Lifetime Achievement Echo for the Scorpions
On 21st February the Scorpions will receive the Lifetime Achievement Echo. According to the organizers of the Echo the band who started their career more than 40 years ago in Hanover is with over 75 million sold products and countless platinum and gold albums the most successful German rock band of all times. Furthermore, the formation had “a huge impact on generations of rock musicians”.
With albums like “Blackout” or “Love At First Sting” and single hits such as “Still Loving You” or “Rock You Like A Hurricane” the Scorpions around Rudolf Schenker, Klaus Meine and Matthias Jabs not only made German rock history, according to the statement from Berlin. During last years highly acclaimed “Humanity Hour 1” world tour they played gigs in front of more than 150.000 fans in South America and together with Greenpeace lobbied for the protection of the rain forest.
“The Scorpions are among the absolute top bands worldwide”, explains Gerd Gebhardt, Executive Producer of the Echo. “Their journey took them from the clubs of Hanover to the biggest arenas of the world. To this day they still hit the mark with their music amongst listeners from all kinds of different cultures, and all that with the continuity of four decades. All those who have been to a Scorpions concert know why: the band always gives 100 percent. It is pure adrenalin and intensive energy – rock from Germany for the world.”
At the Echos the Scorpions are to perform a medley in front of more than 10.000 guests of the Berlin O2 World.
Among the key moments of the international career of the Scorpions – already in 1976 their album “Virgin Killer” reaches gold status in Japan, in 1979 and 1980 they also make the breakthrough in the USA – are also the late 80ies and early 90ies: in 1988 they are the first band ever from the West to perform in Leningrad. This experience brings Klaus Meine to write the song “Wind Of Change” in 1989 which is to become the unofficial hymn of Perestroika and the fall of the Berlin wall. In 1991 this song is the most successful single in the world. The Scorpions are invited to the Kremlin by Mikhail Gorbachev.
