Frank Mertens (born Frank Sorgatz; 26 October 1961) is a German musician. He is a former member of the German
synth-pop
Synth-pop (short for synthesizer pop; also called techno-pop; ) is a subgenre of new wave music that first became prominent in the late 1970s and features the synthesizer as the dominant musical instrument. It was prefigured in the 1960s ...
group
Alphaville.
Personality wise, he is a shy and quiet person who doesn't like to talk. Shortly after the success of their
debut album, he left the band in December 1984, because he found public attention stressful.
After he left, he founded the group Lonely Boys with his girlfriend at the time Matine Lille (née Richter) and Felix Lille (né Schulte). Mertens disbanded the group in 1987 to study
economics
Economics () is the social science that studies the Production (economics), production, distribution (economics), distribution, and Consumption (economics), consumption of goods and services.
Economics focuses on the behaviour and intera ...
.
In 1991, Mertens moved to
Paris
Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...
to study art. In 1996 he moved back to
Cologne
Cologne ( ; german: Köln ; ksh, Kölle ) is the largest city of the German western States of Germany, state of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) and the List of cities in Germany by population, fourth-most populous city of Germany with 1.1 m ...
, to work as a plastic artist.
During the same year, he started but never completed a musical project called ''Maelstrom'', which was a combination of
ambient-style music, impressionistic and colorful art in the form of paintings, sculptures, and etheric poetry.
References
1961 births
People from Herford (district)
German keyboardists
German new wave musicians
Living people
Alphaville (band) members
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