Dschinghis Khan was a natural offspring of those days a long time ago when all signs were mercilessly pointing toward disco.

Of course, Dschinghis Khan was what you heard in the Hit Parades, and yet there were worlds of difference between that and the characteristic drawl of Dschinghis Khan's Peter Alexander. Dschinghis Khan had discovered that their songs were quite different from the usual limited circle of constant music themes: love homesickness, need for luck. Being different, the songs of Dschinghis Khan were not so uninteresing, having the theme of processing of historical events.

1978 had already seen Frank Farian's group Boney M with their hit "Rasputin". It had been established that the international hit parade was not critically opposed to historical themes. Whether or not the success of Boney M is due to the witty lyrics ("...Ra Ra Rasputin, Russia's greatest love machine...") or to the characteristic disco beat is difficult to determine.

The wild success of the "PROPYLÄEN - WELTGESCHICHTE" ("PROPELIEN - WORLD HISTORY") with the obvious favor of legendary empires (Mongolian horse attacks, Roman empire) had not occurred to Frank Farian. To make this discovery he would need the personality of a farseeing world ruler who knew the sign on the times and who knew what the people of 1977 desired in entertainment: history till the end.

So it was for the 1979 Grand Prix (music competition) that the king of German music producers, Ralph Siegel himself, moved to the use of historical themes and put together a group of young entrepenures for the already composed title song "Dschinghis Khan". The song did not make it into the finals but was a huge hit (primarily because of its visual presentation) and became a musical emblem of Dschinghis Khan. Their extravagant costumes gave the individual group members distinct characters, allowing easy recognition and high identification potential with the public (naturally copied from the Village People). With its unconventional use of complex historical problems and extravagant costumes, the young artists had obviously hit the nerve of the music consumer industry.

It was clear that their first success would go down as one of the hits of 1979, where it would be in good company with similarly fatalistic songs such as Peter Maffay's Karat adaption "Über sieben Brücken mußt du geh'n" ("Over the seven bridges you must go"). These songs possibly expressed the fear of invasion from the East ("... let's get some more vodka, ha-ha-ha, because we are mongols, ha-ha-ha .." --> Mongols = East = Soviet Union = Threat) and turned out to be a prediction of the Soviet invasion of Afganistan in December of that same year. At the same time, the group's next hit "Moskau" ("Moscow") showed that at one time things had been different in the Soviet capital and added a positive slant to the Czar empire ("...Moskau, Moskau, werft die Gläser an die Wand, Rußland ist ein schönes Land, ha-ha-ha-ha-ho-hej...", in English translation "Moscow, Moscow, throw your glasses against the wall, Russia is a beautiful country, ha-ha-ha-ha-ho-hey...").

Dschinghis Khan's first LP united an enormous variety of historical themes including Far East Culture ("Samurai", "China Boy") and geopolitical problem areas ("Sahara","Puszta") with humoristic ("Rocking Son of Dschinghis Khan") and anthropological issues ("Der Verräter" - "The Traitor" (Judas)). Their message was simple as well as enlightening. In every possible corner of the earth, at every possible time there was more going on than in the dreary and gray Germany. The rise and fall of numerous world empires, the fate of foreign people and legendary adventures were more exciting than The Olympic Summer Games in Moscow.

The success of the group was significanly tied to their escapist use of history. This became painfully obvious as albums after "Hadschi Halef Omar" (1979) and "Rom" (1980) moved away from historical themes. The last high point of Dschinghis Khan may be "Wir sitzen alle im selben Boot" - "We all sit in the same boat" (1981), but the titles of their last LP's "Klabautermann", "Der Dudelmoser" (both 1982) and "Himalaya" (1983) are evidence that the fate of the group was the same as that of the people about which they had composed their music, finally falling into forgottenness.