Scorpions: Still rocking like a hurricane

2015 marks 50 years since Scorpions stung the world; band is gearing up to launch their 20th album, accompanying tour.

German rock band Scorpions confirmed that they will celebrate their 50th anniversary next year with the launch of their 20th album and an accompanying tour, reported blabbermouth.com. “Yes, we have started already. We have 12 songs. We found songs mainly from the early 1980s Blackout and Love At First Sting days, which many people consider our most creative and best time,” said the band’s lead guitarist Matthias Jabs in an earlier interview.

“The leftover tracks sound good, but they were never finished. They don’t have lyrics or vocals, and they’re not recorded to a click. So, we have to do everything new, but it sounds quite good so far,” he added.



Rudolf Schenker, who launched the band in 1965, said two of the new songs on MTV Unplugged, Dancing With The Moonlight and Rock & Roll Band, have been saved as bonus tracks. “We’ll put them out as electric versions. I think we have a total of 15 songs from the 70s and 80s that we want to release. In 2014, we’ll finish the places we haven’t played yet on tour, and then get back to the record,” he commented.

Interestingly, the band had announced in 2010 that they will end their career following a three-year farewell tour. In an interview, Schenker, Jabs and the band’s lead singer Klaus Meine were asked what changed their minds.

“When you start a three-year farewell tour, you know you’ve got a long time ahead of you. But that long period went by much faster than we imagined. The closer we got to the goal (Munich in December 2012), the stronger the feeling was that we hadn’t come to the end,” Meine said. “There were so many images in our minds and so many emotions in our hearts. Everything we experienced between 2010 and 2012, the 200 concerts — it was all so powerful.”

Meine epitomised the band’s sentiment when he said: “You stand on stage, look down and see so many fans including the younger generation, who are really getting into it and saying: ‘Guys, this is so cool. We’re seeing you for the first time. When will you be back?’ It’s so motivating and inspiring to play for three generations. We’re all having too much fun to put down the guitars.”

Schenker said the band had initially announced the farewell tour because they didn’t want to be standing on the stage and not able to deliver what people expected from them. “The success of the farewell tour bowled us over,” he said.

“At first, there were plenty of arguments in favour of stopping,” revealed Jabs. “But we were quickly overshadowed by the feeling of how much fun it all is. It doesn’t matter where we went, the shows were packed. So, we just thought: This can’t really be the end.” “It’s one thing to say, ‘This is going to be the end of the Scorpions’ and another to do it,” said Meine.

Published in The Express Tribune, August 20^th, 2014.

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