We want to give it back.’”

 

Milli Vanilli

Fab Morvan of Milli Vanilli said even before the Grammys asked the duo to return its best new artist award, the group planned to give it back.

“We didn’t sing on the record. That is 100 percent, so we wanted to give it back. It was the right thing to do,” he said in a recent interview with The Associated Press. “And to this day it got twisted (and people thought) the Grammys wanted it back, when in fact we were the first to say, ‘We want to give it back.’”

Milli Vanilli, who won the honor at the 1990 Grammys, had to famously return the award after the public learned Morvan and Rob Pilatus didn’t sing on the duo’s 1989 U.S. debut, “Girl You Know It’s True.”

Morvan said despite that, it was still an honor to be nominated and that he and Pilatus, who died in 1998, still put in a lot of work.

“People might say, ‘Well, you know, they didn’t sing on the record.’ But look at the rest. We were the heart and soul of Milli Vanilli. We did those 107 cities (on tour) ... in eight months,” he said. “We worked hard. We worked our butts off. We entertained people.”

Milli Vanilli beat out acts like Indigo Girls, Soul II Soul, Neneh Cherry and Tone Loc for the honor. In some ways, Morvan feels winning the Grammy actually hurt the group.

“We were a target, an easy target at that. So, you know, winning the award definitely made us a major target. It pissed people off,” he said.

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