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Herman Rarebell (born Hermann Erbel) began his life on the 18th of November 1949 in Saarbrucken, Germany, his zodiac sign being Scorpio. By the age of 12 his passion for drumming was so extreme that he would practice on anything available, including an old sloped chair. His song writing was influenced by the music of Led Zeppelin, a group which he still loves.

After qualifying in drums and piano at the Music School in Saarbrucken, and after he played with Mastermen (1965) and with Fuggs Blues (1968) he moved on to England from 1971 to 1977 where he was hoping to find the next great Heavy Metal Band and there Michael Schenker introduced him to the Scorpions and began his international career as drummer and songwriter for the Scorpions. He was a driving force for the band, leading it with the “full” sound of his drums and especially during the live appearances, making the band perform the songs in a spectacular way. He was an important composer in the history of the group, writing classic songs like “Another Piece of Meat”, “Falling in Love” and the second single from Savage Amusement “Passion Rules the Game” and writing the lyrics for some of the most classic songs of the band like “Rock You Like a Hurricane”, “Make it Real”, “Dynamite”, “Blackout”, “Arizona”, “Bad Boys Running Wild”, “Don’t Stop at the Top”, “Tease Me, Please Me” and other songs. In 1982 he released his first solo album Nip In The Bud (which he re-recorded as Herman ze German & Friends with the help of some friends of his as guest such as members of Dokken, Great White, Ratt etc. It is worth noting that he is and was the only musician of the Scorpions who did his own solo project while still a full member of the band.

In April of 1996 he left the band following their 1993 album “Face the Heat”and the third Scorpions’ live album’Live Bites’ . His career with the band has seen his name on an international reputation boasting 32 million album sales. Surely with his absence the consistency of the group was lost and the change in the sound was obvious to all the fans.

Maybe the fatigue from the non stop touring, maybe the disagreements regarding the recordings and musical directions of the upcoming Scorpions album (Pure Instinct) and making the acquaintance with Prince Albert were some of the reasons he decided to leave the group and to get involved with a new challenge, to become a producer and to cofound the record company Monaco Records. He participated in many of the projects as a drummer and he released a second solo album under the label called Stings like a Scorpion, while he had already released “Nip in the Bud” and “Herman Ze German and Friends” while he was still with the Scorpions which were produced by Ric Browde. The two albums are essentially the same but the latter has re-recorded vocals and a re-mix courtesy of Michael Wagener. The track “I’ll Say Goodbye” was co-written with Dokken's lead singer Don Dokken. Artists on the album include bassist Juan Croucier of Ratt, vocalists Don Dokken, Jack Russell of Great White, Charlie Huhn of Victory, Steve Marriott and guitarists Chris Storey and David Cooper. His artistic restlessness lead him to a project with his wife Claudia Raab, former 7 Sins saxophonist and well known actress, and released a debut album “The Rhythm of Art". Its musical direction was atmospheric dance music with saxophone, drums and electronic music and some live appearances under the Art Meets Music project with shows which would become a lot more than regular Rock n’ Roll events, also featuring dancers as well as featuring original paintings by Rolling Stones guitarist Ronnie Wood and Ronald Muri, founder of the “Pop-Expressionist Movement”. He participated in the “Drum Legends” project with his friend Pete York (ex Spencer Davis Group) where they released a live CD & DVD with the contribution of Jazz drummer C.Antonini. He also released a great ‘soft’ album with the Monte Carlo Pop Orchestra(Let me take you to the moon) as well as a single with the singer of 2Unlimited Ray Slijngaard (a remake of the song "The Eye of The Tiger") showing his need to experiment.

Herman also wrote a German pocket-book called "Here I Am". It's about his life as a Scorpion.

In 2005 Herman Rarebell was featured on a cd called "Drum Legends LIVE 2005" along with drumming legends Pete York and Charly Antolini. The cd was by Skinfire Records and featured 14 songs both original songs and some jazz versions of classic Scorpions songs.

The Scorpions put on a celebratory event including former members for their headline show at the Wacken Open Air festival on the 3rd of August 2006 billed “A night to remember – A journey in time”. Herman was invited by his old friends to join them on stage as their guest and the band perform many archive songs featuring Uli Jon Roth, Herman Rarebell and Michael Schenker . This inspired him to put together his own group and go on tour and led to Herman announcing the formation of the project Herman Rarebell and Band for a new album “I’m back”. This album includes a re-recorded version of the Scorpions’ “Rock You Like a Hurricane” as well as the classic song “Heya Heya” by Geronimo. The group involved singer Stefan Erz, guitarist James Jackson and his wife Claudia Raab on saxophone. It was released in spring 2007

In 2007 Herman Rarebell released his first full solo album since 1985. The album "I'm Back" was release on Mausoleum Records and features 13 new songs. Also in 2007 Retrospect Records re-issued the 1985 "Herman Ze German And Friends" album on cd for worldwide sales.

In January of 2008 he released an audio book, called "My Life As A Scorpion" in German which has been released in English as well in spring of 2009. He also released his best of album 'Herman's collection'

On 5/24/08 he played at Rock Legends Adventure along with musicians like"Steve Lukather" (Toto), "Bobby Kimball" (Toto), "John Miles", "Ian Paice" (Deep Purple), "Pete York" (Spencer Davis Group), "Carl Carlton" (Robert Palmer) and "Leland Sklar" (Phil Collins, Toto). And in 25/10/08 played again with the Scorpions in another one sold out reunion concert in Strasbourg and he join the Scorpions again in Athens,Greece on the 6th of July, 2009.

In 2009 Herman returned to the rock n roll stage with his new band Herman Ze German (HZG). On July 10 2009 his new band headlined the Retrospect Stage at the 2009 Rocklahoma Music Fest in Pryor Oklahoma. The new band features Duke Jackson on lead guitar from the band Strikeforce. And also Joe Council from the band Push on bass. The band then followed with several more shows in the mid-west and then headed into the studio in St. Louis Missouri to start work on a full new cd. the new cd will be produced by Duke Jackson at 420 studios. A new tour is said to follow the release of the new HZG album.

So far herman has 78 Gold Records and 30 Platinum Records and has received many music awards, including an ECHO and a World Music Award.

HZG BIO From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia