Billy Talent

Billy Talent biography

Billy Talent (formerly known as Pezz) is a Canadian punk rock band from Streetsville, Ontario. They formed in 1993 with Ben Kowalewicz as the lead vocalist, Ian D'Sa on lead guitar, bassist Jon Gallant and drummer Aaron Solowoniuk .

The band existed for almost a decade before mainstream success. The members met and played in Our Lady of Mount Carmel Secondary School under the name Pezz and remained underground in Toronto's indie music scene until 2001. The band renamed itself Billy Talent after running into legal trouble with the old name. It was then that Kowalewicz's connection with an employee of Warner Music Canada's A&R department landed the band a record deal and launched them into mainstream success. Since then, Billy Talent has made two multi-platinum records in Canada, and continues to expand their success overseas, this included touring for 20 months supporting their third album. They released their fourth album Billy Talent III on July 14, 2009. The fifth album is planned to be released in July 2012.

Pezz began writing, performing songs, and gaining attention and credibility at first locally, and soon in Toronto's broader indie music scene. Their first recording was a cheap 4-track demo. It was recorded in Ian D'Sa's basement in July 1994, and was named Demoluca, after a friend of the band named Jason Deluca had stopped by the house, banging on a basement window while the band was recording. Soon after, in January 1995, they all put in money to record another demo of better quality with engineer/producer Dave Tedesco at the "Signal to Noise" studio which they called Dudebox. Originally, two tracks from Demoluca and four newly recorded tracks were compiled onto it, but a year later the band recorded four more tunes live in the studio and re-released it. After these releases and their continued performances in the immediate area, Pezz was gaining a following in Mississauga and it continued to spread.

D'Sa studied classical animation at Sheridan College, and even worked on Angela Anaconda as an animator. Gallant almost finished a business degree. Kowalewicz was in between jobs, one which included working at 102.1 the edge. Solowoniuk worked at Chrysler Canada. But during this, each member found the time and finances to max-out their credit cards, and record their first full-length album in 1999. They laid down twelve tracks at a studio called "Great Big Music", collaborating with Juno-nominated music producer Brad Nelson. Kowalewicz started singing in melody with D'Sa. The music began to transform from a "raw rap-rock" songs into "catchy and angst-ridden pop punk anthems". With that, Watoosh! was born and independently released. While popular within Toronto's indie scene, it did not reach large mainstream sales levels.

Billy Talent and success: 1999-2004

In 1999, after threatening the American punk band Pezz on BYO Records with lawsuits and demanding thousands of dollars from them, the Canadian Pezz received documentation from their American namesake proving that then they had held the name internationally since 1989; thus, the Canadian band had no legal claim over the name anymore and changed it. Billy Talent would become their new name, inspired by the guitarist "Billy Tallent" from Michael Turner's novel Hard Core Logo. The film adaptation by Bruce McDonald would be the inspirational medium for the band.

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