Back in 1997, A Danish-Norwegian pop band lastly bought the success its members had been dreaming about when the third tune from their debut album burst on to the charts.
That tune was Barbie Girl, and it propelled Aqua to the high of the charts, together with right here in Australia, the place they remained in the primary spot for 3 weeks.
The international success of the tune was a precursor of issues to come, with extra hit songs from three albums. But it wasn’t all excellent news, with toy large Mattel suing the band over the suggestive lyrics of their hit tune.
The band in the end broke up greater than as soon as earlier than getting again collectively.
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Today, the band is having fun with renewed curiosity on the again of the success of the Barbie film.
Barbie Girl, is a mainstay on the radio, with few having escaped its catchy tune and distinctive Europop sound, whereas virtually each end-of-year kids’s dance live performance options the monitor.
The official video has been seen greater than 1.4 billion occasions on YouTube.
So who’re Aqua and what happened to them?
The Copenhagen-based band was shaped by Søren Rasted and Claus Norreen, who had been producing a soundtrack for a movie in 1989 and employed membership DJ René Dif to work on some songs.
After the movie was full, they determined to preserve working collectively, earlier than Dif noticed Lene Nystrøm singing on the Norway–Denmark.
He requested her to be lead singer of their new band, which at the time was named Joyspeed.
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The group was signed by a small Swedish file label in 1995, and their first single, Itzy Bitzy Spider, was launched in Sweden.
After it flopped, they cancelled their contract with the file label and began over, writing and producing songs with a distinct model, earlier than attracting the consideration of main label Universal Music Denmark.
They renamed themselves Aqua, based mostly on a poster of their dressing room, and in 1996, launched their first tune, Roses Are Red, a bubblegum pop dance monitor.
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It stayed in the Danish charts for greater than two months. Their follow-up single My Oh My, went straight to primary in Denmark.
Their debut album Aquarium was launched in 1997, and contained 11 tracks, together with the third single, Barbie Girl, which featured the lyrics, “You can brush my hair, undress me everywhere” and “Kiss me here, touch me there, hanky-panky.”
The single was launched round the world and went to primary in the UK and Australia.
Their subsequent tune, Doctor Jones, was additionally a success, as was Turn Back Time, from the film Sliding Doors.
The group launched a second album, Aquarius, in 2000. The first single, Cartoon Heroes, bought properly throughout Europe and Australia. It was adopted by Around the World.
In December 2000, Mattel filed a lawsuit towards the group’s file label claiming that Barbie Girl had broken the repute of the Barbie model.
But after a drawn-out case, a US Court of Appeals choose upheld a district courtroom discovering the tune fell inside non-commercial use exemptions and concluded, “The parties are advised to chill.”
More singles adopted, earlier than the band break up in 2001. They reunited in 2008, and launched a best hits album a yr later.
New singles and a brand new album, Megalomania, adopted. A reunion tour introduced them to Australia in 2012, the place additional live shows had to be added to sustain with demand.
The band break up once more, solely to reform to tour Australia and New Zealand in 2014.
Further excursions adopted, earlier than Norreen introduced he was leaving the group. The remaining trio has continued to tour the world.
In 2023, Aqua collaborated with Nicki Minaj and Ice Spice for the Barbie World tune from the Barbie film soundtrack, which included a pattern of Barbie Girl.
The single grew to become a worldwide hit and Aqua acquired their first Grammy nomination.
Today, the band is having fun with a resurgence off the again of the success of Barbie. They had been even a part of the line-up at the famed New Year’s Eve reside broadcast from Times Square in New York.
They are presently on a world tour that can deliver them to Australia in March.
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