Boney M. are a R&B, reggae, funk and disco music group founded in 1974, who achieved popularity during the disco era of the second half of the 1970s. The band was created by German record producer Frank Farian, who was the group's primary songwriter. Originally based in West Germany, the four original members of the band's official line-up were Liz Mitchell and Marcia Barrett from Jamaica, Maizie Williams from Montserrat, and Bobby Farrell from Aruba. Since the 1980s, various line-ups of the band have performed with different personnels.
Exposé is an American freestyle vocal group formed in 1984 in Miami, Florida. The group primarily consisted of lead vocalists Jeanette Jurado, Ann Curless, and Gioia Bruno, who achieved much of their success between 1984 and 1993. They became the first group to attain four top 10 entries on the Billboard Hot 100 since their debut album, including their 1988 number one single "Seasons Change." As an all-female group, Exposé’s seven consecutive Top 10 hits on the US Hot 100 landed them only behind The Supremes nine consecutive Top 10 hits for most Top 10 hits by an all-female group. In March 2015, Billboard magazine named the group the eighth most-successful girl group of all-time.
B.U.G. Mafia, is a Romanian hip hop group from Pantelimon, Bucharest, widely regarded as one of the seminal acts of gangsta rap in Romania. Founded in 1993 as Black Underground, its original lineup consisted of Vlad "Tataee" Irimia, Dragoș "Caddy" Vlad-Neagu and two other members, D.D. and Mr.Nobody, who, by the end of the year, had already departed from the group. Irimia and Vlad-Neagu, who were still teenage high school students at the time, had been working on amateur solo recordings and had little professional prospects on their own prior to their encounter. The group initially performed as a duo throughout Bucharest at local highschool proms and parties while considering their options for professional careers in music and, following a string of relatively unsuccessful attempts at promoting their music in English, they recruited Alin "Uzzi" Demeter in 1995 and eventually transitioned to writing in Romanian.
Floyd Elliot Wray, known professionally as Collin Raye and previously as Bubba Wray, is an American country music singer. He initially recorded as a member of the band The Wrays between 1983 and 1987. He made his solo debut in 1991 as Collin Raye with the album All I Can Be, which produced his first Number One hit in "Love, Me". All I Can Be was the first of four consecutive albums released by Raye to achieve platinum certification in the United States for sales of one million copies each. Raye maintained several Top Ten hits throughout the rest of the decade and into 2000. 2001's Can't Back Down was his first album that did not produce a Top 40 country hit, and he was dropped by his record label soon afterward. He did not record another studio album until 2005's Twenty Years and Change, released on an independent label.
Goodies is the debut studio album by American singer Ciara. It was released on September 28, 2004, via Jazze Pha's Sho'nuff Records and LaFace Records. After writing songs for several established acts, Ciara's talents were noticed by Jazze Pha, and she began to work on what became Goodies. The album's conception came through the title track, produced by Lil Jon and created as a female crunk counterpart to other singles produced by Lil Jon such as Usher's "Yeah!" and Petey Pablo's "Freek-a-Leek". Ciara worked with additional writers and producers on the album, including Jazze Pha, Bangladesh, R. Kelly, Johntá Austin, Sean Garrett, and Keri Hilson, among others.
Milk & Sugar is a German house music producer and record label, represented by Mike Milk and formerly Steven Sugar. The duo collaborated between 1993 and 2022 under a variety of names, including Axis, Hitch Hiker & Jacques Dumondt, and Mike Stone & Steve Heller, and have scored major club hits internationally, including a re-make of John Paul Young's "Love Is in the Air".
Mr. President was a German Eurodance project best known for the crossover world hit "Coco Jamboo," released in 1996. The group is also renowned in Europe for the dance hits "Up'n Away," "I'll Follow the Sun," "I Give You My Heart," "4 on the Floor," "Jojo Action," and the successful albums Up'n Away – The Album and We See the Same Sun.
Akcent is a Romanian dance pop group whose members sing in Romanian, English and Spanish. Their name originated as a wordplay on accent. Originally a duo, it consisted of Adrian Sînă and Ramona Barta. They released their debut album Senzatzia in 2000. Except for the first track, "Ultima vara", which received some airplay, the album was a commercial failure and the duo disbanded shortly after. Sînă brought Marius Nedelcu, Mihai Gruia and Sorin Brotnei into the group, changing it from a duo to a boyband in 2001. They came to prominence with the single "Ți-am promis" in their native Romania.
"You Know My Name" is the theme song of the 2006 James Bond film Casino Royale, performed by American musician Chris Cornell, who wrote and produced it jointly with David Arnold, the soundtrack's composer. The track was leaked onto the Internet on September 20, 2006, and later released as an official single on November 13, 2006 through Interscope Records. It was not included in the Casino Royale soundtrack, but appeared on Cornell's second solo album, Carry On.
Paula Seling is a Romanian singer, songwriter, record producer, and television personality. She has released more than thirteen albums and over twenty singles, which include two top-ten hits in the Romanian Top 100, and a minor European hit which entered the charts in Finland and Norway, as well as the UK Singles Chart.
Thaddis Laphonia "Kuk" Harrell is an American songwriter, vocal producer, arranger and engineer. He was a member of a songwriting–production team composed of himself, Christopher "Tricky" Stewart and Terius "The-Dream" Nash. In 2011, Kuk Harrell and partner Tricky Stewart joined the ranks of Fox's American Idol along with music mogul Jimmy Iovine, producing many of the songs performed on television by the contestants and released via iTunes. 2011 marked the highly anticipated return of Jennifer Lopez and her album LOVE? in which Kuk served as Album Vocal Producer. Earning his fourth Grammy for the vocal production of Rihanna's No. 1 Billboard Single "Only Girl ", Harrell is also the vocal producer and co-writer of Rihanna's Grammy-winning single "Umbrella". A composer and engineer on Beyoncé's chart topping "Single Ladies " from the album I Am... Sasha Fierce, he is also vocal producer and engineer of the Diane Warren-penned "I Was Here" from Beyoncé's 2011 album 4. He also produced the majority of the vocals on Mary J. Blige's Platinum album Growing Pains, which won the 2008 Grammy for Best Contemporary R&B Album. The first single from Growing Pains, "Just Fine", earned a Grammy nomination for best R&B vocal performance in 2007.
Swedish popular music, or shortly Swedish pop music, refers to music that has swept the Swedish mainstream at any given point in recent times. After World War II, Swedish pop music was heavily influenced by American jazz, and then by rock-and-roll from the U.S. and the U.K. in the 1950s and 1960s, before developing into dansband music. Since the 1970s, Swedish pop music has come to international prominence with bands singing in English, ranking high on the British, New Zealand, American, and Australian charts and making Sweden one of the world's top exporter of popular music by gross domestic product.
Play & Win is a Romanian songwriting and music production project that was formed as a trio in 2008 by Radu Bolfea, Marcel Botezan and Sebastian Barac. It became a solo project by Bolfea after Botezan and Barac left and formed Marco & Seba in 2013. The production team have more than 500 songs to their credit registered at the PRS. As Play & Win, they have been produced some of Romania's biggest dance music hits, collaborating with artists including Inna, Akcent, 3rei Sud Est, and Cătălin Josan. As a musical group, they have released numerous singles that have charted on various music charts. They are among the pioneers of the Romanian popcorn music style.
Adi Cristian Colceru also known as David Deejay, is a Romanian former DJ, Record producer and composer from Bucharest, Romania. He studied violin in primary school. After moving to Bucharest, he worked with several local producers, and in 2007 started with the hit single "Sexy Thing". He subsequently released several singles after the success of Sexy Thing such as Temptation and Fantasy. He is best known for his long time collaborations with singer Dony from the band Refflex. David Deejay is a pioneer of the Romanian popcorn music style.
Vlad Irimia, primarily known by his stage name Tata Vlad, formerly Tataee, is a Romanian record producer, rapper, record executive, and music manager. He is one of the founders of the influential Romanian hip hop trio B.U.G. Mafia, also having produced albums and overseeing the careers of many acclaimed Romanian hip hop artists, such as La Familia, XXL & 10 Grei, Mahsat and JerryCo. As a music producer, he is frequently credited as one of the pioneers and key figures in the architecture of the Romanian version of gangsta rap, a style of music that closely resembles its American counterpart but also includes various local influences derived from balkan music or, more recently, electronica.
"Colors" is a song by Romanian group Morandi intended to be the lead single off the group's fourth studio album, Zebra. However, it was later included in their compilation album, Best Of (2011). The supposed Zebra's mix of club and British rock served as inspiration for the track. Written by the group, the song was first released on 16 June 2009 in Romania and on 6 August 2009 for digital download and streaming in the United States through Universal Music Romania.
Dollarman is a Caribbean singer, songwriter, producer and musician born in Grenada. Since moving to Brooklyn, New York, he continues to present hits with a Caribbean influence and reggae.
Adrian Claudiu Sînă, better known as Adrian Sina or simply Adi Sina, is a Romanian singer-songwriter, record producer, radio DJ and entertainer. He is best known for creating, producing and singing in the dance group Akcent and also for writing and producing mainstream hit songs for himself and other international artists. He started out as a disc jockey in the 1990s and then created a group with his fellow musician Ramona Barta. He came to prominence as a member of Akcent with the song "Ultima vară" in 1999. His group was joined by Marius Nedelcu, Sorin Brotnei and Mihai Gruia. Together they scored multiple number-one hits both in Romania and throughout Eastern Europe, especially in the mid- to late 2000s. Their albums have been certified multi-Platinum by the Uniunea Naţională a Producătorilor de Fonograme din România and millions of copies were sold worldwide. Their signature song was "Kylie", released in 2005.
"Kylie" is a song by Romanian group Akcent from their fourth studio album, S.O.S. (2005). It was written by two of the group's members, Adrian Sînă and Marius Nedelcu, alongside its producers Sebastian Barac, Radu Bolfea, Marcel Botezan and Viorel Şipoş. The track was initially released as "Dragoste de închiriat" on 28 January 2005, before being re-released in June in English under its current title. "Kylie" is a dance track which describes the group's fondness of Australian singer Kylie Minogue.
"Jokero" is a song by Romanian group Akcent for their fifth studio album French Kiss with Kylie (2006). Marius Nedelcu wrote the song, while Adi Colceru and Adrian Sînă produced it. The song was officially released on 17 December 2005, when it premiered on a Romanian radio station. In February 2006, "Jokero" was announced as one of the competing songs in Selecția Națională 2006, an event used to determine Romania's entry for the Eurovision Song Contest 2006. Akcent asked Romanian singer Nico to perform the track with them for the competition. The song came second overall, losing to Mihai Trăistariu's "Tornerò" (2006), though it won the public vote.
