Chris Franck is a German

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

-born English

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

 musician, songwriter

Songwriter

A songwriter is an individual who writes both the lyrics and music to a song. Someone who solely writes lyrics may be called a lyricist, and someone who only writes music may be called a composer...

, producer, and remixer, best known for his involvement with the bands Batu

Batu (group)

Batu were a British music group strongly influenced by Brazilian music.Formed in early 1992, in Brighton, England and disbanded in late 1994, this group featured the madcap talents of Bebeto De Souza, a native of Sao Paolo, Brazil, as well as the vocals of Sharon Scott.Full members included Chris...

, Da Lata

Da Lata

Da Lata are a Brazilian-influenced British group formed in the early 1990s.The main member of the group is Chris Franck, a multi-instrumentalist and main creative input...

, Smoke City

Smoke City

Smoke City were an English band, who blended acid jazz and trip hop, borrowing from Brazilian styles such as samba and bossa nova. They are best known for their single "Underwater Love", which was a major hit in 1997, after being used in a Levi's television advertisement, "Mermaids" .In 1997, the...

, and Zeep. He is described as a "multi-instrumentalist".

Career

Franck gained initial success in 1992 with Patrick Forge

Patrick Forge

Patrick Forge is a British jazz, jazz-dance and soul music DJ who spent much of the late 1980s and early 1990s DJing alongside Gilles Peterson at the famous Dingwalls club in Camden, North London....

 in the group Da Lata

Da Lata

Da Lata are a Brazilian-influenced British group formed in the early 1990s.The main member of the group is Chris Franck, a multi-instrumentalist and main creative input...

. De Lata toured the UK and US in 2000.

In 1997, the Smoke City single "Underwater Love" debuted strongly on the UK singles chart after appearing as part of a Levi's ad campaign in the United Kingdom

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

.

The band Zeep

ZEEP

The ZEEP reactor was a nuclear reactor built at the Chalk River Laboratories near Chalk River, Ontario, Canada . ZEEP first went critical at 3:45 PM, September 5, 1945...

 is a project created with Nina Miranda

Nina Miranda

Nina Miranda is both a singer and songwriter who was part of the English group, Smoke City, and more recently, Shrift.Nina Miranda's father is Brazilian, her mother is English and she was born in Brazil, and educated in Brazil, England and France...

, a bandmate from Smoke City.

Franck's musical influences include samba

Samba

Samba is a Brazilian dance and musical genre originating in Bahia and with its roots in Brazil and Africa via the West African slave trade and African religious traditions. It is recognized around the world as a symbol of Brazil and the Brazilian Carnival...

, Bossa nova

Bossa nova

Bossa nova is a style of Brazilian music. Bossa nova acquired a large following in the 1960s, initially consisting of young musicians and college students...

, the music of Africa

Music of Africa

Africa is a vast continent and its regions and nations have distinct musical traditions. The music of North Africa for the most part has a different history from sub-Saharan African music traditions....

, folk music

Folk music

Folk music is an English term encompassing both traditional folk music and contemporary folk music. The term originated in the 19th century. Traditional folk music has been defined in several ways: as music transmitted by mouth, as music of the lower classes, and as music with unknown composers....

, funk

Funk

Funk is a music genre that originated in the mid-late 1960s when African American musicians blended soul music, jazz and R&B into a rhythmic, danceable new form of music. Funk de-emphasizes melody and harmony and brings a strong rhythmic groove of electric bass and drums to the foreground...

, and rock music

Rock music

Rock music is a genre of popular music that developed during and after the 1960s, particularly in the United Kingdom and the United States. It has its roots in 1940s and 1950s rock and roll, itself heavily influenced by rhythm and blues and country music...

.

Franck co-wrote and produced two albums for Chris Blackwell's "Palm Pictures" label with the band Da Lata. The first album was called Songs From the Tin, and the second was called Serious. He also released an album of remixes under the Da Lata name for Palm Pictures. He co-wrote and produced two albums with the band Smoke City for Jive Records

Jive Records

Jive Records was a record label based in New York City, operating under RCA Music Group. Jive was primarily known for a string of successes with hip hop artists in the 1980s, and in teen pop and boy bands in the late 1990s. The word "jive" was inspired by Township Jive, a form of South African...

: Flying Away and Heroes of Nature.

Franck collaborated on Ernest Ranglin

Ernest Ranglin

Ernest Ranglin O.D. is a Jamaican guitarist and composer. Best known for his session work at the famed Studio One, Ranglin helped give birth to the ska genre in the late 1950s...

's album Modern Answers to Old Problems alongside Tony Allen

Tony Allen (musician)

Tony Oladipo Allen is aNigerian drummer, composer, and songwriter who currently lives and works in Paris. He is currently writing his autobiography "Tony Allen: Master Drummer of Afrobeat" with author/musician Michael E...

, Courtney Pine

Courtney Pine

Courtney Pine CBE is an English jazz musician. At school he studied the clarinet, although he is known primarily for his saxophone playing. Pine is a multi-instrumentalist, also playing the flute, clarinet, bass Clarinet and keyboards...

, and Denys Baptiste

Denys Baptiste

Denys Baptiste is a jazz musician from London, England. A graduate of Tomorrow’s Warriors, Baptiste plays tenor and soprano saxophone in addition to composing....

. The album was engineered by Jerry Boys and produced by Mark van den Berg and Trevor Wyatt

Trevor Wyatt

Trevor Wyatt is a British record company manager and record producer.Wyatt was Chris Blackwell's first employee at Island Records London. Trevor drove the Island cab, delivering records to the stores as well as taking the artists around when they came to town...

.