Hi! For months, maybe years, I’ve been considering writing about this. It’s a ridiculous story and perfectly suited for Now I Know, but it’s also something that I knew about as it was unfolding, having grown up in the late 1980s/1990s. So it’s now new to me in any sense of the phrase. Today’s the anniversary of a key moment in the story, so I concluded if not now, when?

If it’s new to you, great! And if not, I hope the nostalgia factor carries the day. — Dan

On March 7, 1989, a German R&B duo named Milli Vanilli released their debut U.S. album, “Girl You Know It’s True,” to a ton of fanfare. The album, under the Arista Records label, sold millions of copies, earning Platinum status six times over. It spent 78 weeks on the Billboard Top 200 chart, including 41 in the top 10 and seven in the #1 position. Five of the songs on the album, including “Blame It on the Rain,” topped the Billboard Hot 100 singles list. And on February 21, 1990, the duo earned the Grammy Award for Best New Artist. Milli Vanilli looked like the next big thing in music.

But despite the album’s title, it wasn’t actually true. Milli Vanilli was a lie.

The problems began at Lake Compounce, an amusement park and concert venue in Bristol, Connecticut (which, from experience, was a really great place to spend a day). On July 21, 1989 — just a few months into their meteoric rise to fame — Milli Vanilli took to the stage to perform the title track of their debut album. It didn’t go well, as seen — and heard — below.

If the video isn’t working for you or you can’t watch it where you are, here’s what you missed. A few seconds into the video, the duo starts singing the chorus of “Girl You Know It’s True” but the song gets stuck after the “it’s.” (Ironically, the word “true” was the one omitted.) The “girl you know it’s” phrase keeps repeating, and one of the two performers, Rob Pilatus, runs off stage. It later became clear that both he and his co-Milli Vanillian, Fab Morvan, were lip syncing during this performance. The tape glitched and Pilatus panicked. He ultimately returned to the stage and finished the performance — after the technical issues were resolved, that is. And while lip synching wasn’t (and still isn’t) uncommon during live shows, fans still began to wonder: why didn’t the duo just sing through it?

That question went unanswered, at least at the moment, and Morvan and Pilatus continued to perform. But as they became more famous, the questions piled up. Morvan spoke English with a heavy French accent and Pilatus had a German accent; in interviews, they pronounced certain words in ways that were inconsistent with how they sang them on their album. Biography notes that “their former Arista product manager, Robert Wieger, recalled the situation to Billboard. ‘I remember there were some words Fab couldn’t pronounce. He had a pretty thick French/Guadalupan accent, so on ‘Girl I’m Gonna Miss You’ he couldn’t say ‘miss,’ and he said ‘meeees.’" The seeds of doubt began to grow. And that doubt was taking a toll on the duo themselves.

It turned out that, when they were originally signed to their record label, Morvan and Pilatus expected to sing their own song— as any artist would expect. But, when they got into the studio to record their album, the record label executives were less than impressed. The duo had the right look for the music, but didn’t actually sing all that well. So the studio re-recorded the songs with other singers and released the album as if Morvan and Pilatus had do the singing. According to E! News, “they attributed the subterfuge to having signed a contract that got lost in translation, Morvan being from France and Pilatus from Germany. Especially since they'd already received an advance, they said they were under the impression they just had to go along with what producer Frank Farian wanted: To put their faces and names on an album they didn't make. They said everyone expected the release to just come and go.”

But success proved fatal to that plan. Fans loved the album and wanted more. Morvan and Pilatus, reportedly unwilling to be the frontmen of a ruse, told Arista Records that they wanted to sing their own songs on their next album, but the label executives didn’t agree and fired them instead. One of the biggest new acts on the music scene evaporated in a blink, and the world wanted to know why. And on November 16, 1990, the Los Angeles Times shared the truth, with perhaps the best source possible: Pilatus himself. He told the paper that “the last two years of our lives have been a total nightmare. We’ve had to lie to everybody. We are true singers but that maniac Frank Farian would never allow us to express ourselves.”

Three days later, the Grammys revoked Milli Vanilli’s Best New Artist award — the first and, to date, the only time a Grammy has been revoked. The record label stopped sales of the album and fans brought a class action suit against Arista, resulting in a settlement where fans could get a refund on their purchase (but still keep their CDs and cassette tapes).

The duo tried to mount a comeback in the late 1990s, this time singing their own songs, but it didn’t go well. Pilatus struggled with drug addiction and died of what is believed to be an accidental overdose in 1998. Morvan has built a career for himself as a session musician, songwriter, and producer — and as an author. He wrote an autobiography titled “You Know It’s True: The Real Story of Milli Vanilli,” in 2025, and also released it as an audiobook with him as the narrator. In a full-circle moment, the audio book earned Morvan a Grammy nomination for “Best Audio Book, Narration & Storytelling Recording,” with a winner to be announced in February 2026.

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Today’s Bonus fact: The Milli Vanilli scandal had some long-standing repercussions — especially in Turkmenistan. In 2005, fifteen years after the scandal broke, the longstanding President of Turkmenistan, Saparmurat Niyazov, took action to ensure that it could never happen in his country. As the Seattle Times reported that year, “President Saparmurat Niyazov has ordered a ban on lip-syncing performances across the tightly controlled Central Asian nation, citing ‘a negative effect on the development of singing and musical art.’ [ . . . ] Under Niyazov’s order, lip-syncing is prohibited at all cultural events, concerts, on television and at private celebrations such as weddings.” Niyazov’s ban is often said to be inspired by Milli Vanilli.

From the Archives: The Super Bowl’s Musical Secret: The secret is that there’s a lot of lip synching.

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And thanks! — Dan