Why Does American Music Rock Elsewhere?

N E W   Y O R K , Aug. 9 -- In the United States, David Hasselhoff is best known as the aging hunk of Knight Rider and Baywatch fame, who made his name talking to his computerized car or leaping over waves to rescue stray beach bunnies.

In Europe, Hasselhoff is known as a multi-platinum recording star too — one who has had a half-dozen hit albums and performed to several standing-room only tours.

"His love songs [are] beautiful and he [sings] with great charisma," said Elisabeth Csepan, president of Hasselhoff's fan club in Austria.

But Hasselhoff, a native of Baltimore, Md., hasn't found himself as popular among his countrymen. Americans have largely treated his singing career as a joke.

He "has the kind of voice you would politely sit through at a karaoke bar, but secretly wish for the next guy up. It's clunky, off-key and charmless," wrote Hartford Courant critic Roger Catlin shortly after one of Hasselhoff's first performances in the United States.

Hasselhoff is not all that unusual in his stardom though. Many U.S. musicians have found much more receptive ears abroad than at home.

In an age when globalization opponents cry out about the dominance of American multinationals like McDonalds and Starbucks, the music world at times presents an amusingly different model of cultural exchange.

A Variety of Circumstances

Sometimes they're passé, sometimes they're reviled and sometimes they're just overlooked — but plenty of American musical acts have found salvation away from home.

Michael Jackson, whose image in the United States has been tarnished by erratic behavior, is believed to draw most of his fans from abroad nowadays. His last major world tour played to sold-out crowds from Prague to Johannesburg — but not a single stadium in the United States.

"Jackson could probably tour right now in maybe Japan, Russia somewhere and still be the biggest thing since sliced bread," said J.J. Rice, music program director at New York radio station WBLI.