Scorpions are a German hard rock and heavy metal band founded in Hanover in 1965. Over more than fifty years on the road, they’ve released dozens of studio albums, singles, live albums, compilations and live DVDs. They’ve also received numerous awards and honours, making them Germany’s most successful rock band.
In their early days they were called Nameless, later becoming The Scorpions, before settling on simply Scorpions towards the end of 1969. Their debut album was Lonesome Crow (1972), with Klaus Meine on vocals, Rudolf Schenker and Michael Schenker on guitars, Lothar Heimberg on bass and Wolfgang Dziony on drums. During the album’s promotional tour, however, Michael announced he was leaving the band to join English act UFO, causing a brief break-up in 1973. Later that same year, Rudolf and Klaus reformed the band with some members from Dawn Road, including Uli Jon Roth and Francis Buchholz, with whom they released the albums Fly to the Rainbow (1974), In Trance (1975), Virgin Killer (1976) and Taken by Force (1977), which earned them major recognition across Europe and Japan.
In 1978 they released their first live album, Tokyo Tapes, which turned out to be the last with Roth, who left the band to pursue a solo career. Matthias Jabs joined the following year, and with him the band began its push into the North American market with Lovedrive, which also featured Michael Schenker on three of its songs. Through the ’80s, with Animal Magnetism (1980), Blackout (1982), Love at First Sting (1984) and Savage Amusement (1988), they achieved major commercial success across much of the world, landing at the top of the charts and earning numerous gold and platinum records.
Scorpions
Barcelona Rock Fest
Venue: Sant Jordi Club
Photography: Jordi Amela (@amela_photo_concert)
As the ’90s arrived, they released Crazy World, which included the song “Wind of Change”, which would go on to become an icon of the socio-political revolutions the world was living through at the time. In 1993 they put out Face the Heat, the first record with bassist Ralph Rieckermann, who had come in to replace Francis after he left the band in mid-1992. In the latter part of the decade they released Pure Instinct (1996) and Eye II Eye (1999), with James Kottak as new drummer replacing Herman Rarebell, records that showed off a renewed sound with softer, more electronic touches — especially on the latter — which drew a fair amount of criticism from both the specialist press and their own fans.
During the first decade of the new millennium, they released the symphonic project Moment of Glory (2000) and the unplugged Acoustica (2001), which put them back on the charts. Later, with Unbreakable (2004) and Humanity: Hour I (2007) — the first albums featuring Polish bassist Paweł Mąciwoda — they returned largely to their classic sound. In 2010 they launched their “farewell tour” alongside what would be their final studio album, Sting in the Tail, which they announced on their website as the start of the end of the road, and which took them across five continents over the following years. However, in interviews given in 2011 and 2012, they said they would carry on with their career, focusing on celebrating their fiftieth anniversary with the release of a new album, Return to Forever (2015).
Scorpions are recognised as the most important and successful rock band from Germany and continental Europe, with worldwide album sales estimated at over 100 million, of which 10.5 million have been sold in the United States alone. Even so, in 2011 the German specialist press estimated the band’s sales had reached 160 million records worldwide. At the official presentation of the 2009 Echo Awards, it was noted that, by then, they had played more than 5,000 live concerts in over eighty countries. Furthermore, by 2015, their albums had been certified with more than thirty-five platinum and over a hundred gold records.