Who protects the (bad) reputation of Dieter Bohlen?

Politicians and elite celebrities always have to have tight connections with the media and important law firms in order to keep their reputations and image intact. So whenever there is an inconvenience, these entities work hard to keep these people’s images intact. But it’s not just for any inconvenience; it also helps their fame rise, making them likable, popular, and untouchable.

For over 40 years, the huge popularity of Dieter Bohlen was made possible thanks to the large media companies that he himself tried to establish a very good and solid relationship with. In some way, the fame and popularity were achieved in different ways. So we will go one by one and speak about these extremely good connections.

Dieter is not a special case. He is a typical celebrity with connections, where he can freely abuse his power. In another article, we explained that real producers don’t need to be so much in the limelight, to be given so much publicity. Producers, the bad and the good ones altogether, in general, have nothing to prove to anybody. They do their job and simply have no time to whine and tell everybody “Look what I did! Praise me!” in the media or on Instagram.

Dieter has to remind people of his doings constantly while simultaneously being shown as a role model, an “Alpha-man” whom everybody has to copy. First and foremost, nobody who wants to climb the heights in life would want to have this level of insecurity and emotional immaturity that Dieter has had forever. Life has taught us that bosses don’t hire insecure and immature people. The only difference is that we peasants are, well, nobodies, not the illegal children of billionaire families with a Nazi past.

This immaturity and insecurity of Dieter, comes as a result of deep self-rejection as a complete nothing. He knows he is nothing, but without telling people the opposite of what he is, he would forever be irrelevant. It’s not just his personal life and dark past, it’s also the fact that he owes the success that he claims is thanks to him, to Thomas Anders. And the media, have done an extremely solid job of portraying Thomas as badly as possible.

With all that said, we’ll go back in time.

In the 1980s, when Modern Talking was created, Dieter was already known as the composer, producer, lyricist, guitarist, and the one who sang the falsetto parts. Thomas meanwhile was known as, the singer and the attractive face of the band. In other words, somebody who can easily be replaced. This was heavily implied back then as names like Chris Norman (who collaborated with Dieter) and Schlager-singer Jürgen Drews surfaced in the media as replacements for Thomas.

Speaking of the 1980s period, Dieter had strong ties with BRAVO’s chief editor Inge Czygan, and the top photographer of the magazine, Fryderyk Gabowicz. It was said at that time that Inge did not really like Thomas and preferred Dieter, and with good reason: Dieter gave her free leaks and information, no matter how extremely fabricated they were, in exchange for making him more popular, plus hiding sinister things.

While Thomas was practically inaccessible (for everybody, not just Inge), hence, less popular, the question is, how can it be? Girls always liked Thomas… while that’s true, in this case, we have to emphasize that being popular and being attractive are two different things. But this is a little complicated. As for Inge, she always painted Thomas as a homosexual man in the articles and it was she who endorsed all those derogatory headlines.

Thomas was indeed more popular, among girls. But that popularity began to fall after 1986. The girls never saw him as a person they’d admire but as an object of sex. Fans even wrote letters to the magazines, that the looks don’t matter if you aren’t smart.

At the same time, magazine polls (like from this Rennbahn Express magazine) showed that Thomas had more fans, but even these fans did not trust him as much as they trusted Dieter, not only when it came to music but also behavior. As far as the looks were concerned, this was unwinnable for Dieter. But for MT fans, Modern Talking embodied Dieter. Thomas was just a sexy replaceable singer.

But this doesn’t mean that such unpopularity cannot be staged and invented. The polls can also be invented, and the “unpopularity fact” can also be fabricated. If you tell people this man is not worthy of fame and praise, they’ll quickly change their minds. In this poll, which only had 200 “fans”, only Dieter answered; nobody wanted to know about Thomas’ opinion.

In the BRAVO magazine, a handful of offensive letters were aimed at Thomas, by women, who agreed with the sentiment made by the “Musik-express” journalist Martin Brem, that Thomas was a “singing faggot who bathes in the sun and a lapdog under the chain of his wife”, (while Dieter was called “The Rambo”) and that Dieter is the main man of the group.

Thomas, even though he was deemed crazily in love with his wife (Nora) he was still called a faggot, a homosexual lapdog, also by women. It’s quite impossible to comprehend the logic of these women: Loving your wife is to be a faggot. Unless the idea of a “real man” for these women, is to be violent, narcissistic, assholes who cannot even wash or keep themselves clean.

One question, though: Fellas, is it gay to love a woman?

The fact that Thomas still made peace with the journalist only 2-3 years later, despite the abuse, the hate, and the health problems he was facing (thanks to these people) speaks a lot about his character. He also did not have any problem with the band who made a song about him wishing to die. But Dieter said that he went through two stomach ulcers. And this is what his dogs and his fans always remember. The suffering of the narcissist. Ah, Dieter, Dieter… if you loved your dark-haired angel so much, you wouldn’t have sold your soul to the devil.

Fast forward a couple of years later, in Germany, Dieter’s popularity as a persona was skyrocketing. Everybody admired him and saw him as a role model, not just as a “good” musician. And still, he never missed the opportunity to say how bad the music that Thomas made was. In every interview, he had to mention something about Thomas.

But not just that: newspapers and magazines were obsessed with the idea of pinning Thomas and Dieter against each other when they had gone separate ways in 1987.

For example, here we have two separate magazine issues from PopRocky in September 1989. In the first one, you see Thomas commenting on Bohlen and Modern Talking in very degrading words: “I will not sing the superficial crap of Modern Talking! [..] I will be successful like George Michael”. 

In the next magazine issue, Dieter responds to Thomas statements that he is a jealous man with big mouth. “I would sue Thomas, but I will not do it”. 

From first glance Thomas sounds very arrogant and disrespectful in his statements. But what if we told you that these statements are completely fabricated?

Evidence: On the bottom of the first issue with Thomas’ interview, it says “Bohlen’s counterattack in the next Pop Rocky issue”.

In other words, Dieter had his “response” against Thomas ready, even when the interview with PopRocky and Thomas was yet to be printed on the magazine. Because, logically, interview is conducted first, then later is printed, sold and ready for for the audience to read.

So how did Bohlen know what Thomas would say such outrageous statements, that Pop/Rocky had to print for audience suspense and hype how he would respond?

What these people and Dieter himself do to elevate his image, and make Thomas look like the devil, is absolutely unbelievable.

As the years passed, Bohlen developed good connections with large media enterprises such as Bertelsmann Group, which owns the TV channel RTL, as well as developing a very good relationship with Germany’s most scandalous newspaper, BILD. Already in the late 1970s, Bohlen was managed by Goetz Kiso, who not only became the joint manager of Modern Talking and the CEO of Polydor right after Thomas switched record labels, but also opened his law firm, Kiso-Siefert-Dropmann, the law firm that protects Dieter Bohlen to this day from attacks, for example, by striking YouTube channels who expose Bohlen and his doings for “copyright”.

Like this Spanish YouTube channel, which made 4 series exposing Dieter Bohlen that gained a lot of virality. After the copyright strike, the channel was never the same.

It often happens, that when a celebrity (but even politicians, sportsmen, agents, etc) has a good relationship with some media entities, these personalities leak information to them in exchange for a “good image”. They tell these people any information, true, fake, whatever. The win-win situation is that this person is protected, and the newspaper makes money out of these headlines. But this isn’t enough either, they have to develop a very good relationship with them in general.

In the 2000s, the scandal of Dieter Bohlen “never singing” at Modern Talking, was forgotten quickly. Thanks to these connections and relationships, such a scandal was overshadowed by a series of other scandals, controversies, hype – and other favors: Making 1000 headlines a day about Dieter’s scandalous private life with his girlfriends and his one-night escorts, publishing degrading and ridiculous books, and founding “Deutschland sucht den Superstar” on RTL, the pinnacle of Dieter’s popularity in Germany.

And all these events happened so quickly, at once even, that one might think this was all staged. The public had to forget about such a monstrosity (exposing the last heir of the Krupp dynasty as a fraud) so they must be entertained with other nonsense.

Remember, Milli Vanilli was humiliated and shamed publicly for miming to the tracks that were sung by others, and their Grammy awards were smashed on the roads and were taken away from them… under such humiliation was also the producer and composer of the band, Frank Farian. His reputation was never the same, even in his home country, let alone in America…. meanwhile, Dieter, doing much worse than that, is still being given air-time, praise, and treated as a God.

In 2002 and 2003, Dieter released two books: the autobiography “Nothing but the Truth” and the scandalous book “Behind the Scenes”. Both books were promoted by the wife of BILD’s chief editor, Katja Kessler. In the meantime, you’ll see what we mean by “good relationship”.

Dieter wrote in the book “Behind the Scenes” that Thomas was a lying sewage rat who stole money from him. In the large headline of BILD, a few days before the publication of the book, it was published as “exclusive BILD news”, this headline.

Right after, the book immediately sold millions in revenue. Who gave a shit if Dieter broke the law? Both BILD and Dieter profited. Bild sold headlines, Dieter sold his book.

Later, he removed the passages and lost a lawsuit against Thomas, but the damage was done. The book did not sell as much as when the passages about Thomas were removed. A clearly planned strategy. And with 99% certainty leaked and endorsed by Dieter to BILD. But… let him play the victim. Poor Dieter, how does he let himself be treated badly by Thomas?

But extremely exaggerated headlines to sell papers weren’t the only strategy that Dieter & co. followed. They also consistently aired “informative documentaries” about the “history” of Modern Talking to brainwash the audience. It is a disgrace to even call it “the history”, more like “Dieter You Are The Best Ever xxx” documentaries. Uncreative and uninspired shows that only Dieter fans would watch, where 80% of the intervals talk about Dieter’s success and “hard work”, and how Thomas destroyed the band with Nora. Nothing more. In these documentaries, the only praising words directed at Thomas were “attractive boy with angel voice”.

And how can these “Modern Talking” documentaries talk about the band, ONLY? When the participants in the documentary are all Dieter’s friends, colleagues, and family? It’s impossible.

This punchable face included.

Cringey cartoons such as “Dieter – Der Film” were also very appreciated by the audience. Also released on RTL, in the film, Thomas was (clearly) portrayed as a transvestite, or a woman… it’s quite unclear. However, any critique to the cartoon was shut down, and those were called snowflakes.

The image and the nickname, “Pop-Titan” was also given by the aforementioned channel, RTL, while hosting the talent show which has been airing since 2003. Since then, Dieter was and still is addressed as “Pop-Titan”. Even worse… more than three decades ago, he was called the German Mozart.

Since the show aired, Dieter has been the main judge and producer of the show. There, he insults people who can’t sing. The irony here is huge, how is such a show created right after Dieter is exposed that he did not sing at Modern Talking? But the show wasn’t made to mock Dieter, after all, it’s his own product, and him being the main judge only gives more credit to his persona and image, whose words weigh more than anything. “He was chosen as a jury for a reason”.

Such a show was made to entertain people with Dieter’s bullying and to choose bad singers to audition on purpose so they could be humiliated. At the same time, this was also a show where the production team forced auditioners to fake their stories or relationships or coerced them into doing things they did not want to. For example, David Petters, a victim of this nonsense, auditioned in DSDS in 2012 and was coerced by the RTL team to pretend he was gay and to seduce another male candidate.

According to him, he only received “questions about whether he had sex with this particular man” and there was little to no privacy in the rooms, where the staff had a spare key and entered their rooms to force them to perform sexual acts. On the other hand, they also spread news of “gay sex” happening behind the bushes. After refusing to comply with the ideas of RTL, he was immediately disqualified after the preliminary round.

Afterwards, he filed a criminal lawsuit against RTL for sexual coercion and nothing was heard of him, or the court case since then.

But what about those who won? If you won the DSDS, you received a “record deal”, a.k.a. immediate free number one spot in the charts with an album produced by Dieter Bohlen himself, then after a year is completely forgotten. The only one who really won something is Dieter and his staff. It’s not as if radio airtimes and charts cannot be bought.

The same can also be said about Dieter’s Instagram followers. Online tools for marketing and PR can show that Dieter buys followers. Considering that the policies for immediately bought followers have become more strict, (they would close your account) Dieter loses more followers than he gains. In the past, he did attempt to buy over 100k followers, but he quickly lost them.

And speaking of social media popularity, Dieter also has the edge over Thomas. And not in a good way.

On Russian platforms like VKontakte, in the country where “MT” received the absolute popularity, there exist fan clubs dedicated to the band, or to one of the band members. Such fan clubs or communities were created more than a decade ago already and the majority of the administrators, happen to be fans of Dieter. The administrators are quite an unpleasant bunch.

For example, they post fake news from bad sources about Thomas (e.g. alleged flop concerts), fake statements where Thomas speaks “badly” about Dieter (purposely mistranslated statements), or aggressive behavior towards the fans, for example: trying to convince them that Thomas is 100% gay and if you disagree, you’re stupid. This was the logic of the head of the official Russian fan club community for MT. Quite pathetic for a Russian fan club to behave this unprofessionally.

In other fan club communities about Modern Talking, administrators not only publish fake, wrongly translated news from extremely horrible sources where Thomas is painted in a bad light, but they also block people who think differently than them. They, however, have no problem in keeping aggressive and disrespectful “fans”. 80% of the members, in fact, across all communities, are only fans of Bohlen, who openly dislike Thomas.

It’s a much different story in online forums, where everything is moderated and discussed in a respectful manner. Unfortunately, this aggressive behavior is also noted on other social media accounts in the German language. Fans of Dieter storm over Anders’ accounts and tell him that he cannot sing and advise him to sing live… You heard that right.

Speaking of Russia, in the late 1980s, Thomas also had a bad reputation within the Soviet media, despite being popular among the fans. The media spread that Thomas sang playback in concerts that were held in Soviet cities and called him a “fake star”. It was a nationwide story.

Meanwhile, they held the clear playback concerts of Blue System to the highest esteem and praise. But this was because, in the mid-1980s, Dieter established very good contact and relationship with Soviet journalists. In a video, he praised Gorbachev and the Perestroika. It explains why the Soviet media were so warm with Dieter. But despite all this (fake) love from the media, nobody in the Kremlin square even had the excitement to invite Dieter to perform for the highest esteemed Russian politicians. The ex-wife of Vladimir Putin and Russia’s First Lady, Lyudmila Putina, asked her then husband to invite Thomas to perform privately for them, and he complied with her wish.

Speaking of books, there were two men who tried to expose juicy secrets about Modern Talking and Dieter Bohlen, and those are producer Frank Farian and Bohlen’s ex-manager Gerd Graf Bernadotte. Farian’s book, Stupid dieser Bohlen, which was published in 2004, did not sell well and was a complete failure, despite numerous attempts to promote the book in the German media like SAT1, which was vocal about being anti-Bohlen.

Bernadotte, on the other hand, wanted to expose the group “Modern Talking” as a whole in some passages, even though the book was called “The Bohlen Code”. There were also passages about Thomas (described as lusty hidden gay or that his son was illegitimate) and his marriage at the church with Nora. Overall, the book was published against Bohlen, and it was published in the USA to avoid German jurisdiction. A year later, he was found dead by his son, who heavily suspected that he was poisoned.

In summary, Dieter doesn’t want “strong connections” just to protect his reputation from “unpleasant” exposure. Because, by protecting his reputation, his relevancy is also kept intact. His scheme at Modern Talking, as a “singer”, was uncovered. But the hype and the shockwave did not last long. It was quickly forgotten through the publication of controversial books and the production of “DSDS”.

Dieter knows that without these strong connections, he will be irrelevant. They need to create rigged talent shows where auditioners are insulted by the main judge, publish controversial books, or make stupid statements. All these create hype. And you cannot create hype just by yourself, you need to promote, promote, promote. Have strong connections. Pick up something you have to exploit.

Let’s say, a few would be interested in the piquant details of Dieter Bohlen’s professional career (Hinter den Kulissen) if BILD did not make any headlines about how unscrupulous, lazy, and greedy Thomas is.

Maybe Deutschland Sucht den Superstar is the pinnacle of his popularity, but only in Germany. Because the pinnacle of his success was Modern Talking, and that was achieved by having Thomas at his side, who did most of the job.

It’s Dieter Bohlen who cannot do anything alone.