Milli Vanilli

Milli Vanilli was a West German-based R&B, pop and dance music project created by Frank Farian in Munich in 1988. The group was formed with Fab Morvan and Rob Pilatus. The group's debut album Girl You Know It's True achieved international success and earned them a Grammy Award for Best New Artist on 21 February 1990. Milli Vanilli became one of the most popular pop acts in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Their success turned to infamy when the Grammy award was withdrawn after Morvan, Pilatus and their agent Sergio Vendero confessed that Morvan and Pilatus did not actually sing any of the vocals heard on the record. The group recorded a comeback album in 1998, but Rob Pilatus died before the album was released.

Beginnings

According to VH1's Behind the Music, the single "Girl You Know It's True" was first produced by Jesse Powell and had already been completed before Rob Pilatus and Fab Morvan were recruited. Frank Farian felt that no efforts should be focused on refining Pilatus and Morvan's voices. Farian added his own studio-augmented voice to recordings, using back-up singers to hide the other two members' voices live.