David Usher

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David Usher
Usher in 2008
Background information
Born	April 24, 1966 (1966-04-24) (age 43)
Origin	Montreal, Quebec, Canada
Genres	Rock, pop
Years active	1992–present
Labels	Maple Music, Capitol
Associated acts	Moist
Website	http://www.davidusher.com/

David Usher (born on April 24, 1966) is a British-born Canadian rock singer-songwriter who currently lives in Montreal. Formerly the frontman for the Canadian band Moist (1992–2000), he embarked on a solo career in the late 1990s.

Biography

David Usher was born in Oxford, England to a Thai Buddhist, artist Samphan Usher, and a Jewish Montrealer, Dan Usher, who is a professor of economics at Queen's University.^[1] He has lived in various places such as Malaysia, New York City, California and Thailand since early childhood, before his family settled in Kingston, ON. He attended high school at Kingston Collegiate and Vocational Institute. Usher attended Simon Fraser University in Burnaby, British Columbia, majoring in political science. His degree would later influence his music career. Usher is a humanist, and has been involved in such causes as War Child Canada, White Ribbon Campaign and Amnesty International. Usher is featured in the acclaimed 2001 MuchMusic special "Musicians In The WarZone", a humanitarian documentary produced by War Child Canada, directed by filmmaker Liz Marshall. In it Usher journeys to the northern border of Thailand to visit a large Burmese refugee community.

Usher married Sabrina Reeves, photographer and co-artistic director for the Bluemouth Inc. performance theatre company, in 1997. They have two daughters, Coco born January 10, 2003, and Océane Danayia born April 28, 2008.

Usher also has a blog on Art, Technology and the Communications Revolution, which can be found at Cloudid.com.

Musical career

Moist

David Usher met his Moist bandmates in 1992 while in university and their 1994 debut release, Silver, went quadruple platinum in Canada. Moist went on to release their multi-platinum follow-up, Creature, in 1996, Mercedes 5 and Dime in 1999 and Machine Punch Through, a collection of singles, in 2001.

Solo career

Recorded in Usher's kitchen in three, 10-day stretches, Little Songs, Usher's debut solo album, shines in its acoustic simplicty. Little Songs was released in April 1998 during Moist's hiatus following the release of Creature.

Following Moist's Mercedes 5 and Dime, Usher revived his solo career and released the highly successful Morning Orbit in the summer of 2001. It contains the hit singles "Alone in the Universe", as well as "Black Black Heart" which was co-produced by Jeff Martin, former frontman for the Canadian rock group The Tea Party. Other "special guests" on Morning Orbit include rapper Snow, Jagori Tanna and Bruce Gordon from I Mother Earth as well as Gord Sinclair from The Tragically Hip.

In 2003, he released another solo album entitled Hallucinations, which features a cover track by Manic Street Preachers entitled "If You Tolerate This Your Children Will Be Next", as well as a bonus disc which includes live tracks and one remixed track.

After Hallucinations, Usher left EMI in favour of a smaller record company MapleMusic, moved his family to New York, and released the predominantly acoustic If God Had Curves in 2005. This effort featured a collaboration with Tegan Quin, on the track "Hey Kids", as well as a guest guitar performance by Bruce Cockburn on the track "Long Goodbye". That same year Usher released a DVD entitled "Walk.Don't.Run", which gives us a look into the making of If God Had Curves.

Usher's fifth solo album, released in March 2007, is titled Strange Birds. It contains the popular song The Music.

Wake Up and Say Goodbye is the second single from the album entitled Wake Up and Say Goodbye, which was released on September 23, 2008.^[2]

Discography

Moist

• Silver (1994)
• Creature (1996)
• Mercedes 5 and Dime (1999/2000)
• Machine Punch Through (2001)

Solo

• Little Songs (1998)
• Morning Orbit (2001)
• Hallucinations (2003)
• If God Had Curves (2005)
• Strange Birds (2007)
• Wake Up and Say Goodbye (2008)

Videography

• Appears in Building a Mystery from Sarah Mclachlan's Surfacing (1997)
• Forestfire from Little Songs (1998)
• Jesus Was My Girl from Little Songs (1998)
• St. Lawrence River from Little Songs (1998)
• Alone in the Universe from Morning Orbit (2001)
• Black Black Heart V 1.0-2.0 from Morning Orbit (2001)
• A Day in the Life from Morning Orbit (2002)
• My Way Out from Morning Orbit (2002)
• Time of Our Lives from Hallucinations (2003)
• Surfacing from Hallucinations (2003)
• Love Will Save The Day from If God Had Curves (May 2005)
• The Music from Strange Birds (2007)
• Ugly is Beautiful from Strange Birds (July 2007)
• Kill the Lights from Wake Up and Say Goodbye (November 2008)

Notes

External links

• Official Website and Blog
• Myspace page
• The Playdoh Mask - fan website
• Interview with David Usher which originally appeared in the Queen's Journal
• Video interview and performance recorded March 2007
• Forestfire (1998)
• St.Lawrence River (1998)
• Jesus Was My Girl (1998)
• Alone in The Universe (2001)
• A Day in the Life (2002)
• My Way Out (2002)
• Time of our Lives (2003)
• Surfacing (2003)
• Love Will Save The Day (2005)
• The Music (2007)
• Ugly is Beautiful (2007)
• Kill The Lights (2008)
• David Usher's Social Media Channel Company Deqq created in collaboration with Work At Play