Its deeply moving personal reflection introduced Karat to audiences outside of East Germany, especially when West German singer Peter Maffay recorded a cover version of it that became a massive hit for him in 1980.

Karat's third album, titled Schwanenkönig (Swan-King) and released in 1980, expanded the band's following in both East and West Germany, although it failed to produce any top hits.

This period is considered by many to be the highest point of the band's success, as it appealed to audiences in both East and West Germany, other countries of Eastern and Western Europe, and even in the Soviet Union.

That year Karat also appeared on the popular West German television show Wetten, dass..?, where it was the only music group ever to be invited from the GDR.

The latter track included Silly singer Tamara Danz, with whom Swillms, Römer and Dreilich had also briefly performed in the short-lived East German supergroup the Gitarreros.

A turning point came in 1987, when another founding member, principal composer and first keyboardist Ulrich "Ed" Swillms, left Karat, citing health concerns.

The group's first album produced without Swillms, ... im nächsten Frieden (... in The Next Peace), was released in 1990 shortly after the fall of the Berlin Wall, and reflected a strong shift toward a radio-friendly pop rock structure.

Karat's albums, having been re-released as compact discs by DSB (the privatized successor to East German state-owned record label AMIGA), began to sell fairly well again.

[1] Karat celebrated its 20th anniversary with a sold-out concert at a horse racing track in the Karlshorst district of Berlin, with appearances by well-wishers including the bands City and The Puhdys, and singer Ute Freudenberg.

Coinciding with this concert was the release of an album that returned to Karat's more distinctive style of progressive rock, Die geschenkte Stunde (The Given Hour).

In 2000, the band released the compilation Ich liebe jede Stunde (I Love Every Hour), consisting of a few remakes, a few new songs, and some of its most popular older material remastered.

The band's 25th anniversary was celebrated in front of a crowd of 20,000 people in Berlin, with former first keyboardist Ulrich "Ed" Swillms making a guest re-appearance, and sharing the stage with the German Film Orchestra Babelsberg and Peter Maffay.

The 2003 album Licht und Schatten (Light and Shadow) was to be Dreilich's last personally completed effort (notably, it contained one of only two Karat songs ever recorded in English, "Someone Got Hurt," a demo from 1983 that may have been a reference to Dean Reed).

In the same year Karat also released a new album named Weitergeh'n ("Movin' On"), a book about the band and its history, and during that autumn and winter gave a special Anniversary Tour.