The story of how Bachman-Turner Overdrive came to be.
After leaving The Guess Who, Randy Bachman recalled that "nobody wanted to work with me". The exception was Chad Allan, former Guess Who lead singer who had left that band four years before Randy. The two decided to form a new band with Randy's brother Robin "Robbie" Bachman on drums and they named it Brave Belt. Brave Belt's first album, which had Randy playing both lead guitar and bass, did not sell particularly well. The record label still wanted Brave Belt to tour, so fellow Winnipeg bassist/vocalist C. F. (Fred) Turner was added to the lineup. Brave Belt had a few songs that made the Canadian charts but only one, "Crazy Arms, Crazy Eyes" made the Canadian Top 40.
Turner was soon asked to be a full-time member for the recording of Brave Belt II in 1972. Chad Allan appeared as a vocalist on two Brave Belt II songs, but left the band shortly after the album's recording. Another Bachman brother, Tim Bachman, was added as a second guitarist. Brave Belt II also failed to achieve any notable chart success.
According to Randy Bachman's autobiography, the seeds of the B.T.O. sound were sown at a university gig in Thunder Bay, Ontario, Canada shortly after Allan's departure. A promoter was not happy with Brave Belt's country-flavoured songs and decided to sack Brave Belt for the Saturday night show and bring in a more rock-oriented replacement from Toronto. When that didn't materialize, he begged Brave Belt to stay on and play a set of classic rock cover songs. As the band played songs like "Proud Mary", "Brown Sugar" and "All Right Now", the dance floor filled up and, according to Randy, "We instantly saw the difference between playing sit-down music people could talk over and playing music they would jump out of their seats and dance to."
After Reprise Records dropped Brave Belt from their label, Randy Bachman emptied his own bank account to finance another set of recordings with the Brave Belt II lineup, and began to shop around the next album. Said Randy in 1974, "I went to A&M, Epic, Atlantic, Columbia, Asylum – you name it. A week later, I’d get letters saying ‘Dear Randy, We pass.’ We’re thinking of calling our greatest hits album We Pass and printing all those refusals on the jacket. I’ve got all 22 of them."
The band eventually landed a deal with Mercury Records, one which Randy proclaimed as a pure stroke of luck. In April 1973, Charlie Fach of Mercury Records returned to his office after a trip to France to find a stack of unplayed demo tapes waiting on his desk. Wanting to start completely fresh, he took a trash can and slid all the tapes into it except one which missed the can and fell onto the floor. Fach picked up the tape and noticed Bachman's name on it. He remembered talking to him the previous year and had told Bachman that if he ever put a demo together to send it to him. Coincidentally, Mercury had just lost Uriah Heep and Rod Stewart to other labels, and Fach was looking for new rock acts to replace them. Fach called Bachman, and Randy describes the conversation from there:
I could hear "Gimme Your Money Please" playing in the background, and that was the first song on the tape. Back then, you sent out two 7+1/2-inch reels of your album, an A-side and a B-side, and that was side one, cut one. He said, "Randy, this is fabulous. Is the rest of the album like this?" And I said, "Yeah, it's all just good ol', dancing rock-and-roll." So he said, "Well, I have a meeting with my A&R people, but as far as I'm concerned, this is great and I want to sign it."
At this point the band's demo tape was still called Brave Belt III. Fach convinced the band that a brand new name was needed; one that capitalized on the name recognition of the band members. The band had already mulled over using their surnames. While on their way back from a gig in Toronto, the group had spotted a copy of a trucker's magazine called Overdrive while dining at the Colonial Steak House in Windsor, Ontario. Turner wrote "Bachman–Turner Overdrive" and the initials "B.T.O." on a napkin. The rest of the band decided the addition of "Overdrive" was the perfect way to describe their music.
