Groenemeyer

Although his first four solo albums were commercial disappointments, 1984's 4630 Bochum turned Herbert Grönemeyer into the biggest musician in Germany. Featuring a blue-collar, stadium rock sound and highly literate lyrics – including double entendres, puns, and other creative word play – 4630 Bochum became the best-selling German album of all time, a record it held until Grönemeyer's Mensch beat it two decades later.

Schiffsverkehr, Herbert Grönemeyer's 13th studio album, is the beginning of a new chapter for the German singer: after losing both his wife and his brother to cancer in 1998, his past couple of albums have been informed by his grief, and while Schiffsverkehr doesn't dispense with the melancholic ballads, it marks a return to the more experimental sounds of his album Bleibt Alles Anders, coupled with a stronger focus on guitars and synthesizers, giving the album an '80s sound with elements of Deutschrock. Just like its two predecessors, the record reached the number one spot in the German, Austrian, and Swiss album charts (thus continuing a streak of number one albums in Germany that has lasted since 1984's 4630 Bochum).