At the climax of Disco music, in 1979, Germany's Eurovision contestants debuted a revival of the notorious Mongol warlord, Chingis Khan. The song, Dschinghis Khan, which was the band's name too, couldn't make it to better than the 4th place, but that was just the beginning. The band continued record making and made their mark in the history by Moskau, a classic example of Disco genre and de facto song of the 1980 Moscow Olympic games. Though in the midst of Cold War this song seemed more mocking than praising, today thousands of young Russians live their lives to the fullest with it!
We had a Beta-max copy of the English version of Moscow, and not to mention that the song was one of my pre-school favorites:
My other favorite song of theirs is Hadschi Halef Omar, or Hajji Caliph Omar, who is a fictitious character in German stories. The funny thing is that in the middle of the song they praise Muhammad, but apparently back then the world was a less radical place to incite an outrage by zealous Muslims!
It was a time of joy and nostalgia when few weeks ago I rediscovered them on YouTube, and it seems I am not the only one on YouTube with such feelings. In fact, YouTube has caused a new rise of the old band, reflected on the high demand for Dschinghis Khan's CD's on Amazon. So it may be true to say that Chingis Khan still rules!
