History
The piece originated by initiative of record producer Horst Fuchs, who had contact to a Belgian group of studio musicians, calling themselves "The Waikikis" and for whom Fuchs looked for compositions with a certain "Hawaiian flair". He contacted the composers Hans Blum and Martin Böttcher for some music pieces. Martin Böttcher did not respond at first, but after some personal words he delivered a composition within half an hour. Being known in Germany for a completely different music style Böttcher decided to take his pseudonym "Michael Thomas" for this composition.
In 1961 the first four tracks for a record by the Waikikis were produced, among them "Hawaii Tattoo", that soon gained international fame. In Germany some 600.000 copies were sold and internationally about 2.5 million, Horst Fuchs remembered. In December of 1961 "Hawaii Tattoo" entered the top 50 of the German music charts, being listed for 37 weeks with a top rank on place 4. Three years later the song also was listed in the American Billboard charts.
The arrangement of the published track was probably by the leader, arranger and piano player of "The Waikikis", Willy Albimoor. Martin Böttcher himself recorded a version under the title Hawaii Tattoo Dixie with a formation he called Mike Thomas and his Wall Street Babies. In 1962 he included the famous version by the Waikikis in his soundtrack of the Heinz Rühmann movie Max, der Taschendieb (Max the pickpocket), where it could be heard coming from a jukebox.
Read more about this topic: Hawaii Tattoo
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