Falco

Cast

Born

February 19, 1957 · Vienna, Austria

Died

February 6, 1998

Birth name

Johann Hölzel

He was born as Johann Hölzel in Vienna, but was mostly called "Hans". Very young, he was considered as a new Mozart and decided to have a musical career. He started playing the bass guitar in local bands such as "Drahdiwaberl" or "The Hallucination Company". Around that time he changed his name to Falco, fascinated by the German ski jumper Falko Weisspflog. However, he felt that playing in these bands couldn't give him the success he wanted to have, even if the single "Ganz Wien" ("All of Vienna"), dealing with the local drug scene, was a huge success. His first solo album, "Einzelhaft" (solitary confinement) was a huge success (more than seven million copies were sold), and the single "Der Kommissar" (The Commissar) was a success, too. The next album "Junge Roemer" (Young Romans) was quite a flop since it was too refined, too far ahead of its time, to be a hit with the masses, thought appreciated by many critics. His third album, "Falco 3", and the single "Rock me Amadeus" went number 1 in Austria, Germany, England, South Africa, Canada in end of 1985. And when Falco thought he was at the top, his song "Rock Me Amadeus" hit #1 on the Billboard 100 on the 29 march 1986 and stayed there for four weeks. The other single of Falco 3, "Jeanny" was a success too but was banned from numerous radio stations due to its controversial lyrics, which could be interpreted as romanticizing of rape and murder. The next album "Emotional", 1986 was quite a success with the singles "Emotinal", "The sound of musik" and "Coming Home (Jeanny part 2)". Then he made some less recognized albums between 1986 and 1992, due to problems with his wife (marriage problems, divorce, finding out later that his daughter Katharina was not actually his), and drug problems. The he made a comeback in 1992 with the album "Nachtflug" ("Night Flight"), the single "Titanic" when number one in Austria for 17 weeks. In 1993, he made a big concert for the Donauinselfest (Danube Island Festival) in Vienna, under the pouring rain, more than 110,000 people went there for Falco's probably best concert. In 1995, he released the single "Mutter, Der Mann Mit Dem Koks ist Da" ("Mother, the man with the Coke is There"), which was successful, particularly in Germany. In 1996, he moved to the Dominican Republic for two reasons: he didn't like the penetrating and indiscreet media in Austria and couldn't stand the cold winters any more. In 1996 too, he released his last single, "Naked". In the summer 1997, Falco worked on a new, and as it turned out, final, album which was quite finished at the end of 1997, next to release under the title "Egoisten", but the perfectionist Falco wanted to drop what was quite a finished album. The 6th February 1998 at 4.40PM, a bus, driving too fast, ran into his Mitsubishi Pajero as he was going out of a parking lot, and unfortunately he died. The album was released posthumously as "Out of the Dark". A last album was released in 1999 "Verdammt Wir Leben Noch" ("Damn, we're still alive"), with songs that were dropped by Falco, and a best of was released, "The final curtain - the ultimate best of Falco". Falco's tombstone was inaugurated on the 2nd of September in Vienna.