But I Won't Do That
Where we side eye the lyrics and videos of some of our favorite songs
But I Won't Do That
Blame It On The Pain
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In which Becky and Dan revisit the saga of Milli Vanilli and their meteoric rise and fall. Along the way they ask some great questions like Why did the artists shoulder the blame? Why was the public so pissed when the truth came out? Is lip syncing really so bad? And why is Jimmy Fallon so annoying?
We'd love to hear from you! Leave a comment on Youtube, Spotify, or email as at butiwontpod@gmail.com
Artwork: Billi Rakov
Music Credits: LonPeakMusic and Vodovoz Music Production
All right, here we are.
SPEAKER_00Here we are. Cheers.
SPEAKER_02Cheers. So last week we did we did half of the James Bond songs. Mm-hmm. Which I thought was pretty cool.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_02So it turned out really well. We still have a whole other half of Bond songs to do.
SPEAKER_00We don't like to do things consecutively.
SPEAKER_02Well, no, I think you sort of like, you know how like um You need a breather. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Okay.
SPEAKER_02Well, it's like it's like an action star doing a movie, and then they're gonna do the sequel, but maybe do some other films in between.
SPEAKER_00You know, and then it's like, oh wow, he's doing a sequel to I like to um compare ourselves to like Tom Cruise.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah, right. Cruise. Cruise did some stuff between Mission Impossible. Yeah, did he? I don't even know if he did it actually.
SPEAKER_00I'm sure he did. Didn't he do that Maverick?
SPEAKER_02I don't I don't think it was between the two.
SPEAKER_00It was between one of his mission impossibles.
SPEAKER_02Oh, oh, we could do all the mission impossibles. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, exactly. Cruz and the mission impossibles.
SPEAKER_00There you go. I'm sure a lot of people do. You're right. Dan likes to be right.
SPEAKER_01More than you?
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Do you think that's wrong? Do you want it to be right?
SPEAKER_02Who wants who likes to be right more? I mean, I like to be right.
SPEAKER_00You're when you're you usually are right. It's the problem with me. Because I think I'm right and I'm super sure I'm right and then I'm wrong.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, like the water bottle cover today.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_02We were riding, we went on our long bike ride, and we carry our two water bottles, which are hydro flasks with a proper screw top.
SPEAKER_00Listen.
SPEAKER_02No, you you have to screw you really had to screw those all the way down.
SPEAKER_00Which I did. I did. And he thinks I didn't.
SPEAKER_01Well, one of them just fell off mid-ride.
SPEAKER_00I lost the lid. But it really I sat there, I would okay, standing at the counter, turning them on. And you know, there's a point at which they can't go down any further. That's how much I did it.
SPEAKER_02On on one of them.
SPEAKER_00On both of them.
SPEAKER_02So both of them.
SPEAKER_00So he thinks it's right because it fell off. I'm sure there's a circumstance.
SPEAKER_01So wait, so we're riding, and through the bumps, it the high the the top starts to unscrew.
SPEAKER_00Maybe my knee hit it or something. I don't know what happened. Something happened. Maybe you had a sip. I think you had a sip on the patio, and then just maybe you didn't even put the lid back on.
SPEAKER_02I don't take the lid off to take a sip though. That's why they have this, that's why it has the little spout.
SPEAKER_00Oh.
SPEAKER_02Anyway, someone's out there with a with a hydroflask top, re- refashioning it into something.
SPEAKER_00Big whoop. Lucky them.
SPEAKER_02They're like screwing it into like a tall boy of Budweiser or something, and like, you know, who knows? Put some good use to it.
SPEAKER_00I'm sure.
SPEAKER_02All right. Okay, let's. Shall we jump in? Yeah, let's jump in. Here, let me let me read you a little paragraph here to get us started.
SPEAKER_00Okay, I can't.
SPEAKER_02A little history. He's a rebel. The crystals single, the band of the crystals, it reached number one in November of 1962. But it wasn't really a crystals song. The crystals didn't sing on it. Instead, Darlene Love and her group, The Blossom, sang the song. But producer Phil Spector decided the song would sell better if it was marketed as a crystal single, and he had to get it out quickly before a competing version hit the market, so he just released He's a Rebel under the Crystals name. The Crystals themselves, on tour during the song's recording, didn't know anything about it until they heard it on the radio. In other words, he's a rebel is a complete act of pop music fraud. One that, in this case, was committed by a guy who would later become an actual murderer, Phil Spector. But nobody holds the shady ass backstory of he's a rebel against the song. Most of us consider it a classic pop single, fraud or no fraud.
SPEAKER_00And also no one holds accountable the person who perpetrated it.
SPEAKER_02This kind of thing used to be fairly common music business practice. It was sketchy and it caused plenty of angst for performers, but it kept happening. Which takes us to today's topic. We decided we would talk about Millie Vanilli. We watched a really good documentary.
SPEAKER_00I was just gonna say we should preface this whole thing with that documentary. Everyone should watch that documentary.
SPEAKER_02The great documentary from a few years ago. Um it's made with uh one of the singers in Millie Vanilli, one of them's deceased. Rob.
SPEAKER_00What was his uh Fab. Fabs.
SPEAKER_02Rob is dead.
SPEAKER_00Right.
SPEAKER_02Um, so he's in it. So one of the is one of them is in it, and um, and it's a really great look at them, very sympathetic.
SPEAKER_00Um, but uh but it's but it's not but also really clear-eyed, like because it's not like you know, they did get a little big for their britches, you know. Yes, they did, like their writers and stuff like that, which I mean, you know, when everyone's catering to you, I'm sure this happens where you just think you know, you get Trump syndrome or whatever.
SPEAKER_02Well, before we get into the the particulars and the music, um let's go back to 8990. Yeah. Um I mean, do you remember liking Millie Vanilli? Was Millie Vanilli a a group that you actually liked? Because I loved Millie Vanilli.
SPEAKER_00I didn't know.
SPEAKER_02It was like I was like, I was like 13. I mean, they were right in my like adolescent pop music wheelhouse.
SPEAKER_00But the thing was, so I mean, yeah, I remember, so that's MTV. It because they're aesthetic. I mean, obviously, you know, extremely good looking.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00They were models.
SPEAKER_02They were models, yeah.
SPEAKER_00They were super good looking, but to me, it was their style. I know it's ridiculous, right? Their style when you look at it, it's like these bike shorts. But they but they had bandanas and bike shorts. This point of view that was it was like laughable, but like I'm always subscribed to the idea of like even bad style is better than. I mean, I was telling you to stay on the bike ride when we rode by that group of people. I it's like rather have even bad style than no style.
SPEAKER_02Like, apathy is just so much worse than like but to be clear, one of the people we saw today like was wearing a pair of pants that apparently was like half of it was missing.
SPEAKER_00No, those were those were constructed. They had like a clear scrim of fabric that showed their butt.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I was gonna say, I was looking at just pure butt sheets.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, but I know, but that's because it had a sheer piece of fabric sewn into the denim. No, I checked that out.
SPEAKER_02Okay, thank you. I did not, I caught a glimpse and looked away.
SPEAKER_00Well, that's good of you, babe. Okay, but the um anyway, sorry. No, it's fine. It's like I just think that they they had it all in the way like they had style, they had this super catchy song, right? Oh, those songs are really catchy, like just the hook and everything was like so good about the song. And then on top of it, they're just like these well, it was the dances too, right?
SPEAKER_02Dancing fashion.
SPEAKER_00Everyone was trying to do that weird little kicky dance and shit.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, and there was something, there was something exotic about them because even if you didn't know, if you hadn't heard their speaking voices, they were black, they're from Europe. There was just something interesting about them. The braids, too.
SPEAKER_00I have to say, the braids was quite like wow, this is like very, you know, I mean, it was cool. Like, let's all this is such a cool look. Just I don't know. They had style.
SPEAKER_02So today on the show, we're gonna talk about Millie Vanilli, whose one album produced three number one hits and a couple minor hits. So it was a huge album. I think it sold something like six or seven, eight million copies.
SPEAKER_00Oh, it was ridiculous.
SPEAKER_02It was a huge hit. Uh, we're gonna talk about Millie Vanilli, their music, uh, their rise and downfall. And yeah, stick around. I think this is gonna be a great one. You're listening to But I Won't Do That an irreverent dive into the lyrics, music, and videos of some of our favorite songs. Okay. We're back.
SPEAKER_00Yep. Hi.
SPEAKER_02Hello. Millie Vanilli. First of all, what how did they come up with? No, I think they said in the documentary it had some sort of silly origin. But Millie Vanilli was a pop duo from Munich, Germany.
SPEAKER_00Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_02Comprised of Fab Morvan and Rob uh Palladis. Rob and Fab.
SPEAKER_00Who both had really sad origin stories.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, they did. The duo was founded in 1988 by producer Frank Farion.
SPEAKER_00Total.
SPEAKER_02The villain of the story, Enter villain. We talked about Bond villains last week. Yeah. Frank Farion. Right up that alley.
SPEAKER_00He's like mustache twirling redhead.
SPEAKER_02So the the group combined pop rap, RB, disco, and dance music, and a lot of sort of like late 80s pop slop. So the producer hired uh Brad Howell, John Davis, and Charles Shaw, along with the host of women, to sing on the records and had Rob and Fab dance and lip sync the performances. Millie Vanilli's debut album, All or Nothing, was released in Europe in 1988 and repackaged in the U.S. as Girl You Know It's True, spending eight weeks at number one producing three number one singles, making Millie Vanilli one of the most popular acts of the year. And in 1990, they won three Grammy Awards, including Best New Artist.
SPEAKER_00So the Best New Artist thing was like, I just remember that so clearly. Also, like what's weird is like in the documentary, you know, they talk about when they came over to the US, like I guess every European like producer has their affiliate here, or was it on like whatever, Virgin or whatever capital?
SPEAKER_02Arista. Arista, okay. Clive Davis.
SPEAKER_00Clive Davis was here, right? So, like everyone in this documentary, you know, you just have the sense that everyone knew.
SPEAKER_02Absolutely. Oh, that this is one of the most interesting things of the story is like it's little we talk about little emperor's has no clothes, yeah, kind of thing, where a lot of people are staring at it and it's like really obvious, but they either see a financial benefit in going along with it, or they're just sort of like, well, I guess this is what it is.
SPEAKER_00Well, because Rob and Fab could not hardly speak English.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, so this is okay. So let me get let me cut to a uh this is a good time to say.
SPEAKER_00And wasn't it the guys who actually sang it were Americans?
SPEAKER_02They're Americans. Yeah, so like living in Germany. So this from a critic. In retrospect, it's remarkable that anyone ever bought the Millie Vanilli gimmick. Rob and Fab, the two gorgeous European models who are presented to the world as Millie Vanilli, had thick accents and their voices sounded nothing like the voices on their hints. With all the long spoken passages on the record, nobody even worked especially hard to maintain the fiction.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, like like Fab had the French accent and Rob had German. And then when people ask them questions, it's almost like they don't even understand a question someone's asking them, you know? I mean, it was so apparent that that and the way in which the English is spoken in the it's so native.
SPEAKER_02Right, you know, absolutely in the album.
SPEAKER_00So it's just so interesting. Like this guy is making such a good point. So again, like they knew, and even remember they talked to all those executives, and the one guy's like, Oh, yeah, we all knew. The one guy that admitted, the guy that seemed very mafioso.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Oh, right, exactly. Yeah. Um, so another critic says, when the whole Millie Vanilli Enterprise fell apart, the music business really only had itself to blame. In the months before the grand revelation of the Millie Vanilli deception, the German producer Frank Farion's project seemed to be one of 1989's great success stories. Girl You Know It's True, the repackaged version of their European album had sold six million records, um, and three singles went to number one. Uh, but in telling the story, this guy Frank Farion is quite clearly the villain. He trapped Robin Fab in goofy contracts, forced them to keep his secret, and refused to let them sing on records, something that they very much wanted to do. But Farion is also the singular creative force behind Millie Vanilli. And as a producer, he knew what he was doing.
SPEAKER_00I know you have to give him credit for like the catchiness of the song, absolutely, the music, knowing these guys are hot. It's that's a good example, babe. Your crystals thing. Because, like, I don't know, are the crystals a really good-looking band?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah, I don't know.
SPEAKER_00Because like I was thinking about that. Like, Rob and Fab were they always wanted to sing. Like they're like, they were always asking, can we sing? They like they were really, it was sort of sad because they wanted to, they really wanted to do something. And once they had this level of fame, like someone should have given them the chance. Yeah, you know, and everyone's like, no, no, no, no, we've got this thing.
SPEAKER_02So interestingly enough, the the European album is the one that's available now. They um the American label pulled, you can't even find it anywhere.
SPEAKER_00Oh, really?
SPEAKER_02Yes. If you go like on Spotify, what you hear is the one that they said is not good enough. The European all or nothing album. So interesting is that the Americans at Arista, the major label that Clive Davis is the head of, they're seeing like money bags when they hear Rob and Fab. They see pictures of Rob and Fab and they hear them.
SPEAKER_00But well, also it's rolling that it's like everyone's buying the album. That's when people buy albums.
SPEAKER_02So they haven't released the American version yet. They want them to re-record a few things, right? But they can't get them to come over and do it. And this is when they first are like, it's clear the documentary that they understand right away, something is up here because they can't get these two to come to America and record the album. They're like, no, no, we have to do it here in Germany. No, no, no. It's not like you don't need to send anybody over here. We'll handle it ourselves.
SPEAKER_00But that has to be the guy.
SPEAKER_02They literally wanted to send people from America over to help them record it, and they were like, no, you can't. And it it's it's so clear that in that moment they're like, something is off here. But who cares?
SPEAKER_00All those women backup singers like knew what was up the whole time.
SPEAKER_02Yes, because they had to record during the day, and then Rob and Fad recorded at night, and they never overlapped. Rob and Fad recorded because they brought in these other Americans.
SPEAKER_00They didn't want to do that, they they wanted to sing.
SPEAKER_02Well, this is like the classic thing where if you're a person with any kind of conscience, when you're holding on to a lie, it just eats at you. Yeah, it eats at you. And and whether you're a kid who's told a lie at school or you're an adult telling a lie to at work or to your partner, like it's corrosive and it it eats at you. And Rob and Fab, this is one of the like the things in the documentaries, like they were they were living in a kind of hell. Well, and which then which led to drug use, like yeah, oh, they're numbing themselves with drugs and alcohol, because on the face of it, they're like, they're going on shows and they're dancing and singing and they're selling all these records, and then behind the scenes they're just falling apart because they are trying to hold this lie together.
SPEAKER_00But but you have to believe, like this is not explicitly said in the documentary, but you have to believe that behind the scenes, I bet everyone's like, you better fucking keep it together, you better hold the line, you've got to do this performance, you've got to pull this off, you've got to, you know, all these things because how many people are they supporting in that moment? You know, like when you think, I mean, I'm thinking of Britney Spears and like when she's falling apart, and you know, you're supporting like so many people are on your payroll, you know?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I feel like in 2026 this story falls apart in like the matter of like a week. But at that time, it took a while. I mean, people like literally the guy who does the rapping on the album came out and said, I'm actually the guy.
SPEAKER_00And then there's the lip syncing scandal where this the or where the the track uh broke and the it it they were on at a concert Connecticut repeating the line, and so everyone knew they were lip syncing.
SPEAKER_02But but it still goes on and on. It's like it's like word was like filtering out and um but everyone's like whatever. Yeah. Two songs that went number one were recorded just for the American album. Uh Girl I'm Gonna Miss You, their ballad, and and my favorite, Blame It on the Rain.
SPEAKER_00Blame It on the Rain. It's the dumbest song.
SPEAKER_02Blame It on the Rain is a song written by Diane Warren, pretty big hit maker. She wrote this um, and Clive Davis asked her to write a song. What else has she written? For the label. Diane Warren, let's see what Diane. Diane Warren. Let's see what Diane Warren has.
SPEAKER_00Um I like they have a young picture of her. Look at her background, that 80s.
SPEAKER_022022. Um let's see. Let's see what songs she's written. Warren has written nine number one songs in 33 top 10 songs.
SPEAKER_00Wow.
SPEAKER_02If I could turn back time. If I could turn back time. Look away by Chicago. What do you think? Because uh Okay. Because you loved me, Celine Dion. How do I live? Leanne Rhymes, like her biggest song. When I see you smile, bad English, I don't want to miss a thing, Arrow Smith.
SPEAKER_00Wow.
SPEAKER_02She's been inducted into the songwriter's Hall of Fame as a star on the Walk of Fame. So she's tapped by Clive Davis to write a song. Originally, um, this was written for uh a sibling group called The Jets, but the band didn't record it, so Clive Davis suggested uh that to Warren it would be a good fit for Millie Vanilli.
SPEAKER_00Um the Millie Vanilli, whoever those guys who really sang.
SPEAKER_02Exactly. Yeah, yeah. Brad Howell and whatever. Um, so yeah, this was uh it came it was on their American debut album, Girl You Know It's True. Um and the song was the song was written in second person, and the protagonist is advising the listener to blame it on the rain and other natural elements after leaving their lover and regretting it. The song topped the charts, becoming Millie Linelli's third and final single to do so, and went huge in a bunch of other countries as well. I mean, I always love this song, and like the video is so cheesy.
SPEAKER_00Oh my god, fake rain and theirs are so fun to watch. Like, that's the thing, but also that was like I don't know if did you have any sense of the MTV era?
SPEAKER_02Not much because uh we didn't have MTV, so I didn't either.
SPEAKER_00I know you didn't grow up with it in your house, neither did I. My friend, I've mentioned my friend Jenny Gratsky. I don't know if she's you know still alive, but she had it, and so like and she was my best friend at the time, and so like I was always at her house um and she lived my Away. This is like I would drive, I would ride my bike to her house up that hill. You know that hill, like off the La Paz exit. Yeah. That hill going to like Alicia.
SPEAKER_01Oh, yeah.
SPEAKER_00I would ride my bike up that hill to her house because she was just on the other side of that hill. And um anyway, so we we were like obsessed with MTV. I mean, MTV was, I just remember when it came out, like I can't explain enough how I imagine there's somebody who had it in their house, and maybe it wasn't as like, but we were like, um, like send me an angel. There's so many songs that are in my head of the video of that, like, oh, that's dark. Like they're walking, it's like had all these like pagan influences with my Christian upbringing. But like, it was so visual and appealing to me. Like, I I can't explain enough how impactful MTV was.
SPEAKER_02Thab, who now is like 50 or in his mid-50s, looks incredible still.
SPEAKER_00He looks the same in the documentary.
SPEAKER_02Amazing.
SPEAKER_00Like he looks exactly the same. And also seems like such a sweet, he lives in Holland.
SPEAKER_02Lives in Holland, yeah.
SPEAKER_00Which we need to go visit.
SPEAKER_02And he can sing.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, he so they who knows about it.
SPEAKER_02I don't I don't think Rob could sing, but Fab could sing because even in like the early like recordings, you hear like he could sing. And I this is the part that I just don't quite understand. I guess because their accents, like they just, but like it was weird. You got a guy who's like good looking, good dancer, and can sing. It's like can you not like just lip sync this way?
SPEAKER_00Let him be like um Justin Timberlake, like right, this person who's gonna break out of the pair.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_00You know, like he broke out of in sync and you know, became the star, right?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, it's so weird. You know, he because if you go even on Spotify right now, you can find him singing Blame it on the rain. Oh, in like 2023. And it's like, um, this is actually pretty good. He has a really good voice. Surprisingly good.
SPEAKER_00He his own voice, it doesn't sound the same, but it sounds really good.
SPEAKER_02Exactly. No, exactly. It's different because he clearly he's a different singer. They did try, so after the scandal, they did they'd recorded an album in America called Rob and Fab.
SPEAKER_00Um but people were too mad.
SPEAKER_02People are really mad. But look here, check out um where is it?
SPEAKER_00Why do they rip it apart?
SPEAKER_02Where is there's I have the video here?
SPEAKER_00Does everyone know that Dan does research and I just come in blind?
SPEAKER_02I don't think that that works. Here it is. Here's Rob and Fab's their attempt at a comeback. So, okay, so we were just watching their their attempt to at legitimacy, and um when they rebranded themselves as Rob and Fab, um, an album that sold like next to nothing. In October 1992, Rob and Fab made their live singing debut on the Arsenio Hall show.
SPEAKER_00Arsenio Hall, who is so You don't like him. I hate him.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, why? What's your what's your Arsenio beef? Again, I've literally never watched the Arsenio Hall show.
SPEAKER_00Okay, well, he is younger than I am. So Arsenio Hall was like this. He was the phoniest person alive. He would he was if you would have hated him.
SPEAKER_02If you had been He was great in coming to America.
SPEAKER_00I love him in coming to America as semi.
SPEAKER_02Semi, yeah.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I who buys the hot tub and then no, I love him in that as that character role. Like as an actor, he's great. As a talk show host, he's phony, he's um ingratiating. Ingratiating, that's a great word. He's like he's disgusting. He's there's nothing about him that is authentic. He he has no authenticity. Like, and I feel like do people not have an authenticity meter? Like, I how can you not know? Because I I couldn't watch that show, like I hated it because I felt like any interview, any, anything seemed um just not real, not true. Yeah, and and so I never liked him, and he had so many like he started this thing.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00He, I mean, people probably to this day love him, but I just he's still alive, right?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, he's 70.
SPEAKER_00I don't know. I just never liked Arsenio Hall. And he ripped on them. He was ruthless.
SPEAKER_02He was, he was, he was ruthless.
SPEAKER_00He was ruthless about them. So the fact that he had them on his show was like, I to me, he was rooting for them to fail. Like I could see him sitting with like crossed fingers, they've got to fail. Because he's just so, and these are like, you know, fellow black artists. Like, don't you want them to win? Don't you want them to make it? Like, come on, like I feel like there's this thing about like zero-sum game shit where like as women we have to be competitive with each other, but I would rather that we all like we all rise with the tide, kind of thing. You know, like I hate that. Like, I don't know.
SPEAKER_02Okay, but as a but as a black talk show host, Hall was kind of kind of a trailblazer, wasn't he? That's that's kind of the way I think of him.
SPEAKER_00Okay, you can think of him that way.
SPEAKER_02I don't know. I never I didn't watch it.
SPEAKER_00I'm sure you're right, but he um there's something so like like I'm your best friend.
SPEAKER_02Jimmy Fallon. This is Jimmy Fallon.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I feel the same. I don't like Jimmy Fallon.
SPEAKER_02He's the fucking worst.
SPEAKER_00He's gross. Well, that was Arsenio Hall.
SPEAKER_02Oh, okay, there you go.
SPEAKER_01If that gives you an idea, that's it.
SPEAKER_00That's exactly it. Like, I cannot stand Jimmy Fallon either. Like, he's so uh yeah, you're great.
SPEAKER_02Like he's uh Oh no, he's horrible.
SPEAKER_00I I never will be popular. He's he's super talented in everything, but he doesn't believe in his own self. So he like panders. Arsene New Hall panders.
SPEAKER_02Okay. Well, Robin Fab made their debut on on the show. Um sounds like it was whatever, but uh they released their album that year, and uh let's see, Rolling Stone gave it two out of four stars. It sold two thousand copies and bankrupted the company that produced it. Two thousand.
SPEAKER_00That's that's hard.
SPEAKER_02Ross that's hard. You think I've just pure curiosity it would have sold more.
SPEAKER_00People are like this.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, they were, they were that was it. That's what it is. Following, yeah, go ahead.
SPEAKER_00All I want to say is people felt like vitriol towards these artists that did something against their own nature and that they were blamed for. It's like they took all the blame for something that someone else made them do.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, and I think they they were they were lured into the idea that one day they would be able to sing, and so they're told to lip sync, and then the train leaves the station, and it's like, okay, I guess we're on it, and just now they didn't always do themselves a ton of favors. You know, for example, um after all of Millie Vill Vinilli's success, Rob and Fab had also come to think of themselves as stars, and that wasn't helping anything. In a Time magazine profile that ran in March of 1990, Rob talked a whole lot of shit on his pop chart elders. Quote, musically, we're more talented than any Bob Dylan. Musically, we're more talented than Paul McCartney.
SPEAKER_00This sounds like cocaine.
SPEAKER_02Mick Jagger. His lines are not clear. He don't know how he should produce a sound. I'm the new modern rock and roll. I'm the new Elvis.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, Fab would never say that. Like Rob was Yeah, Rob was Rob.
SPEAKER_02There was something with Rob.
SPEAKER_00But but also his upbringing, you know, he had such a rough. He was left in a he grew up in an orphanage in Germany. Nobody wanted him. When he was finally adopted, the people he already had another family. The sister was in the documentary. Like you just had the sense that he and his parents that adopted him were super strict. He would do anything to be loved, and then he thought he was loved, and then like it was all like a facade.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Yeah, he's he's he's dealing with um personal demons that I think he thought fame could fix, but he also was he was feeling the weight of the of the lie as well, and when and when it all fell apart, so did he.
SPEAKER_00And and hatred, the hatred directed at those two was insane. So, like Mana Monica Lewinsky level thing. Like, right? Right, like and poor Monica too. Like absolutely this shit, these everyone that hi Clinton, you know, you should be that's actually that's actually a good comp because you know the Clinton, like any sexual harassment, it's about the power dynamics.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, and and that's with Millie Vanilli, you know, people might think that the artists have the power, but they don't.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Uh-uh.
SPEAKER_00Bill Clinton was the person who allowed this to happen. This poor 20, was she 20 or old she was, but yeah. 19 or 20? Like, God, what a dumb shit I was then. Like, you don't have any idea, and you you have no experience of your life. And everything, and these guys were that young, they were very young, and they were like one was an orphan, one was escaping a horrible home life, like escape from France to Germany and and living on the street, and you know exactly.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I mean, it was like they were not but also is is but also when you're an artist, for the most part, you're at the beck and call of the label, they have the money, yeah. So you're gonna do and often they get you in contracts, like they sort of have horrible contract, so yeah, you don't have the power, and so people take their anger out on you, people like burning their milli vanilli albums and just generally being so upset that they were fakes, but it's like, yeah, but how were they able to be fakes? They didn't do this on their own. In fact, it wasn't even like mostly them.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, someone created a facade for you to appreciate.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Following the scandal, Millie Vanilli became the butt of jokes. Rob and Fab assumed they would receive offers from other record companies, but none came. Uh, Rob said, one day you're rich and famous and you have all these friends, and the next day everything is destroyed and you're all alone. He took a job teaching French at a school, performed at small venues, and hosted a show on the LA radio station K I I S.
SPEAKER_00KISS FM?
SPEAKER_02Oh, that's Fab, sorry. Yeah, KISS FM.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, because I can't. Yeah, KISS FM is a huge is. That was to the addiction.
SPEAKER_02And Rob fell into addiction in 1996. He assaulted two people and broke into a car. He was sentenced to a few months in jail in a treatment uh center. He made several suicide attempts and and and then everything just went down. He had a whole grand theft uh felony.
SPEAKER_00He finally like achieved his suicidal goal.
SPEAKER_02And then, yeah, and then eventually.
SPEAKER_00And the the person who found him was like um the producer's what was she?
SPEAKER_02Oh, yeah. There's just, you know, the thing with this story is it's like there's just so many people who manipulated. Yeah, manipulated, and then in retrospect, try to explain their own way out of it. The American producers, this German woman who was like Farin's girlfriend or whatever she was, and it's just like it's like you manipulated them, you took advantage of them, and then tried to slip away unscathed. And uh for the most part, seems like you did. Their big year is 1989, they have three number ones.
SPEAKER_00Insane.
SPEAKER_02Girl, you know it's true, blame it on the rain. Girl, I'm gonna miss you. And they also had, you know, don't forget my number, like like lesser hits.
SPEAKER_00Don't forget.
SPEAKER_02Where do you think their three number ones ended up for the year?
unknownDoesn't matter.
SPEAKER_00Girl you know it's true. I'm gonna say that was huge. So I'm gonna say number two. And blame it on the rain, I don't know, nine.
SPEAKER_02Okay, girl you know it's true was number eight for the year.
SPEAKER_00Oh, eight. Okay, I was saying two.
SPEAKER_02Girl, I'm gonna miss you was number 16 for the year.
SPEAKER_00I didn't even say that one.
SPEAKER_02Blame it on the rain was 21 for the year. Don't forget my number was 28 for the year.
SPEAKER_00Wow.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. So they have four in the top 30 for 1989. Look away by Chicago topped the charts that year.
SPEAKER_00Oh, what else?
SPEAKER_02Followed by My Prerogative by Bobby Brown.
SPEAKER_00Okay.
SPEAKER_02Every rose has its thorn.
SPEAKER_00Wow, what poison disparate group of songs.
SPEAKER_02Straight up Paul Abdul and Miss You Much, Janet Jackson.
SPEAKER_00Miss You Much.
SPEAKER_02I love that song.
SPEAKER_00That's very much how Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Miss You Much was how that Yes, the Robin Fab song. Totally. Yeah. Total ripoff, Janet Jackson.
SPEAKER_00Wait, so this is 1989. When did the when did the controversy break?
SPEAKER_0290.
SPEAKER_00One year later. Yeah, yeah, it happened so quickly. The next year.
SPEAKER_02It happens so quickly. And the documentary pointed out that the for them, like, even though the story was already out because of the singers, the true singers in Germany had said it, there was the skipping track in the Connecticut concert. Like, it was like obvious to people, but the tipping point is they win the Grammy.
SPEAKER_00As best new artists of the year, when there's so much amazing competition.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, Nana Cherry, Tone Loke, can't remember who else. But that once they won, the scrutiny suddenly was like, wait a second, what the fuck?
SPEAKER_00Wait, so who ends up getting because I remember they took back their Grammy.
SPEAKER_02No, they did take it back.
SPEAKER_00Who got it then?
SPEAKER_02That's a good question, actually. Let's see. The Grammy Award for Best New Artist was originally awarded to Millie Vanilli, but the award was revoked by the National Academy on December 19th, 1990, after the admission by band members that they did not sing. Um, the award has since been declared vacant.
SPEAKER_00What? It doesn't go to the next person.
SPEAKER_02As of 2025, as of now, this is the only occasion that a Grammy Award has been revoked. And they didn't go, they didn't give it to anybody.
SPEAKER_00What the fuck? They should have given it to wait, who was up for that award? Nina Cherry. I loved it. Indigo Girls.
SPEAKER_02Oh, Indigo Girls.
SPEAKER_00Soul to Soul.
SPEAKER_02Soul to soul, okay.
SPEAKER_00And tone luck.
SPEAKER_02Tone lug.
SPEAKER_00Come on. Yeah, so I guess you can't like it.
SPEAKER_02So that's so interesting though, but but it was only it was very quick. I mean, it was it was only about seven months later, or eight months later, they revoked it. So why wouldn't you just go to the second place?
SPEAKER_00Well, is there a second place? It's like first or nothing.
SPEAKER_02But I mean, there they're but it's it's a the award is the result of a vote tally, right? So like members of the academy vote.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_02So there must have been a number, right? Why not? So why not just go? Well, there's so indigo girls or soul to soul gets it. Like, I wonder why they didn't do that. Uh maybe because they didn't know what to do. They were like, shit, this is the only time this has ever happened. What do we do? Guys, what a what a cool year though for nominees, and yeah, in terms of like the diversity of the nominees, like soul to soul, tone loak, really different. Like indigo girls who are extremely freaking amazing. That's um, I mean, just such an interesting mix.
SPEAKER_00They're all so good, and then the brand that the the band that won is like a and that was the thing.
SPEAKER_02I think people were like that. I think in the documentary at least makes it sound like nobody thought they were gonna win. They're like they were even nominated, and then they win, and people they performed too. Didn't they perform that night? They did. And people are just like, what the fuck?
SPEAKER_00They're fine with the performance and stuff, right? But also like God, the talent that they were up against, it's insane. Yeah, it's insane because the the the level of work that goes into achievement, you know what I mean?
SPEAKER_02Well, that's it. That's what I think that's what it was.
SPEAKER_00It's like the they worked hard too. I'm not saying they didn't work hard. It's like they didn't like to perform their dancing and they're every night, they're working as hard as because other people had somebody who wrote your song for you.
SPEAKER_01Sure.
SPEAKER_00You know, that and you have producers, like other people have all the same things. You just actually performed it. These guys then fake performed it every night of their lives, you know?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, so I guess, yeah, there's different there's there's the artist that yeah, there's a sliding, there's a whole scale.
SPEAKER_00Also, there's like Nina Cherry. I think she writes all her own music. Like, you know, there's love.
SPEAKER_02You write, produce, record, you write and record, you just record, and just keep going down that scale. Yeah, just keep going. You get you find Millie Vanilli, we lip sync and dance, and that's the and that's like a bridge too far. It's like you can't you cannot be an acclaimed artist you because that you're not actually doing the thing.
SPEAKER_00So you probably wouldn't even know this, what I'm gonna bring up right now, but like do you remember like Jessica Simpson and like when do you know? Okay, so she and she was in a reality show for a while and she was a Nic Lachet Yeah, and all that shit, right? When she had a sister, Ashley Simpson. Well, her sister performed as lip syncing on Saturday Night Live. Do you remember that?
SPEAKER_01I don't remember this.
SPEAKER_00Oh my god, it was such a scandal. But I think only because of this Millie Vanilli thing, even though I know it was later and everything, I think it just made people think you're fake and you're stupid, and like they hated her because and she was like so young and it's like nothing, like she couldn't compete with her sister.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, let's look at Ashley Simpson. This is good. I'm glad you brought this up. Okay. On October 23rd, oh, by the way, she sold five million copies of her album, Ashley Simpson.
SPEAKER_00Which is respectable for beast.
SPEAKER_02That's way no, that's it's amazing. That's a huge, yeah, five million. On October 23rd, 2004, Simpson appeared as a musical guest on an episode of Saturday Night Live to promote her album. After suffering from what Simpson said was a vocal cord inflammation caused by acid uh acid reflux on the day of the live broadcast. She lost her voice, was unable to complete the final rehearsals. She decided to use pre-recorded vocal track as support of the two scheduled performances.
SPEAKER_00Also, like the thing is, I I bet you a million people like do that on Saturday Night Live. Like, maybe. I don't know. I could be wrong. But like, okay, it went wrong, whatever. Own up to it and say, Yeah, I I lip synced and I I think, but she had this excuse of reflux and blah blah blah. It's just like, ugh, gross. That's what I'm saying.
SPEAKER_02So it says her first performance went smoothly. When the band prepared to play the second song, an incorrectly played vocal track from the previously performed song was mistakenly triggered before Simpson reached the microphone.
SPEAKER_01Yes.
SPEAKER_02The vocal track was promptly lowered, but in the meantime, the band synchronized with the notes of that first song to mitigate the causing even more confusion. Yes, live.
SPEAKER_00Yes.
SPEAKER_02Simpson initially reacted with a brief little jig. Like probably to try to diffuse the tension. After 30 seconds left the stage, the band continued playing, prompting the production to initiate a commercial break.
SPEAKER_00Which probably pissed the hell out of Lauren Michaels because here's a person who just like fucking.
SPEAKER_02Oh my god. Simpson reappeared during the closing credits with the evening's host Jude Law saying, My band started playing the wrong song, and I didn't know what to do, so I thought I'd do a hoedown. I'm sorry, this is live TV. These things happen.
SPEAKER_00No, girl.
SPEAKER_02The incident triggered a strong backlash on the Audience and media and sips was criticized for lip syncing.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, it was so terrible. It was such a thing. Anyway, I think that the lip syncing from Millie Vanilli, what year was this?
SPEAKER_022004.
SPEAKER_00I know it's much later, but I think that there's something like we already had, we hate it if you do that. Oh, yeah, it's there was nothing, no one ever admitted to that was a thing. I like everything was so re-recorded in the 60s and 70s, and then like now we have to like sing things live if we're saying we're gonna sing things live, and we're all like, we're all like holding hands and saying that that's what's happening, but that wasn't always happening. Yeah, but in this case, like this girl making all this excuses. Like, I remember thinking that girl is full of shit. I remember being at work just thinking, uh, why is she even like making this shit up? Like it was I I just that's why I brought it up today because I just remember thinking she's so full of shit. She's that's not true, yeah.
SPEAKER_02Well, this from Billboard, um the 10 most infamous lip sync incidents. Okay, so let's see what we got here. According to according to Billboard. Um, let's see. You've got um Michael Jackson doing Billy Jean at the Motown 25 celebration.
SPEAKER_00Never heard of that.
SPEAKER_02Now, Whitney Houston, her famous Star Spangled Banner performance at the Super Bowl. I have heard this before that it was not live. Oh, I didn't know. It's like the most famous, like it's this incredible performance, but I have heard that before. Is that actually true? That was that was huh. New kids on the block, general allegations that they just generally weren't singing in their concerts.
SPEAKER_00Okay.
SPEAKER_02Uh Red Hot Chili Peppers at a Super Bowl.
SPEAKER_00Oh, Super Bowl, sure.
SPEAKER_02Let's yeah, yeah, because you get out there. Beyonce at a Super Bowl, a lot of like Super Bowl things where you maybe it's just two, hold on. Mariah Carey, emotions we belong together at Dick Clark's Rockin' New Year's Eve in 2016.
SPEAKER_00I love that there's these things.
SPEAKER_02An in-ear monitor malfunction heard around the world will undoubtedly be remembered for many ball drops to come with Mariah's ad-lib, lip-synced, self-narrated debacle proving an instantly iconic moment in television history.
SPEAKER_00But the thing is, we all know she has an amazing voice. You know what I mean? So it's kind of like you get away.
SPEAKER_02And number number two, Ashley Simpson, number one, Millie Vanilli. So there you go.
SPEAKER_00Ashley Simpson is like, Wow, okay, that's cool. You always find these things that justify my memory. Like my memory is just like the Millie and Vanilli is the worst. God, when that Ashley Simpson thing happened, it was so like on the tails of Millie Vanilli, but it's so much later. But I just like I remember like conflating the two. I haven't that's what my brain does.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. All right. Well, so unfortunately, Rob, you know, uh Fab said uh later that Rob became addicted to the fame and couldn't live without it. Um, but but but in the documentary, I mean Fab seems to be doing pretty well. He's married to some like four kids Dutch model, four kids. He's he's singing, he's he's out there singing Millie Vanilli songs.
SPEAKER_00Like present father, like in the thing, he's like holding all the kids, making them fit. I know you can make a um like a move a video or whatever look like that, but there was some kind of I don't know, authenticity about it where because the way in which the kids interact with him, like kids, you know, and then the wife when they interview her, she's like, What? You know, she it's like she loves him, not what he was. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Which is an interesting way for someone like that to kind of come around at the end of it, like you're part of this completely fabricated, fabricated um thing, right? And now here you are 30 years later, and you're just kind of doing it. Like you gotta, you know, now you've got all the real things, you know, a family, and you're really singing to crowds that want to hear Billy Vanilli. They want to hear him sing Millie Vanilli songs, even though it wasn't his voice. Um, and it's kind of an interesting, cool way to bring it back around.
SPEAKER_00I know. Good for you, Fab. We wish you well, and you seem like cute.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, and you still look really good. So good job.
SPEAKER_00I'm sure you're gonna hear us and like listen to our pause. Absolutely. Love you. Love you.
