History
Bryne, where Ottesen grew up, had few activities available at the time other than football, so he was given a guitar by his grandmother when he was a child. Ottesen and his friend Geir Zahl began writing music in his cellar, recording their music on a cheap tape recorder.
The partnership between Ottesen and Zahl eventually evolved into the band Blod, Snått og Juling. In 1994 they produced their first studio album En glad tunnel, which only sold 50 copies. They made a more serious attempt with better studio equipment for their second album, but this still only managed to sell around 100 copies.
Ottesen moved to Bergen in 1995 to study. In 1996 he joined the army, but soon after moved back to Bergen and became a music teacher. Upon his return Ottesen and Geir formed a new band gnom. They released the album Mys in 1998, but it sold poorly. After gnom's dissolution, the pair finally found critical success in forming the band Kaizers Orchestra.
After two albums had been released by Kaizers Orchestra, Janove decided to launch a parallel solo career while working on a third album Maestro (released in 2005). His 2004 solo album, Francis' Lonely Nights is entirely in English and contains 12 songs, two of which had their music videos filmed in Scandinavia.
In 2007, Kaizers decided to take a break for the majority of the year, only writing up demos for their fourth album and playing three concerts (including opening the German art expo Documenta festival). Janove took this opportunity to write music for Det Tusende Hjertet, a family musical which opened in November 2007. In August 2007 he revealed that his next side project will not be a solo album, and that he has assembled another band (like fellow Kaizer band mate Terje Winterstø Røthing and his band Skambankt). Nothing is known about the status of this project.
Aside from his work with Kaizers and as an independent artist, he has also acted as producer for multiple albums, working with various artists with various styles, including Micke From Sweden (Folk), Britt-Synnøve Johansen (Tango), and The Brigade (Americana). He also participated in Geir "Uncle Deadly" Zahl's album Monkey Do, that was released February 1, 2010.
Read more about this topic: Janove Ottesen
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