Johnny Mathis

Frank Sinatra used to privately refer to him as "The African Queen". Today, Fabrice Morvan forges a solo career, performing light alternative music that is far from his glory days with Milli Vanilli; he plays in clubs throughout the U.S. Mathis has recorded over 100 albums of original music and has sold more than 180 million albums worldwide. Then, in 1998, Pilatus was found dead of an alcohol and drug overdose in Frankfurt, Germany. His hit songs include "Wonderful Wonderful", "A Certain Smile", "Chances Are", "The Twelfth of Never", "Misty", "Too Much, Too Little, Too Late", and "I'm Coming Home", and the original recording of the Thom Bell-Linda Creed composition "Life Is a Song Worth Singing", later made popular by Soul/R&B vocalist Teddy Pendergrass. In 1997, Milli Vanilli had a chance to tell their side of the story of their musical fiasco in the premiere episode of VH1's Behind The Music. Although frequently described as a "Romantic" singer, his vast discography contains Jazz, Traditional Pop, Brazilian & Spanish music, Soul, Soft Rock, and Broadway Show Tunes. After a few more tries, Pilatus began a series of criminal acts, arrested for assault and vandalism, among other crimes, in Los Angeles.

Around the same time, he had his first number one hit with "Chances Are". Pilatus tried to commit suicide soon after, then rejoined with Morvan as Rob & Fab. He sang one of his first hits, "It's Not For Me To Say", in the film, Lizzie, in which he also had a small acting role. Farian tried to reform the band as the Real Milli Vanilli, but the resulting LP Moment of Truth was an utter failure. While training to become a teacher, he was talent-spotted at a concert and signed by Columbia Records. A court ruling in the US allowed anyone who had bought the album to get a refund. Mathis grew up in San Francisco, and began singing at school. Milli Vanilli's Grammy was rescinded four days later, and Arista Records dropped the act from its rosters and deleted the album and its masters from their catalog.

Johnny Mathis (born September 30, 1935 in Gilmer, Texas) is an American popular singer, and one of the few remaining male vocalists associated with Traditional Pop music. With Morvan and Pilatus pressuring him to let them sing on the next album, Farian revealed the truth to reporters on November 15, 1990, after the record of Girl You Know It's True skipped during a live performance recorded by MTV at the Lake Compounce theme park in Connecticut. Pilatus was ridiculed in the press for comparing himself to Paul McCartney, Elvis Presley, Mick Jagger and Bob Dylan; he also developed a cocaine problem. Milli Vanilli won a Grammy Award for Best New Artist on February 22, 1990 for their second album, Girl You Know It's True (1990 in music). Despite critical pans, Milli Vanilli's fame continued to grow worldwide even after Charles Shaw told a reporter the truth; he later retracted his statement after Farian paid him off.

Their first album was All or Nothing (see 1988 in music), which was both a European hit and an American hit. Frank Farian used Pilatus and Morvan to front Charles Shaw, Johnny Davis and Brad Howell; he felt that these musicians were talented but unmarketable. In fact, some of melodic influence in today's hip-hop may be attributed to Milli Vanilli's influence. Despite the scandal, the Milli Vanilli sound created by Frank Farian was ground-breaking in pop-music, as it combined (American) hip hop rhythms with Eurodance melodies.

Other bands, including C&C Music Factory and Black Box, were also fronted by lip-syncers. They have since been used as an example of utter shallowness in music, though they were hardly unique at the time. Their photos were pictured on the album cover and they lip-synced in concert. They are notorious for being the only group to have their Grammy Award stripped from them after it was revealed that they had not been involved in the creation of their breakthrough album, Girl You Know It's True and did not sing in concert.

Milli Vanilli ("milli" is a word meaning "national" in Turkish, picked up by the artists while visiting Turkey on one of its national days) was a duo, Fabrice Morvan and Rob Pilatus, formed in Germany in the mid-1980s. 1989 "Girl I'm Gonna Miss You" #2 UK, #1 US. 1989 "Blame It on the Rain" #1 US. 1989 "All or Nothing" #4 US.

1988 "Baby Don't Forget My Number" #16 UK, #1 US. 1988 "Girl You Know It's True" #3 UK, #2 US.