Backstory

Raised in the Sierra Foothills of Meadow Vista, California; David Bruns is a writer, musician, journalist, and videographer. His family had deep musical roots, during the 1950’s his mother studied Broadway voice while working switchboards at Decca Records in New York City.

In college at UC Davis, Bruns became obsessed with guitar and songwriting – particularly the work of Neil Young, REM and The Smiths. In the ensuing years, Bruns fronted a number of indie bands throughout the 1990’s in Northern California – including The Said and Bellstar.  Both bands released two albums.

In 2006, he moved to the East Coast to live in Washington, D.C. There, he released two solo albums, the wildly diverse Maryland, and Virginia – with Maryland deeply entrenched in alternative tunings and sonic complexity, and Virginia exploring alt-Americana themes with mandolins, banjos, and a hired fiddle player.  During this time he also released on Amazon his first novel The Silent Year - available on Amazon here.

Champ de Mars is the latest ‘band’ incarnation of his music. However, instead of the traditional three-piece, four-piece type ensemble – this band is more of an amalgamation of contributions from a number of people Bruns has made music with over the years.

Champs’ first EP Back from the West was recorded at our basement studio in Alexandria, Virginia throughout 2015.  

Recording for the first full length disc Rancho Seco Victory began in earnest in the fall of 2017 and continued throughout the winter, with mixing and mastering stretching into June of 2018.  It is currently available for order, as well as on iTunes, Spotify, Deezer and Google play. It also received a slew of very positive music reviews

In 2023, Bruns released a new disc that reimagined staple songs from his first band The Said. Titled, “Best of 1993-1996” featured the single ‘Martyr’ and is available on Spotify. 

Recording for the latest album, Halloween Leaves began in February of that same year. For this disc, Bruns experimented with using hip-hop drum loops as beds which he recorded piano loops over. Real drums were recorded in Sicily by respected session player, Federico Gucciardo. Bruns also hired a choir from Nigeria for three songs in the “Leaves” trilogy. Thematically the album primarily focuses on the story of a couple’s existence in different rooms of one house in suburbia during the pandemic. There’s allusions to wedding dresses in closets and desires to ‘have a baby,’ but also to relationship dysfunction, substance abuse, and reconciliation. The album’s centerpiece may be ‘Leaves in Winter’ which courageously confronts the societal taboo topic of miscarriage and the silent grief that couples often experience from it.