Quick Facts
Biography
Alberto Bertapelle, better known by his stage name Brainbug, was an Italian symphonic electronic trance music record producer and guitarist from Ceggia, Italy. He died during a concert in November 2016 at 57 years old.
Early life
Alberto Bertapelle is from Ceggia, a town in the province of Venice. Since the age of 13, he played in many local bands as a guitarist and as a keyboardist. He taught sound engineering at a musical academy he started, Support Music Academy.
Career
During 1993-1994, Bertapelle worked for Media Records before opening his own recording studio where he started producing his own music. He also worked for Great Dane Records, for whom he has released many records. He later worked for Danceworks and signed to EMI in London.
He achieved mainstream success with the single "Nightmare" which was a top ten hit in many countries including England and the United States. The single also won the International Award WMC in Miami and was certified gold in Australia.
His single, Nightmare appeared in the soundtrack of several movies, such as Human Traffic, Playing by Heart, Freddy vs. Jason and A Night at the Roxbury, and was played during the second half kick-off at Leeds United home games at Elland Road as well as being the entrance music for the 2013 Elite League Nottingham Panthers Ice Hockey team. The music video was directed by Tim Claxton and was inspired by 1950s science fiction films, and the films of Ed Wood.
Further singles, The 8th Dwarf (1997) and Rain (1998) took the formula established by Nightmare and Benedictus and explored some different areas. Rain features lyrics by Italian singer Nadia Casari, who also appears in the music video.
Several remixes by various artists have been released on Brainbug's singles, and not all of Bertapelle's originals are obviously titled. "Nightmare (Sinister Strings Mix)" and "Benedictus (Exitiale Mix)" are examples of this. The Maxi-CD release of Rain also features those original mixes, although "Benedictus (Exitiale Mix)", while not labeled as an edit, was edited slightly shorter.
Bertapelle has also added his symphonic trance touch to other artists' works through various remixes.
Death
On 23 November 2016, Bertapelle died of a suspected heart attack at 57 years old while playing the guitar in a performance on stage during a concert in Tavagnacco of Udine, Italy. Despite having a group of nurses in the audience who performed CPR and an ambulance arriving shortly after, Bertapelle was pronounced dead as nothing was able to be done to save his life.
Discography
Compilation albums
| Title | Details |
|---|---|
| Miami Gold Night Collection |
|
Singles
| Year | Title | Peak chart positions | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| AUS | IRE | NED | SCO | UK | US Club Play | US Dance Sales | ||
| 1997 | "Nightmare" | 14 | 15 | 47 | 10 | 11 | 4 | 14 |
| "Benedictus" | — | 25 | — | 26 | 24 | 2 | 17 | |
| "The 8th Dwarf" | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | |
| 1998 | "Rain" | — | — | — | — | — | 4 | 35 |
| 1999 | "Nightmare" (remix) | — | — | — | — | 98 | — | — |
| 2004 | "Nightmare" (re-issue) | — | — | — | 66 | 63 | — | — |
| "—" denotes items that did not chart or were not released in that territory. | ||||||||
Remixes
- "The Age Of Love" - Age Of Love (1990; remix 1998)
- "Ever Rest" - Mystica (1998)
- "SuperSonic" - Music Instructor featuring. The Flying Steps (1999)
- "Rock Your Body" - Music Instructor (1999)
- "Another Day" - Skip Raiders Feat. Jada (2000)
- "Nightmare":
- "Benedictus":
- "Nightmare" (re-issue):