Bran Van 3000 biography
Bran Van 3000 (also known as BV3) is an electronica collective from Montreal, Quebec. Founded by DJ James Di Salvio and E.P. Bergen, they collaborated on a number of songs with Stéphane Moraille, Sara Johnston, Steve "Liquid" Hawley, Jayne Hill, Jean Leloup, Kim Bingham and other musicians.
History
1994-1996: Formation
James Di Salvio and E.P. Bergen got together in Manhattan and coined Bran Van 3000 in 1994.
Di Salvio was a video director and asked E.P. to come teach him how to produce tracks with a sampler and turntables. Together they went and bought studio equipment in Times Square.
E.P. returned to Montreal and immediately co-wrote/produced a single with Jean Leloup called: "Johnny Go". E.P. invited James to come over and record his first ever rap on that song. It later went to number one in the Quebec charts. James Di Salvio also directed the music video.
This was in effect the first ever Bran Van 3000 collaboration.
Together James and E.P. went back to New York to record "Forest" and "Ma Chambre" for Jean Leloup's platinum album "Le Dome". These tracks were very successful, leading to a record deal with Audiogram Records. Together with Haig V, they co-produced the first BV3 album. Jean Leloup gave "Forest" to Bran Van 3000. Bergen started a cover of "Come On Feel The Noise" with plans to have Sara Johnston sing on it. Di Salvio discovered Liquid. In 1996, the album was almost finished. As a joke, James and E.P. sent a demo of the unfinished songs "Drinking In LA", "Couch Surfer" and "Everywhere" to the Canadian Music Week contest. Bran Van 3000 came in first place with another act, but got disqualified because there was no real band to perform the showcase. They finished the album and E.P. started auditioning the touring band that included Gary Mackenzie, Nick Hynes and Rob Joanisse.
1996-1999: Glee
Bran Van 3000 finally released their first single, "Drinking in L.A.", in February 1997 in Canada. In April of the same year, the band released their first album, called
Glee. The record went gold in 1998 and won a Juno Award for best alternative album. It contained 17 tracks, one of them entirely in French called "Forest" featuring Jean Leloup. "Afrodiziak", produced by E.P. Bergen sold 100 000 copies in Germany with EMI and appeared in the movie XChange. The song "Everywhere" was featured on the soundtrack to the film
Practical Magic and "Drinking in L.A." was featured in the soundtrack to
Playing by Heart. "Ceci n'est pas une chanson" (later "Une chanson") contains the main melody of "Perfect" song from The The.
In March 1998, Glee was released internationally albeit some changes: "Ceci n'est pas une chanson" became an instrumental simply called "Une chanson"; the French song, "Forest", was reworked with several English verses. The international version has 19 tracks. Previously unreleased songs are "Rainshine", "Carry On" and "Old School".
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