by RUPERT BOTTENBERG

"For lack of a better description, it's comparable to the Fourth of July - with a lot more soul." That's how veteran Montreal club-night promoter Romero Gonsalves describes Quebec's annual Fête de la St-Jean-Baptiste to Americans. It's something he's had to do a lot lately, because his latest and most ambitious party project is no less than exporting Quebec's consistently raucous national holiday to Las Vegas.

Gonsalves' on-site partner in what's been dubbed the French Connection weekend (misleadingly, perhaps, but close enough for rock 'n' roll - and for Americans) is singer Barnev Valsaint, formerly of Dubmatique and now a star player in Celine Dion's backing band. Given Valsaint's gig, it's no surprise that the two got to talking, last October, about Quebec's stranglehold on Sin City's entertainment dollar, namechecking Celine, multiple Cirque du Soleil shows, renegade Cirque member Franco Dragone's water show at Steve Wynn's much-ballyhooed new hotel, even sound-and-light support from Montrealers Solotech.

"Other artists saw Celine's success and tried to emulate it, but buddy, it's flopping," he says. "Elton John ain't selling that much, and that thing with Barry Manilow? That thing tanked! Celine's getting 4,000 people a night. The most successful shows in Las Vegas are all Quebec shows. Most profitable, best reviews - that's us, man! We have such a strong presence there, and we're very respected. So I want to take it a step further. Okay, you saw what Celine and Cirque du Soleil can do, now look how regular folks party. Because nobody parties like us."

While some Québécois might have a limited definition of who "us" is, you can be sure that Valsaint and Gonsalves, a Haitian and a Latino-Chinese from Guyana, respectively, harbour a broader view, and place it in contrast to both pur laine exclusivity and the proverbial American melting pot.

"Look, if you take salad, rice, beef and starch, and you put it in a pot and melt it, what do you get? Slop. Montreal is a salad - you have tomatoes, some grilled chicken, some lettuce and cucumbers. Everything maintains its individual flavour, but together, they're amazing."

The pair's first shot is humble, by Vegas standards anyway - a trio of parties, June 23 to 25, at the Treasure Island, Venetian and Mandalay Bay casino hotels, with Montreal's multifaceted DJ Groove handling the decks. But as matters progress, they aim to make their Fête de la St-Jean weekends a promotional platform for Quebec's tourism, art, food and liquor industries.

"Next year, hopefully, I'd like to do it over a four-day weekend, and start it off with a wine-and-cheese opening party - but it'll be only Quebec wine and cheeses. So I gotta talk to the Quebec cheese board - there are associations for all the cheese and wine producers here. I'd like to talk to the association for cabanes à sucre. Maybe they can set something up, because in the middle of the desert, they don't know what the hell that is. If they get to see this traditional thing that the natives started and the French Canadians sorta took on themselves... it's Vegas, anything is possible. We can find snow in the middle of the desert."