher and Søren Madsen. They have now sold over 11 million records worldwide
for a career spanning for almost thirty years. They are extremely famous in
Asia, mostly due to their subdued clean image and also because their love songs
are very pure with little or no hint of sexual innuendo.
Although the quality of their
songs was on a level of those boy bands of the nineties, they never made ground
in the two big music markets – US and UK. However, their popularity in Asia and
Scandinavia is undeniable as they are overplayed on radio stations, television
music shows and in any sort of lounge atmosphere. Theirs is a very pop/soft
rock sound with any hardly fast paced beats or rhythms.
Their eponymous debut album
was released in 1991 and peaked at No.1 in the home country. This album
contained their signature hit The Actor
which peaked at number one in Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Indonesia, Malaysia,
Singapore, and the Philippines.
Their second album Colours released in 1993 contained another two hits – Sleeping Child and 25 Minutes. Their third album Played on Pepper was released in 1995 which contained their second No.1 hit, That’s Why (You Go Away) and a somewhat fast paced pop rock single Someday.
In 1996 the band released
their first edition of their greatest hits titled Paint My Love – Greatest Hits wherein the title song Paint My Love, became their greatest
love song. The song composed by lead singer Jascha Richter was initially
written in Danish – Kun med dig – as
the Danish entry for the Eurovision Song Contest of 1996 sung by Dorthe
Andersen and Martin Loft. However, it was one of seven entries voted off in a
pre-contest semifinal. This led the band to release the English version in
their album.
The band took to the studio
again and released their fourth album Nothing To Lose in 1997 which contained
the hits Breaking My Heart, I’m Gonna Be Around and Something You Should Know.
In 1999, the band rebranded
themselves with the simple acronym MLTR and released another compilation album
under the same name. This album contained their hit Strange Foreign
Beauty. In a process undertaken by MLTR
for the first time, the song was made by compiling the best details from
recordings of ideas made individually by the four members. This album included
their previous hits, either remixed or refined in some way by notable
international producers. This greatest hits album went to the top of the Danish
sales charts (the second MLTR album after their first album to do so), as well
in Sweden and Portugal, and logged sales of nearly a million copies.
In 2000, Søren Madsen left the
band and the remaining members decided to continue as a trio and released Blue
Night which was also moderately successful and produced hits such as You Took
My Heart Away, Angel Eyes and the title track. In 2001, they released another
compilation album titled 19 Love Ballads with all their best singles and an
original single titled The Ghost of You.
In 2004, the band released
their sixth studio album which was another eponymous album. This album produced
hits such as Frostbite and Take Me To Your Heart. Take Me To Your Heart was one
of the most downloaded songs in Asia that year exceeding 6 million downloads
alone and this memorable ballad proved to be their last hit single worldwide.
After 2004, the band went on
to release two more studio albums Eternity in 2008 and Scandinavia in 2012.
Thereafter, the band celebrated their 25th anniversary in 2014 with
the release of a compilation album 25: The Complete Singles wherein two
original singles Silent Times and Call on Love were released. In 2016, they
released an Extended Play titled With Love which produced the singles We Shared
The Night and Dream Girl.
Although I have covered in
this review almost all the songs that were hits for the band, here are some of
the other songs which are worth listening to:
· How many hours
· Anyway you want it
· We shared the night
· More than a friend
· Nothing to lose
· Sweetest surprise
Till the next review...
At Ease!!!
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