Plastic Bertrand
Encyclopedia
Plastic Bertrand is a Belgian
Demographics of Belgium
This article is about the demographic features of the population of Belgium, including ethnicity, education level, health of the populace, economic status, religious affiliations and other aspects of the population...

 musician, songwriter, producer, editor and television presenter, best known for the 1977 international hit single "Ça plane pour moi
Ça plane pour moi
"'" is a punk rock song by Plastic Bertrand, although the voice on the original recordings is of producer Lou Deprijck. It was issued as a single in December 1977. The song was composed by Yvan Lacomblez and produced by Lou Deprijck. "Jet Boy, Jet Girl", an adaptation recorded in November 1977 by...

".

Early life and bands

He was born in Brussels of a French
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

 father and Ukrainian
Ukraine
Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It has an area of 603,628 km², making it the second largest contiguous country on the European continent, after Russia...

 mother. At the age of nine, he became a singer and drummer in the Buffalo Scouts Band, a group he formed with the Boy Scouts
Scouting in Belgium
The Scouting and Guiding movement in Belgium consists of 15 to 20 separate organizations serving about 160,000 members. Nearly all organizations are grouped by languages and confessions. The Crown Scout rank is the highest a Boy Scout can achieve.- History:...

, who performed covers of Rolling Stones songs. He later formed a band called The Pelicans who performed at parties, later changing their name to Passing the Time, extending their act in bars, clubs and at festivals along the Dutch and Belgian coast. Later he was hired by pirate radio
Pirate radio
Pirate radio is illegal or unregulated radio transmission. The term is most commonly used to describe illegal broadcasting for entertainment or political purposes, but is also sometimes used for illegal two-way radio operation...

 station Radio Veronica
Radio Veronica
Radio Veronica was an offshore radio station that began broadcasting in 1960, and broadcast from offshore for over fourteen years. It was set up by independent radio, TV and household electrical retailers in the Netherlands to stimulate the sales of radio receivers by providing an alternative to...

.

Meanwhile, he continued his education at the Music Academy studying music theory
Music theory
Music theory is the study of how music works. It examines the language and notation of music. It seeks to identify patterns and structures in composers' techniques across or within genres, styles, or historical periods...

 and percussion, passing his degree at the Athénée Adolphe Max. Whilst awaiting admission to the Royal Conservatory of Music
Royal Conservatory of The Hague
The Royal Conservatory of The Hague is a conservatorium of music, providing higher education in music and dance, it is located in The Hague, Netherlands.-The Conservatory:...

 in Brussels, he spent a year at the Saint-Luc
Institut Saint-Luc
The Institut Saint-Luc is an arts school in Brussels. It consists of six departments, with a total of 2200 students and some 430 employees, divided over five locations in Ixelles and Saint-Gilles.-History:...

 Institute studying design.

In 1973 he entered the Conservatory to study music theory, percussion and music history. Influenced by the punk
Punk rock
Punk rock is a rock music genre that developed between 1974 and 1976 in the United States, the United Kingdom, and Australia. Rooted in garage rock and other forms of what is now known as protopunk music, punk rock bands eschewed perceived excesses of mainstream 1970s rock...

 movement, he created in 1974 the band Hubble Bubble
Hubble Bubble
Hubble Bubble is generally an uncontrolled mixture and this dish is similar to Bubble and Squeak in that it is an English dish containing leftover food items such as potatoes, cabbage, brussel sprouts, carrots and onion but with the addition of baked beans in tomato sauce.While the ingredients of...

, sharing his time between study at the Conservatory, rehearsals and concerts with the band, and work as stage manager at the Theatre des Galeries. In 1978 Hubble Bubble released their first of two albums, also titled Hubble Bubble. Jouret is credited as the songwriter, singer and drummer under the name "Roger Junior". Unfortunately, the group's bass player was killed in an accident returning from a rehearsal, and the group disbanded.
The Band manager of Hubble Bubble (Bernard Schol) presented Roger Jouret to the singer/componist/producer Lou Deprijck who had just recorded "Ca plane pour moi" in studio with his own voice. The record company RKM (Roland Kluger) looked for another image for the single than Lou Deprijck's real singer.

As Plastic Bertrand

In 1977, Plastic Bertrand started his solo career as the credited artist of the international hit single Ça plane pour moi
Ça plane pour moi
"'" is a punk rock song by Plastic Bertrand, although the voice on the original recordings is of producer Lou Deprijck. It was issued as a single in December 1977. The song was composed by Yvan Lacomblez and produced by Lou Deprijck. "Jet Boy, Jet Girl", an adaptation recorded in November 1977 by...

, though in fact the song had been sung and produced by its composer Lou Deprijck
Lou Deprijck
Lou Deprijck is a Belgian singer and music producer born in 1946 in Lessines, Wallonia. He was a major figure in the Belgian pop scene of the 1970s and 1980s, with more than 20 million copies of his compositions sold worldwide...

 with the engineer Phil delire for RKM/Vogue at Studio Morgan in Brussels. Plastic Bertrand received only 0.5% of the song's royalties. Ca Plane Pour Moi would be further adaptated in English as Jet Boy, Jet Girl
Jet Boy, Jet Girl
"Jet Boy, Jet Girl" is a risqué song by Elton Motello about a 15-year-old boy's sexual relationship with an older man, who then rejects him for a girl...

 by Elton Motello (aka Alan Ward).

Plastic Bertrand toured Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...

, Japan
Japan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...

, Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

 and North America
North America
North America is a continent wholly within the Northern Hemisphere and almost wholly within the Western Hemisphere. It is also considered a northern subcontinent of the Americas...

 with Lou Deprijck, becoming one of the few French-speaking artists to appear in the Billboard chart. He also appeared on a number of major television shows, presenting Jackpot on TF1
TF1
TF1 is a national French TV channel, controlled by TF1 Group, whose major share-holder is Bouygues. TF1's average market share of 24% makes it the most popular domestic network...

, Destination Noël on France 2
France 2
France 2 is a French public national television channel. It is part of the state-owned France Télévisions group, along with France 3, France 4, France 5 and France Ô...

, Due Per Tutti on RAI2
RAI2
Retinoic acid-induced protein 2 is a protein that in humans is encoded by the RAI2 gene.-Further reading:...

 and Supercool on RTBF
RTBF
Radio Télévision Belge Francophone is the public broadcasting organization of the French Community of Belgium, the southern, French-speaking part of Belgium...

, which he also produced. However, the first 3 albums of Plastic Bertrand were in fact entirely sung in studio by Lou Deprijck and not by Roger Jouret.

Between 1982 and 1985 he lived in Milan
Milan
Milan is the second-largest city in Italy and the capital city of the region of Lombardy and of the province of Milan. The city proper has a population of about 1.3 million, while its urban area, roughly coinciding with its administrative province and the bordering Province of Monza and Brianza ,...

, and millions of Italians followed his adventures in a photo-story of which he was the star. With Daniel Balavoine
Daniel Balavoine
Daniel Balavoine was a French singer and songwriter. He was hugely popular in the French-speaking world, and inspired many singers in the 1980s, such as Jean-Jacques Goldman, and Michel Berger, his closest friend...

 and ABBA
ABBA
ABBA was a Swedish pop group formed in Stockholm in 1970 which consisted of Anni-Frid Lyngstad, Björn Ulvaeus, Benny Andersson and Agnetha Fältskog...

's Anni-Frid Lyngstad
Anni-Frid Lyngstad
Anni-Frid Prinzessin Reuss von Plauen , is a Norwegian-born Swedish pop singer...

, he recorded Abbacadabra, a musical tale for children. In the early 1980s he appeared in movies such as Légitime Violence and the short film Baoum. Working with Vladimir Cosma
Vladimir Cosma
Vladimir Cosma was born April 13, 1940 in Bucharest, Romania, into a family of musicians.His father, Teodor Cosma, was a pianist and conductor, his mother a writer-composer, his uncle, Edgar Cosma, composer and conductor, and one of his grandmothers, pianist, a student of the renowned Ferrucio...

, he wrote several film scores, including Astérix et la surprise de César (Asterix Versus Caesar
Asterix Versus Caesar
Asterix Versus Caesar is the first of the 1980s Asterix films and the fourth film adaption based on the Asterix comic books...

).

In 1987 he represented Luxembourg
Luxembourg
Luxembourg , officially the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg , is a landlocked country in western Europe, bordered by Belgium, France, and Germany. It has two principal regions: the Oesling in the North as part of the Ardennes massif, and the Gutland in the south...

 in the Eurovision Song Contest
Eurovision Song Contest
The Eurovision Song Contest is an annual competition held among active member countries of the European Broadcasting Union .Each member country submits a song to be performed on live television and then casts votes for the other countries' songs to determine the most popular song in the competition...

 with the song "Amour Amour". This failed to impress the juries, however, scoring only 4 points and placing 21st out of 22 entries.

During the 1990s Bertrand explored other facets of music, including songwriting and producing, and also recorded the album Suite Diagonal for Sony in 1994 with Jacques Lanzmann
Jacques Lanzmann
Jacques Lanzmann was a French writer, scriptwriter and lyric writer.-Biography:...

. Forming the company MMD with Pierrette Broodthaers, he produced two albums for David Janssen, an album of classic music with a Turkish
Turkey
Turkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey , is a Eurasian country located in Western Asia and in East Thrace in Southeastern Europe...

 contemporary influence for harpsichord
Harpsichord
A harpsichord is a musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. It produces sound by plucking a string when a key is pressed.In the narrow sense, "harpsichord" designates only the large wing-shaped instruments in which the strings are perpendicular to the keyboard...

 and organ
Organ (music)
The organ , is a keyboard instrument of one or more divisions, each played with its own keyboard operated either with the hands or with the feet. The organ is a relatively old musical instrument in the Western musical tradition, dating from the time of Ctesibius of Alexandria who is credited with...

 with Leila Pinar, an album of traditional Balkan music with the Kazansky
Kazansky District
Kazansky District is an administrative and municipal district , one of the 22 in Tyumen Oblast, Russia....

 choir, and a single for Noël Godin
Noël Godin
Noël Godin is a Belgian writer, critic, actor and notorious cream pie flinger or entarteur. Godin gained global attention in 1998 when his group ambushed Microsoft CEO Bill Gates in Brussels, pelting the software magnate with cream pies...

, "Chantilly c'est parti".

Bertrand's track Stop ou Encore (the voice on the tape is actually Lou Deprijck's voice) featured prominently in the 1999 film Three Kings.

Ça plane pour moi
Ça plane pour moi
"'" is a punk rock song by Plastic Bertrand, although the voice on the original recordings is of producer Lou Deprijck. It was issued as a single in December 1977. The song was composed by Yvan Lacomblez and produced by Lou Deprijck. "Jet Boy, Jet Girl", an adaptation recorded in November 1977 by...

 is featured in Warner Bros. 1985 picture "National Lampoon's European Vacation" and in Danny Boyle's 2010 film 127 Hours
127 Hours
127 Hours is a 2010 biographical adventure drama film co-written, produced and directed by Danny Boyle. The film stars James Franco as mountain climber Aron Ralston, who became trapped by a boulder in Robbers Roost, Utah in April 2003....

.
The song is also used as the soundtrack for a commercial spot for Time Warner Cable in the US (April, 2011).A

Comeback

Twenty years after "Ça plane pour moi", Bertrand returned to the public eye as MTV
MTV
MTV, formerly an initialism of Music Television, is an American network based in New York City that launched on August 1, 1981. The original purpose of the channel was to play music videos guided by on-air hosts known as VJs....

 declared him the "most wanted comeback artist". He made a guest appearance on the album Get Ready!, and rerecorded the 1982 song "Stop ou encore", which went originally platinum in Belgium
Belgium
Belgium , officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a federal state in Western Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts the EU's headquarters, and those of several other major international organisations such as NATO.Belgium is also a member of, or affiliated to, many...

. A "best of" album was released in 1998 on the Universal-AMC label, Bertrand himself handling the remastering process.

Aside from a resurgence in his musical career, Plastic Bertrand made numerous guest appearances on European television, and presented the fortnightly show Duel for two seasons at RTBF
RTBF
Radio Télévision Belge Francophone is the public broadcasting organization of the French Community of Belgium, the southern, French-speaking part of Belgium...

. He also worked with Pierrette Broodthaers to open the "Broodthaers & Bertrand" art gallery, and worked with the Museum of Contemporary Art in Valenciennes
Valenciennes
Valenciennes is a commune in the Nord department in northern France.It lies on the Scheldt river. Although the city and region had seen a steady decline between 1975 and 1990, it has since rebounded...

 and Belgian artist Jacques Charlier to produce 120 Andy Warhol
Andy Warhol
Andrew Warhola , known as Andy Warhol, was an American painter, printmaker, and filmmaker who was a leading figure in the visual art movement known as pop art...

-style portraits.

In 2001, Bertrand toured Belgium, France, Switzerland and Germany with a series of concerts, and composed a number of new songs. He also made appearances on Channel 4
Channel 4
Channel 4 is a British public-service television broadcaster which began working on 2 November 1982. Although largely commercially self-funded, it is ultimately publicly owned; originally a subsidiary of the Independent Broadcasting Authority , the station is now owned and operated by the Channel...

's Eurotrash
Eurotrash (TV series)
Eurotrash is a 30-minute magazine-format programme in English produced by Rapido Television. It was shown in the United Kingdom on Channel 4 from 1993 and was a late-night comical review of weird and wonderful topics from around the world...

 show and BBC2's chat show Clarkson
Jeremy Clarkson
Jeremy Charles Robert Clarkson is an English broadcaster, journalist and writer who specialises in motoring. He is best known for his role on the BBC TV show Top Gear along with co-presenters Richard Hammond and James May...

.

In 2002, he signed a new contract and recorded his eighth album Ultra terrestre, released in Belgium in 2002. In September and November the same year, he managed the TV talent contest Star Academy on RTL-TVI.

In March 2003, to celebrate 25 years since the beginning of his successful solo career, Bertrand performed a concert at the Cirque Royal in Brussels, performing new songs and past hits with a philharmonic orchestra, and singing in duet with guest singers.

From July to September 2003, he presented the TV show Hit Story on France 3
France 3
France 3 is the second largest French public television channel and part of the France Télévisions group, which also includes France 2, France 4, France 5, and France Ô....

. During his comeback, he appeared on a special 1980s edition of Le Maillon Faible, the French equivalent of The Weakest Link
The Weakest Link
The Weakest Link is a television game show which first appeared in the United Kingdom on BBC Two on 14 August 2000 and will end its run in 2012 when its host Anne Robinson ends her contract. The original British version of the show airs around the world on BBC Entertainment...

. He won €1,150 for charity. He appeared at the Countdown Spectacular 2 Tour from 18 August to 5 September 2007 in all major capital cities of Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

.

In 2011, "Ca Plane Pour Moi" was used as the opening title theme for "Jackass 3.5" (2011).

Legal issues

In 2010, an expert appointed by a court stated that the voice of Lou Deprijck, the composer/producer of "Ça plane pour moi," on a record from 2006 is the same voice as on the original 1977 recording. "Today it appears from the report of the experts that the voice of 'Ça plane pour moi' is Lou Deprijck's voice," stated the newspaper La Dernière Heure on Monday, 26 July 2010. Plastic Bertrand previously disputed the allegation, but on 28 July 2010 the singer finally revealed that he is indeed not the singer of any of the songs in the first four albums released under the name Plastic Bertrand.

Albums

  • 1978 AN1 (amc Records)
  • 1979 J'te fais un plan (amc records)
  • 1980 L' Album (amc Records)
  • 1981 Plastiquez vos baffles (amc Records)
  • 1981 Grands succès/Greatest Hits (amc Records)
  • 1983 Chat va...Et Toi? (amc Records)
  • 1988 Pix
  • 1994 Suite diagonale
  • 2002 Ultraterrestre (RM Records)
  • 2009 Dandy Bandit (MMD Records)

Singles

  • 1975 "New Promotion/You'll Be The One"
  • 1977 "Ça plane pour moi
    Ça plane pour moi
    "'" is a punk rock song by Plastic Bertrand, although the voice on the original recordings is of producer Lou Deprijck. It was issued as a single in December 1977. The song was composed by Yvan Lacomblez and produced by Lou Deprijck. "Jet Boy, Jet Girl", an adaptation recorded in November 1977 by...

    /Pogo Pogo"
  • 1978 "Bambino/Le Petit Tortillard"
  • 1978 "Super Cool/Affection"
  • 1978 "Sha La La La Lee/Naif Song"
  • 1978 "Tout petit la planète/C'est le Rock'N'Roll"
  • 1979 "Tout petit la planète /J'te fais un plan/Hit 87"
  • 1979 "Sentimentale moi/Quais Quais Quais Quais"
  • 1979 "Sentimental me/Sentimentale moi"
  • 1979 "Le Monde est merveilleux/ J'te fais un plan "
  • 1979 "Sans Amour/Plastic Boy"
  • 1979 "Téléphone à téléphone mon bijou/Stop ou encore"
  • 1980 "Téléphone à téléphone mon bijou /Kangourou Kangourou"
  • 1980 "Hula Hoop/Amoureux fou de toi"
  • 1981 "Jaques Cousteau/Paradis"
  • 1981 "La Star à pécole/Baby Doll/Coeur D'acier"
  • 1982 "L'amour Ok/New York/Coeur d'acier/Stop ou encore"
  • 1982 "Ping Pong/Coeur D'Acier"
  • 1982 "Duo Avec Nathalie"
  • 1983 "Arret d'autobus/Mon Nez, mon nez"
  • 1983 "Chat/Fou des Fifties"
  • 1983 "Major Tom/Miss Italie"
  • 1983 "Gueule d'amour/Down Town"
  • 1985 "Astérix
    Asterix
    Asterix or The Adventures of Asterix is a series of French comic books written by René Goscinny and illustrated by Albert Uderzo . The series first appeared in French in the magazine Pilote on October 29, 1959...

     est Là/Le Secret du druide
  • 1986 "Je l'jure/La Fille du premier rang"
  • 1986 "Let's Slow Again/Toujours plus haut"
  • 1987 "Amour, Amour
    Amour, Amour
    "Amour, Amour" was the Luxembourgish entry in the Eurovision Song Contest 1987, performed in French by Belgian singer Plastic Bertrand....

    "
  • 1988 "Démente a la menthe"
  • 1989 "Slave To The Beat/Plastiiic Acid Mix"
  • 1990 "Sex Tabou"
  • 1991 "House Machine/Club Control feat. Plastic Bertrand"
  • 1994 "Les Joueurs de Tchik Tchik"
  • 2002 "Play Boy/Canape"
  • 2003 "Plastcubration/Tous, Touchez-vous"
  • 2005 "Machine/Remixes"

External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
x
OK