History - Charts - Official Music Video
By mid-'88, less than 1 year after her international breakthrough, Sabrina and her team could take pride in how far she'd come. Indeed, she was the most famous Italian singer in Europe, Boys had been a huge hit everywhere including in the UK and she had just teamed up with the most successful producers of the time, Stock Aitken & Waterman, to record her new single, All of me.
But Sabrina couldn't afford to rely on her past achievements, and she was now working on her second album. If only a few songs had been recorded, her Italian label had already big hopes to repeat the same summer hit as Sabrina had with Boys the year before. Once again, she was offered to perform at the Festivalbar whose promotional impact was very important in Italy and it was finally decided to release two singles almost simultaneously: My chico and All of me. (The order was reversed compared to other European countries where All of me was released first.) While all hopes were put on All of me, its success was quickly shadowed by My chico which became a huge hit in Italy in from July till September. The song even did better than Boys and mostly topped the official single chart (#2). My chico also reached the first position in many hit-parades.
Sabrina was probably doubly pleased by this success as she had co-written the song for the first time in her young career, determined to prove that she wasn't the puppet of her manager. My chico was co-written with a newcomer in her team, Elvio Moratto, who'd work on Gringo and several songs on the album Over the Pop. He would also remix Fatta e Rifatta in 1995 for the 12” release.
The sound engineer was F. Zafret who'd later co-sign and produce the singles Rockawillie and Angel boy. So My chico was a major step in Sabrina's career, especially in Italy where the success of the single changed the way the Italians had previously viewed her. And to top it all off, Sabrina was awarded the prize for the best European female singer during the Festivalbar.
Abroad, the single came out in October-November and had mixed success. In Germany, it made it difficult to reach #57. In France, it didn't enter the Top 50 (# 63). But My chico became a hit in Scandinavia, especially in Finland where all her singles were then very successful.
In the other countries, the single was released in 1989 and its success was mixed, once again. If the single confirmed Sabrina's growing success in Russia, Eastern Europe and Turkey (where Sabrina had become very popular in 1988), it failed in Spain (in spite of its spanglish title) and Portugal, two markets which had been very important for Sabrina. But as the vinyl records are very difficult to find nowadays, it's likely to think that they were poorly distributed in both countries.
In the end, My chico marked a change in Sabrina's career: while Italy was (re)discovering her, the success she had had in some European countries where she had been celebrated (Germany, France, Spain ...) was starting to fade away. But Sabrina and her team probably didn't notice what was happening as she was caught up in the merry-go-round of tours, TV performances… Moreover, some new markets were beginning to open to her, especially South America, giving the unreasonable hope to conquer the U.S. market.
Charts
COUNTRY |
HIGHEST POSITION |
CHART ENTRY DATE |
CHART HISTORY |
Italy |
2 |
Unknown |
#43 on July 17 and then 16, 8, 8, 6, 6, 6, 4, 2, 4, 3, 3, 6, 10, 20, … |
France |
63 |
06/11/1988 |
63 (1 week) |
Germany |
56 |
14/11/1988 |
Unknown (4 weeks) |
Finland |
3 |
Unknown |
Unknown |
Eurochart Hot 100 |
27 |
Unknown |
Unknown |
Official Music Video