Euro-Disco’s Black Secret: The Boney M. Story

Happy February 1st. It’s the official launch of the Black History Month Centennial, and I’d like to say I started the morning with deep meditation and a green juice. Instead, I started it with a "doozy" of a discovery that honestly has me questioning everything I thought I knew about the 1970s.

It all started with a trailer. I was watching the teaser for a new series on Peacock called "Ponies", and this song came on—infectious, heavy on the disco-strings, and vaguely familiar in that "I’ve heard this thousand times kind of way. I couldn't put my finger on it, so I did what any of us do: I pulled out Shazam.

The result? "Rasputin" by Boney M.

Now, if you’re like me, you hear that song and your brain goes straight to... well, not us. You assume it’s a group of non-Black performers doing their best European disco impression. But curiosity got the best of me. I went to YouTube to find the original performance, and I’ll be damned.

Out comes this tall, shirtless, incredibly limber Black man in velvet pants, flanked by three stunning Black women with Afros that could touch the heavens. My jaw hit the floor.

Wait... Boney M. is Black?!

The Plot Twist: Caribbean Excellence, German Engineering

For those who missed the memo (like I clearly did), Boney M. wasn't just a group; they were a global juggernaut. Created in 1975 in West Germany, the group consisted of four Caribbean-born performers: Liz Mitchell and Marcia Barrett (Jamaica), Maizie Williams (Montserrat), and Bobby Farrell (Aruba).

They weren’t just "popular" in Germany; they were titans. They were selling out stadiums from London to Lagos and were one of the few Western acts to become massive hits in the Soviet Union. Bobby Farrell, the lead dancer and the group’s visual heartbeat, was doing moves in 1978 that would make modern performers look like they’re standing still.

Wait, Who the Hell is Rasputin?

Now, let’s address the elephant in the room: Why on earth did four Caribbean people in West Germany decide to sing a disco anthem about a 20th-century Russian mystic?

If you aren't a history buff, Grigori Rasputin was a self-proclaimed "holy man" and healer in the early 1900s. He managed to charm his way into the inner circle of Tsar Nicholas II (the last Tsar of Russia) because the Tsarina believed he could heal her son’s hemophilia.

The song calls him "Russia's greatest love machine" and the "lover of the Russian queen." While the history books say the "lover" part was mostly just juicy court gossip used to ruin the Queen’s reputation, Rasputin himself was a wild character—big, strong, with "eyes of flaming glow." He survived poisoning and multiple gunshots before finally meeting his end.

Why Boney M. sang about him? Because the 70s were wild, and apparently, nothing says "Disco Hit" like a scandalous Russian monk.

Beyond the Box

This epiphany on Day One of the Centennial is a reminder:

We are so much more than the boxes they try to put us in. 

We often think Black history is a straight line through very specific genres. We hear a high-gloss "Euro-pop" vibe and assume it belongs to everyone else. But Boney M. proves that we have been the secret ingredient in global pop culture for decades. We have been everywhere, influenced everything, and mastered genres before the world even had a name for them.

We aren't just the blues and hip-hop. We are also German Disco icons. We are the rhythm the whole world dances to—even when they don't realize whose soul is behind the sound.

Go to YouTube. Search "Boney M. - Rasputin (Official Video)." Look at the sequins. Look at the energy. And then remind yourself: We’ve been global since the beginning.

Happy Black History Month. Let’s stay curious.