31 December,2010 07:34 AM IST | | Agencies
Bobby Farrell, the frontman of the 1970s disco group Boney M has been found dead in a Russian hotel room.
Farrell (61) had performed in St Petersburg on Wednesday but had complained of breathing problems before and after his show, according to his agent John Seine.
Staff at his hotel discovered him after he failed to answer a wake-up call.
Farrell, who lived in Amsterdam, was more a dancer and showman than singer when he fronted Boney M in the 1970s and 80s. The group, based in Germany, broke into the charts with Daddy Cool and Sunny in 1976.
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Two years later their version of By the Rivers of Babylon sold nearly two million records in Britain alone, keeping it No. 1 for five weeks. The original Boney M disbanded in 1986.
In 1978 Boney M was the first Western music group invited by a Soviet leader, Leonid Brezhnev, to perform in the Soviet Union.
A Soviet military plane flew the performers from London to Moscow, where they sang for an audience of 2,700 Russians in Red Square.
