Although weren't the two singers of Len brother and sister? Maybe that sort of thing is allowed in Canada.
Yes, Marc and Sharon Costanzo. The voice briefly heard at the start is Brendan Canning, a friend of Marc's and who later formed Broken Social Scene. They went back to Canning's house after attending a rave and Canning put 'More, More, More' on his turntables, which inspired Marc to sample and loop the drums and write the song based on the rave they had just attended. When the song became a hit, Len's record company Columbia sent Canning a cheque for $2500 which he spent on pedals for him and Kevin Drew to record Broken Social Scene's debut album.
Was the Len one released in the Uk in March 1999 though? I always associate it with the summertime and working on a school during the holidays when I was in the 2nd year of my apprenticeship, which would make it 2000. Then again, the song might have just been a year old and still on heavy rotation on the local radio stations.
It was released for sale in Canada in July 1999 (March 1999 was when it was sent out as a radio promo in Canada) and reached no.3. It was released in the UK on the 18th of December 1999, peaked at no.8 on it's first week and left the chart in March 2000.
Also, I could have sworn it was a Carling advert that Bran Van was the soundtrack too. Or maybe that was one with California Dreaming playing over it, I think they were around at a similar time. The mind plays tricks.
It was definitely Rolling Rock, in a campaign by Bartle Bogle Hegarty that started in May 1999 (reference to it basically makes up the entirety of the
contemporary Freaky Trigger review of the song). The advert was briefly referenced at the start of their
TOTP performance, with the POV shot of drinking from a bottle.
The Carling Premier
California Dreaming campaign started in July 1997. Carling previously used the 1987 'E Reg Model' remix of Gary Numan's Cars for a
Premier campaign in 1996 (which was then re-released as the 'Premier Mix) that was 'heavily influenced' by the video to REM's Everybody Hurts', Sneakier Pimps' Six Underground for a Premier campaigni n July 1998 and Soulwax's Much Against Everyone's Advice for a Black Label campaign in November 2000.
