Тако (Taco) стал известен своими необычными синтезаторно-танцевальными обработками классических композиций 30-х годов, сумев на этом поприще добиться некоторой популярности в первой половине 80-х, когда его волновая версия песни Ирвина Берлина (Irving Berlin) "Puttin' on the Ritz" попала в американский Тор10.
Урожденный Тако Окерси (Taco Ockerse) появился на свет 21 июля 1955 года в Джакарте, столице Индонезии. Переехав в Германию, он в конце 1981 года записал сингл "Puttin' on the Ritz". Спустя год композиция (первоначально ставшая известной в исполнении классика жанра Фреда Астера (Fred Astaire)), попала в американские поп-чарты, и в июле 1983 года добралась до Тор10, заняв 4-е место. Немалая в этом заслуга оригинально снятого видеоклипа, изобразившего певца, одетого во фрак, лихо отплясывающим в мюзикле времен великой депрессии. Изданный в 1983 году дебютный лонгплей певца After Eight, выдержанный в точности в духе "Ritz", продолжил воспоминания о 30-х, но ни один из последующих синглов в хит-парады не попал. Следующий диск Let's Face the Music оказался и вовсе незамеченным. Больше о Тако ничего не было слышно, тем не менее, трек, сделавший его известным, является непременным гостем ретрорадиостанций и сборников музыки 80-х.
Дискография:
1983 After Eight (RCA)
1984 Let's Face The Music (RCA) Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.
Taco gained international stardom when in 1982 he recorded a distinctive cover record of the old Irving Berlin favorite, Puttin' on the Ritz in Germany, which made him famous early the next year (United States Billboard chart number 4). It has been reported that he did not speak any English at all and merely read the lyrics from transliterations, but this is false: Taco speaks English and almost always performed in English. He also speaks German, having recorded a couple of songs ("Träume brauchen Zeit" and "Blauer Vogel, steig!") for German Eurovision in 1981. He is also a speaker of Dutch and French.
Taco was born to a Dutch couple in Jakarta (On a side note, Indonesia was once a Dutch colony). Prior to his worldwide hit with Puttin' on the Ritz, he fronted a Berlin-based band called Taco's Bizz. Their niche was performing Depression-era oldies in a more contemporary style, and soon Taco was courted by record labels to release a solo single. Puttin' on the Ritz gained so much attention that an entire album was funded by RCA Records. Both the album and the single were hits in Europe, and thanks to a popular MTV video for Puttin' on the Ritz, the single and the album became hits in America as well, selling over 500,000 copies of Taco's 1982 debut album After Eight.
A follow-up album, Let's Face The Music, was recorded in 1984 for RCA, but it failed to recreate Taco's initial success, and he vanished from the American market immediately thereafter. Taco continued to record, however, focusing mostly on the German market with albums Swing Classics/In The Mood Of Glenn Miller in 1985 and Tell Me That You Like It in 1986 for Polydor. In 1987 he recorded the self-titled album Taco. In 1989 he briefly flirted with contemporary dance music by releasing a pair of singles, Love Touch and Got To Be Your Lover, that were blatantly styled after the high energy disco sound popularized by Stock Aitken Waterman. Afterwards he repositioned himself as a swing/soul singer. He has collaborated with Geff Harrison of Kin Ping Meh fame.
He currently resides in Germany, occasionally performing in Berlin and recording.
He has been referenced on the TV show The Simpsons. Episode BABF19, "Behind the Laughter", features Willie Nelson saying, "Thank you, Taco, for that loving tribute to Falco", as well as the end of the tribute itself. Recently, Taco was referenced in an episode of The Venture Bros. in describing Klaus Nomi's tuxedo attire. Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.