Olsen Brothers

Winners of the 2000 Eurovision Song Contest, Danish pop/rockers the Olsen Brothers had been performing together since 1965, when brothers Jørgen Olsen (born March 15, 1950) and Niels Olsen (born April 13, 1954) fronted the beat band the Kids. Best remembered in Denmark for opening for the visiting Kinks in 1965, the Kids released a handful of 45s beginning in 1967, but had split by the end of the decade. Opting to remain together as a duo, the brothers appeared in the Danish production of the musical Hair in 1971 and released their debut album, Olsen, the following year. Further long-players included For What We Are (1973), For the Children of the World (1973), Back on the Tracks (1976), You’re the One (1977), San Francisco (1978), and Dans — Dans — Dans (1979); their biggest hits include “Angelina” (1972) and “Julie” (1977). Falling comparatively silent throughout the 1980s, the brothers resurfaced in 1982 with the hit “Marie, Marie,” and again in 1985 with “Neon Madonna.” Their next album, however, did not appear until 1987 brought the release of Rockstalgi, and new releases continued sporadically throughout the remainder of the century — Det Stille Ocean in 1990 and Angelina in 1999 were punctuated only by 1994′s semi-compilation Greatest and Latest. The Olsen Brothers’ comeback began in 2000, when they surprisingly won Denmark’s Eurovision qualifying contest. Their song “Fly on the Wings of Love” then became one of the most emphatic winners in Eurovision history, and the biggest hit of the brothers’ own long career — at one point, the single (whose Danish title was “Smuk Som et Stjerneskud”) was selling 100,000 copies a day in Denmark alone. The brothers returned to a more or less annual LP release schedule — Fly on the Wings of Love was followed by Walk Right Back in 2001 (they performed the title track at the opening ceremony to that year’s Eurovision Song Contest final), Songs in 2002, More Songs in 2003, and Our New Songs in 2005. They also made another try for Eurovision glory in 2005, entering the Danish qualifiers with the song “Little Yellow Radio.” They finished second behind Jakob Sveistrup. ~ Dave Thompson