History GermansLoveDavidHasselhoff / Music

* Bad Boys Blue - a German-based pop group consisting of an Englishman, a Jamaican, and an American - was one of the first pop acts to achieve popularity in the Glasnost-era Soviet Union.

* American singer Charlene of ''Never Been to Me'' fame is regarded as a OneHitWonder in America and most of the world. But in Norway she managed to be a TwoHitWonder with the aformentioned ''Never Been to Me'' reaching #5 and another song ''It Ain't Easy Comin' Down'' which managed to go to #8. In America, that song only reached #109 and didn't even chart anywhere else.

* American singer Charlene of ''Never Been to Me'' fame is regarded as a OneHitWonder in most of the world. But in Norway she managed to be a TwoHitWonder with the aformentioned ''Never Been to Me'' reaching #5 and another song ''It Ain't Easy Comin' Down'' which managed to go to #8. In America, that song only reached #109 and didn't even chart anywhere else.

* There's a Canadian ProgressiveRock band named Saga, which almost nobody has heard of save the single "On the Loose" from their 1983 album ''Worlds Apart''. This isn't the case in UsefulNotes/PuertoRico, where the band is so popular they even were given the keys to the city by the mayor of San Juan. They're also still very big in Germany. Granted, they have also enjoyed modest success in their home country, but they were overshadowed in the local and worldwide prog rock scene by their contemporaries, a simple rock trio who were later known as Music/{{Rush}}.

* Pop rock/funk rock band Saint Motel enjoy moderate success in their native United States, but have become an overnight success in Europe, especially Italy, so much so they performed at the 2015 Sanremo Music Festival. Their SignatureSong, "My Type", was even certified platinum there.

** She was a legend all around the world, but she was incredibly popular in Australia. She starred as Aunty Entity in the third ''Film/MadMax'' film, ''Film/MadMaxBeyondThunderdome'', and her 1973 song "Nutbush City Limits" holds a special place in the Australian people's hearts. In the 70's, a [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6IpqOn-XsXk line dance]] was developed based on the song and it has become a staple of Australian culture. Kids are taught the Nutbush at school and it's regularly played at wedding receptions and other social functions across the country, not unlike the Electric Slide in the US. Many Aussies have joked that learning and demonstrating the Nutbush should be required for immigrants seeking Australian citizenship, because that's how much the song and dance have become ingrained in the culture. After her death in 2023, [[https://www.cnn.com/videos/world/2023/07/07/exp-nutbush-record-tina-turner-070701aseg2-cnni-world.cnn nearly 6 thousand Australians held a mass dance to the song in her honor]] at the Australian music festival, the Big Red Bash.

* The Series/EurovisionSongContest began in 1956, with some West European countries participating. Today, these countries still participate, but regard the contest as a joke [[labelnote:*]]and an expensive one for the winning country's state broadcaster, which then has to host the contest the following year — Ireland's Creator/{{RTE}} was nearly bankrupted after they won three contests in a row during the 1990s, largely because Eurovision's then-current "must be in the country's native language" rule meant only the UK and Ireland could use English.[[/labelnote]], and send largely unknown artists (most of the West European countries) or grizzled music veterans of varying current popularity (mostly the UK, which has sent Engelbert Humperdinck, Bonnie Tyler, and a reunion of 90s boy band Blue in the past). The Nordic and East European countries, all of whom joined the contest later, take it seriously, and send their top artists. (See: Music/{{ABBA}}, who had their big break at Eurovision) In Sweden, a country where the contest is SeriousBusiness, with the six-week qualifying contest ''Melodifestivalen'' dominating entertainment news during the season.) The Nordic countries' attention given to the contest led to a historical kick in the ass and a SugarWiki/MomentOfAwesome in 2006, when the contest was won by the Finnish heavy metal band Music/{{Lordi}}.[[note]]By that time, the "native language" rule had been eliminated for good. Lordi's winning entry "Hard Rock Hallelujah" is in English.[[/note]]

* The late Music/AmyWinehouse became popular in both her native UK and stateside, but she also has popularity in many Latino cultures, especially in South America. This may be due to her live performances she did in the late 2000’s in Brazil. She also has her signature make-up style, which was inspired by Latina culture she observed while visiting Miami to record, her signature beehive hairdo, and her spunky/soulful attitude when she sings her songs.

* British singer-guitarist Steve Winwood maintained a loyal following at home from his days in Traffic and Blind Faith, but was a much bigger star in the US, where both "Higher Love" and "Roll With It" reached #1 and four other songs hit the top 10.

* Believe it or not, a lot of people from Caribbean countries like old 50s American pop songs that are mostly popular among old baby boomers in the U.S., mainly because of the popularity of waltz dancing. Also popular there is country music from the 60's and 70's, which often shocks people since most Caribbean countries are majority black. This is explained as being because the only American music imported into those countries during that time period was country music, and West Indians were unaware of the cultural associations that country music has in the States. [[http://www.npr.org/blogs/therecord/2011/09/01/140120452/reggae-loves-country-a-50-year-romance This]] NPR article discusses how, at a reggae/dancehall event in Jamaica, a Kenny Rogers song starts playing and everyone goes crazy.
** Curtis Mayfield's old band The Impressions were hugely popular and influential in Jamaica from the get-go, whilst it took until Mayfield's solo career for him to receive the same amount of popularity elsewhere. Part of the reason is that they continued a tradition of harmony groups that Jamaicans had loved since the doo-wop era of the late 50s, and they had religious influences, appealing to the strongly Christian country. The popularity of The Impressions there is most obviously shown by Bob Marley's "One Love (People Get Ready)", a song so widely associated with him and Jamaica generally that most outside the country don't realise it's an Impressions cover.

** The countries have become notorious for becoming the final refuge of many otherwise-forgotten international English-language pop stars whose heyday was in the '70's to '90's, specifically those whose forte are really sappy love songs, or what Filipinos (a majority of whom are diehard romantics) call ''Senti'' (as in, "Sentimental" music); most notably Danish band Michael Learns to Rock, Aussie-Brit duo Music/AirSupply, American singers David Pomeranz and Music/BoyzIIMen, and many others...

* While Laura Branigan was fairly popular in the Philippines throughout the 1980s for her ballads and dance hits alike, her biggest hit in the country, by far, is the over-the-top ballad "Power of Love", which only peaked at No. 26 on the ''Billboard'' charts. Her 1987 cover of Shirley Ellis' 1965 hit "The Name Game" was also especially popular with Filipinos, especially younger listeners, but is largely forgotten today, as opposed to "Power of Love."

** Also one of Elton's most recognizable songs in the Philippines, despite not making a dent in the U.S. and his native U.K.

* Pennsylvania band The Buoys hit the ''Billboard'' top 20 with "Timothy", but had no further success in their home country. (Perhaps unsurprising, considering that "Timothy" was a controversial novelty song about cannibalism.) But the follow-up single, "Give Up Your Guns", was a smash hit in The Netherlands.

* "I'm In The Mood For Dancing" by the Irish disco group The Nolan Sisters (later The Nolans) became a #1 hit in Japan, being one of the first English-language songs to do so, and the group subsequently recorded a Japanese TranslatedCoverVersion. Two decades later, a {{Eurobeat}} version under the artist name Sharon was produced by Ventura(of "Lupin III '78" and "Cat's Eye" remix fame) for the ''Dancemania Happy Paradise'' series, and in turn licensed in the ''VideoGame/DanceDanceRevolution'' series.

* Doing unjustice to ''everyone'', one can state the following trope zig-zag of German pop:

* The Series/EurovisionSongContest began in 1956, with some West European countries participating. Today, these countries still participate, but regard the contest as a joke [[labelnote:*]]and an expensive one for the winning country's state broadcaster, which then has to host the contest the following year - Ireland's RTÉ was nearly bankrupted after they won three contests in a row during the 1990s, largely because Eurovision's then-current "must be in the country's native language" rule meant only the UK and Ireland could use English.[[/labelnote]], and send largely unknown artists (most of the West European countries) or grizzled music veterans of varying current popularity (mostly the UK, which has sent Engelbert Humperdinck, Bonnie Tyler, and a reunion of 90s boy band Blue in the past). The Nordic and East European countries, all of whom joined the contest later, take it seriously, and send their top artists. (see: Music/{{ABBA}}, who had their big break at Eurovision) In Sweden, the contest is SeriousBusiness, with the six-week qualifying contest ''Melodifestivalen'' dominating entertainment news during the season. The Nordic countries' attention given to the contest led to a historical kick in the ass and a SugarWiki/MomentOfAwesome in 2006, when the contest was won by the Finnish heavy metal band Music/{{Lordi}}.[[note]]By that time, the "native language" rule had been eliminated for good. Lordi's winning entry "Hard Rock Hallelujah" is in English.[[/note]]

* Between the time ''Billboard'' established the Modern Rock chart in 1988 and {{Music/Nirvana}}'s release of ''Music/{{Nevermind}}'' in 1991, British artists like Music/NewOrder, Music/DepecheMode, Music/{{The Cure|Band}}, {{Music/XTC}} and {{Music/Morrissey}} dominated AlternativeRock radio in America, with many of these acts remaining popular well into the {{Grunge}} era. There was also a sizable Australian presence during that period, with {{Music/INXS}}, Music/MidnightOil, Music/TheChurch and Hoodoo Gurus all scoring #1 Modern Rock hits.

* A Japanese emo-punk band, Uplift Spice, (now known as The Mus Mus) isn't too terribly popular (if Oricon charts are to go by) in their home country. In France though, they are big, ''really'' big. They had a lot of airtime on the channel Nolife, which broadcast J-music and anime. Thanks to that, they did a lot of concerts in France and nearly every video on YouTube is filled by French-language comments. One song in particular, "Kanojo", is usually ripped straight out of Nolife recordings. Another of their songs, "Omegarhythm", is particularly popular with American fans, thanks to a [[https://youtu.be/TQ6QlmqBPlM?si=fP6J7RyrjS6ga2NY video]] by Finnish animator Benedique, involving the character Kobeni Higashiyama from ''Manga/ChainsawMan''.

* Music/AirSupply are a fond memory from TheEighties in their native Australia and North America, and still perform to this day, but they've increasingly toured to a very dedicated audience in southeast Asia.

* Music/{{Blondie}} were huge in the UK, where the backlash to disco was less pronounced than it was in America and new wave was more heavily established by the time of their commercial breakthrough. Even after the failure of ''The Hunter'' and the band's subsequent breakup, frontwoman Debbie Harry continued to have solid hits there through the rest of the 1980s, while their comeback single "Maria" went to #1 in 1999 (by contrast, it only reached #82 in the US).

* Missouri-born singer Donna Hightower eked out a career in America as a {{jazz}} singer in the mold of Music/EllaFitzgerald in TheFifties, but found herself very well-received when she toured in Europe toward the end of the decade, which, coupled with less racial discrimination there, led her to relocate to the continent, eventually settling in UsefulNotes/{{Spain}}. Then by TheSeventies, Hightower, well into her 40s, took a turn toward soulful pop music, with Spanish songwriters and producers (but still with English lyrics), scoring big European hits with "This World Today Is a Mess" and "If You Hold My Hand" (songs that weren't even released in America). One curiosity was that living in Spain had given Hightower a [[WhatTheHellIsThatAccent quirky accent]], with some unusual vocalizations of vowels (on "If You Hold My Hand" she pronounces "space" so that it almost sounds like "spice"). She eventually moved back to America (specifically Austin, Texas) in 1990.

* The current popularity of French singer Patricia Kaas in UsefulNotes/{{Russia}} is as high if not higher than what she enjoyed in her heyday in France in TheEighties.

** Also, they inspired most British synthpop from the late [[TheSeventies 70s]] and early [[TheEighties 80s]]. Music/OrchestralManoeuvresInTheDark wouldn't even exist without them: Andy [=McCluskey=] saw them when he was 16, and he was amazed enough to decide he'd start his own electronic band.

* While Music/MenAtWork were already hits in their native Australia, their success was ''legendary'' in the United States. Their debut album ''Business as Usual'' spawned two #1's, went 6x Platinum, and even kept Music/MichaelJackson's ''Music/{{Thriller}}'' off the top of the ''Billboard'' 200 for three months. Their sophomore record, ''Cargo'', while not as gigantic, was also a huge success. In fact, Men at Work were a primary factor that sparked the country's [[ForeignCultureFetish obsession with Australia]] during TheEighties.

* Music/RoyOrbison, while... kinda forgotten in the USA, was always recalled fondly in Australia and Britain. And ''adored'' in Bulgaria. He dropped by there in 1980 and got mobbed by Bulgarian fans like in TheSixties!

* The Osmond family, while popular in the US in TheSeventies, had a brief bout of superstardom in the UK from 1972-74. The Osmond Brothers had five Top 5 hits in the UK in that period, compared to zero in America. Donny and Little Jimmy also scored #1 solo hits. They were so big in the UK that many British outlets coined the name "Osmondmania" to describe the phenomenon, much like Beatlemania the decade prior. The Osmond Brothers continue to play big sold out events in the UK, and in 2022 there will be a theatrical musical about them touring in the United Kingdom and Ireland.

** Creator/IsaoSasaki, well-known and adored for singing many classic anime OP's/ED's from TheSeventies and TheEighties, started his career as an Elvis impersonator. In fact, Sasaki's page ''on this very wiki'' calls him "Japan's Elvis".

* Susan Raye, a protégé of Music/BuckOwens, had some CountryMusic success in TheSeventies. While it wasn't her biggest hit on the Country chart, her 1971 single "L.A. International Airport" got enough crossover attention to reach #54 on the ''Billboard'' Hot 100. But the song was a #1 hit in New Zealand, and also huge in Australia (peaking at #2).

* Jim Reeves had some popularity in the US during the TheFifties and TheSixties but became extremely popular in South Africa, Britain, Ireland, Norway, India and Sri Lanka. In South Africa he was popular enough to star in a locally-made movie called ''Kimberly Jim'' and went on to record Afrikaans folk songs. Long after his death in a 1964 plane crash he's still remarkably popular in many of the aforementioned countries. In India and Sri Lanka his Christmas Carol albums are perennial favorites while a 'Best of' album reached No. 7 on the UK album charts as recently as 2009, while any modern American who doesn't happen to be a fan of classic CountryMusic would have no clue who you were talking about if you said "Jim Reeves".

* American musician (Sixto Diaz) Music/{{Rodriguez}}'s story might be the strongest occurrence of this trope. He has released two unsuccessful albums in the early 70's before he quit music[[note]]Though he toured Australia at the end of TheSeventies when he became subject to this trope Down Under[[/note]]. Only in 1998, while working on a building site, he came to know that he was a big star in South Africa all along. Rodriguez's fame was amongst the older crowd who remembered him from the 70s. His popularity was [[VindicatedByHistory revived in the late 1990s]] when his song "Sugar Man" was covered by a well known South African folk-rock band called Just Ginger (later changed to Just Jinger when the band moved to the USA). A documentary film was made about him, ''Film/SearchingForSugarMan''.

* The French space disco group Space has massive popularity in Russia since the Soviet years. Most comments in a [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J7UwSVsiwzI cat version]] of their hit "Magic Fly" are in Russian. Also, the original song was a huge hit in the U.K. in TheSeventies.

* Canadian Hi-NRG act Trans-X were very popular in Mexico and Latin America, to the point founder Pascal Languirand relocated to Mexico and reformed the group in TheNewTens with Mexican musicians. Nearly every upload of their songs on [=YouTube=] have many Spanish-language comments.

* By [[TheSixties the 1960s]], blues music had faded almost into obscurity in the USA. In the UK and parts of continental Europe, however, it began to gain a cult following. Old American blues musicians actually started to tour overseas.

* The same thing as the British Invasion happened with HipHop in TheEighties. New York rap music caught fire in the black neighborhoods of London, eventually evolving into its own regional style distinct from anything coming out of the US, and from there, it conquered Europe and the world just as rock did before it. Unlike rock music, the cross-pollination went mostly one way; while American hip-hop is popular worldwide, non-American scenes usually only get national or regional recognition, with the US still seen more or less as the global leader of the genre and only a small handful of international rappers having managed to break through stateside.

* Rural Scandinavia is dominated by a subculture known as ''raggare'', embracing the greaser culture, with {{Rockabilly}} music and American memorabilia from TheFifties. In fact, in spite of Sweden's draconic automobile safety laws there are more roadworthy American cars from the TheFifties in Sweden than in any other country in the world. Including the U.S.

* {{Trance}} music originated in Germany and does have a strong fandom there, but the genre is especially hugely popular in the Netherlands (which houses the biggest trance acts on the planet, including Music/ArminVanBuuren, Music/{{Tiesto}}, and Music/FerryCorsten), the UK, Japan, Egypt, Australia, and Argentina. Meanwhile, the DarkerAndEdgier psychedelic and full-on varieties are very popular in Israel with many big name acts like Astral Projection, Astrix and Infected Mushroom coming from there, and psytrance scenes have also popped up in South Africa, northern Europe and India (thanks to its history with the Goa rave scene). It's [[ZigzaggedTrope a mixed bag]] in the USA - trance is arguably one of the most well-loved genres of electronic dance music and has experienced a steady growth in [[NewbieBoom new fans]] through TheNewTens, but it falls behind harder sounding genres in terms of commercial success and still perceived by non-electronic listeners as being [[{{Glurge}} cheesy and overtly sentimental]].

* CityPop, a Japanese pop music genre from the late 70s and 80s: it completely fell out of popularity in Japan in the 90s, becoming a DeadHorseGenre, but saw a revival on the internet in TheNewTens, largely because original 80s city pop was a common source of samples for {{Vaporwave}} and FutureFunk (whose creators liked the [[{{zeerust}} retro-futuristic vibes]] you could get by using this obscure [[JapanTakesOverTheWorld Japanese]] music). While some of the new fans are Japanese, the genre is mostly popular with western audiences.

* South Korea '''loves''' breakdance and hip-hop. Brought over by [[UsefulNotes/YanksWithTanks American Soldiers]] in TheEighties, they became very popular in TheNineties.

* Terry Knight, a one-time UsefulNotes/{{Detroit}} radio DJ who switched to performing and is now best-known for having managed Music/GrandFunkRailroad, was briefly recruited by Music/TheBeatles to sign with Apple Records, and visited them in England in 1969. Observing firsthand the major strain in group relations and fearing that they were going to break up, Knight wrote and recorded a song called "Saint [[Music/PaulMcCartney Paul]]", with symbolism-laden lyrics about the band and their situation ("Sir UsefulNotes/IsaacNewton told you it would fall"), and an arrangement filled with Beatle flourishes, including a long fade-out section based on "Hey Jude" (done with their permission). "Saint Paul" briefly made ''Billboard'''s Bubbling Under the Hot 100 chart but was never any sort of hit in America. However, across the Pacific in New Zealand, a singer named Shane recorded a note-for-note CoverVersion and it spent six weeks at #1, becoming one of the biggest hits of the entire decade of TheSixties in that country; it even managed a longer #1 run there than The Beatles themselves had ever accomplished.

* UsefulNotes/{{Philadelphia}}-born comedian[=/=]actor[=/=]impressionist Guy Marks had a minor hit (#51 in ''Billboard'') in 1968 with "Loving You Has Made Me Bananas", a comedic musical piece mixing WordSaladLyrics with a parody of big band radio broadcasts from TheThirties. In 1978, a decade and a jump across the Atlantic later, the record was re-released in the UK and surprisingly made the Top 30, even earning Marks an appearance on ''Series/TopOfThePops''.

* Due to the mutual intelligibility between the Spanish and Italian languages (making for very easy translations) and the catchy melodies, ever since TheSixties, many Italian pop singers have been ''very'' popular in Latin America, such as Music/LauraPausini, Gianluca Grignani and Tiziano Ferro.

* Joe Dolce's 1981 novelty song "Shaddap You Face" stalled out at #53 on the ''Billboard'' Hot 100, but was a number one hit in the UK, Ireland, Austria, and Germany. This pales in comparison, however, to its reception in Australia, where it remains one of the biggest selling singles in history.

* Joe Dolce's 1981 novelty song "Shaddap You Face" stalled out at #53 on the ''Billboard'' Hot 100 , but was a number one hit in the UK, Ireland, Austria, and Germany. This pales in comparison, however, to its reception in Australia, where it remains one of the biggest selling singles in history.

* Joe Dolce's song "Shaddap You Face" did not even reach the Top 40 in the US, but was a number one hit in the UK, Ireland, Austria, and Germany. This pales in comparison, however, to its reception in Australia, where it remains one of the biggest selling singles in history.

* This is very common in the DeathMetal genre (MelodicDeathMetal to be specific). Bands like Music/ArchEnemy, while somewhat popular in their native Europe, are just plain massive in Japan.

* British SynthPop duo Hurts are more popular in Germany, Finland, and Eastern Europe than their native United Kingdom.

* British soul singer Kwabs has only had modest success in his native country. But he has had more success in continental Europe, where his début single "Walk" topped the chart in Germany.

* The band Music/{{America}}, formed in the UK by American musicians,[[note]]The three members were all sons of US Air Force personnel, with one having been born in the UK, and [[EveryoneWentToSchoolTogether met at a London-area high school]] for US {{military brat}}s.[[/note]] only charted once in the UK Top 75, with their debut single "A Horse With No Name". They are ''much'' more popular in the United States. Maybe the name had something to do with it?

** A Eurovision winner that proved to be popular in the UK was Vicky Leandros's "Come What May", an English-language cover of the Luxembourgian 1972 winner "Après toi", which hit #2 on the UK singles charts and is a beloved karaoke song in the UK.

* Due to the mutual intelligibility between the Spanish and Italian languages (making for very easy translations) and the catchy melodies, ever since TheSixties, many Italian pop singers have been ''very'' popular in Latin America, such as Laura Pausini, Gianluca Grignani and Tiziano Ferro.

* [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cumbia Cumbia]] is a music genre created in Colombia and Panama, but is also very well-loved in central Mexico, Argentina and '''especially''' in Chile, where they have even developed ''several'' cumbia styles of their own. Its popularity nowadays spans the entire American continent from north to south -- including the United States, with one of the great exponents of this genre being AB Quintanilla's [[https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kumbia_Kings Kumbia Kings]] -- and has gone as far as being successful in Spain and influencing completely unrelated genres like Romania's manele and Greece's skiladiko.

* Music/{{Bandmaid}} were a flop in Japan and were about to be fired when their video "Thrill" blew up in the United States and other western markets. This would lead to successful tours in the US and being on the soundtrack of ''Series/PeaceMaker''. They and Music/{{Babymetal}} are the most prominent bands of the 2010s female metal boom in Japan.

* British singer Limahl, and his former band [=Kajagoogoo=] to an extent, is hugely popular in central Europe, especially Germany and Austria. His third solo album ''Love Is Blind'' was released on a German label and was only available outside of central Europe and Japan as an import, and he's a common performer on retro music showcase TV shows. It helps that he sang the theme to one of the most famous German-produced films of all time, ''Film/TheNeverEndingStory'' (the title song managed to make it to #2 in West Germany, Austria and Italy -- compared to a #4 peak in the UK and a #17 peak on the Hot 100 in the US -- in spite of it not being in the German-language version of the film, which traded Music/GiorgioMoroder's synthesizer-heavy score pieces for additional pieces by Klaus Doldinger, the film's other composer).

* C.C. Catch, a Dutch-born, German singer and one of the prominent artists of the Eurodisco scene, had achieved notable success in Germany, but her success in Spain was even greater. Many of her singles were top ten hits there, many charting higher than they did in Germany. To name a few: "I Can Lose My Heart Tonight" charted #13 in Germany, but #7 in Spain, "Heaven and Hell" charted #13 in Germany, but #4 in Spain, and most impressively, "Soul Survivor" charted #20 in Germany, but was a #1 hit in Spain.

* C.C. Catch, a Dutch-born, German singer and one of the prominent artist of the Eurodisco scene, had achieved notable success in Germany, but her success in Spain was even greater. Many of her singles were top ten hits there, many charting higher than they did in Germany. To name a few: "I Can Lose My Heart Tonight" charted #13 in Germany, but #7 in Spain, "Heaven and Hell" charted #13 in Germany, but #4 in Spain, and most impressively, "Soul Survivor" charted #20 in Germany, but was a #1 hit in Spain.

* C.C. Catch, a Dutch-born, German singer who was one of the prominent artists of the Eurodisco scene, had achieved notable success in Germany, but her success in Spain was even greater. Many of her singles were top ten hits there, many charting higher than they did in Germany. To name a few: "I Can Lose My Heart Tonight" charted #13 in Germany, but #7 in Spain, "Heaven and Hell" charted #13 in Germany, but #4 in Spain, and most impressively, "Soul Survivor" charted #20 in Germany, but was a #1 hit in Spain.