For the second time in its history, the Festival international de jazz de Montréal (FIJM) will offer its biggest stage to one of the most emblematic Montreal pop phenomena of the 1990s, Bran Van 3000. Fourteen years after his first major event at the FIJM , the collective founded by James Di Salvio and EP Bergen will bring their grooves back to the Quartier des Spectacles on Friday evening to mark the 25e album release anniversary Glee and partying with the carelessness of those years when rap and electronic music took firm root in our music scene.
“I’m as happy as you that joy, dancing and the celebration of life have become legal again – and I’m also happy that Bran Van can be on the menu, in the heart of the Montreal summer”, breathes James Di Salvio, caught flying after a meeting with the team of scenographers for tonight’s concert, walking on Park Avenue, near the Tam-tams. Returned from LA a few weeks earlier, he gathered the friends in a rehearsal room to put on this concert and reminisce about the stories of the good old days. He actually has “hundreds of memories and anecdotes that resurface when he finds friends,” adds Di Salvio, with a smile in his voice.
“It’s even overwhelming to see that nothing has changed in terms of the madness that animated this project — of course it will be nostalgic, like an evening,” he admits. “Somewhere, it is to remember, today, that 25 years ago, [notre musique] projected us into the future, without our realizing it at the time. »
This Glee that binds us
In 1997, rap and electronic music were already present in the Quebec of that time, which was largely unaware of the existence of these scenes. Di Salvio was then working as a DJ, among other occupations; as legend has it, it’s by touching his remixer royalties on the song 1990 from his friend Jean Leloup that he was seized by the desire to burn this sum on musical instruments, inviting his friend Bergen to help him spend all this time for a weekend in New York.
The international success of the song Drinking in LAwhich we will listen to again with pleasure this evening in the company, hopefully, of the best of the album Glee — Afrodiziak, Couch Surfer, supermodelhis version of Cum on Feel the Noize of the group Slade, which became popular again in the 1980s thanks to the metal group Quiet Riot — opened a breach in the minds of many local musicians: yes, it is possible to have success outside of Quebec by doing rap and/or electronic pop.
“The diplomat in me will say yes, Glee has aged well, says James Di Salvio. Precisely because of all the love we’re getting for the anniversary of the release of this album, it’s pretty amazing. I think the bond that has been created between his songs and the public has aged well — when you release an album like that, it’s as if it doesn’t belong to you anymore. And it felt good to listen to it again [avant de monter ce spectacle], I can hear again all the passion we had for 1990s hip-hop. What good memories. »
Identity expression
Above all, there was, in the messy songs of Gleesomething like the expression of a Montreal identity, almost 10 years before Montreal was called the “new Seattle”, in the wake of the first albums by Arcade Fire, Wolf Parade and The Unicorns.
This friendly, community, multicultural spirit that animated the Mile End and this portion of Saint-Laurent Boulevard, more or less between Sherbrooke Street and Avenue des Pins, which was then the beating heart of Montreal nightlife.
The corner looks very sad today, around the defunct Cafeteria and the Di Salvio nightclub… “Basically, what animated us, at the time, were the people” more than the places, says James, philosopher. “Montréal, its people, its dynamics, its richness made up of many cultures, is of a complexity that many other large cities do not know. I am attached to this boulevard Saint-Laurent, to this corner, because of the family”, which operated clubs and restaurants and which still holds others today in Los Angeles. “What’s happening there is also happening elsewhere in the world: the mega-corporations taking over everything. “It is the former punk (fired follower of rap and club music) who speaks, underlines Di Salvio.
“Yeah, that area should have been taken care of, but at the same time, summer has just started, and I find the city resplendent. It will be a party on Friday with Bran Van 3000, who will then give a handful of other concerts in Quebec, until August 20, at the La Grosse Lanterne festival in Béthanie. And after ? Perhaps the Bran Van adventure will continue. The “Bran Man” says he has finished recording a yacht rock album, which will be his first solo album. “I thought about making it a Bran Van record, but it sounds more Steely Dan than Bran Van…”
Case to follow.