David Usher | |
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 Usher in 2012 | |
| Background information | |
| Born | April 24, 1966 Oxford, England |
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| Years active | 1992–present |
| Labels | |
| Member of | Moist |
| Website | davidusher |
David Usher (born April 24, 1966) is a British-born Canadian musician, best-selling author, keynote speaker, and activist best known as the front man for the band Moist. He has also released a number of solo albums. [1] He is the founder of Reimagine AI, an artificial intelligence creative studio.
David Usher was born in Oxford, England to Thai Buddhist artist Samphan Usher and Queen's University economics professor Dan Usher. [2] He has lived in various places such as Malaysia, New York City, California and Thailand since early childhood, before his family settled in Kingston, Ontario. He attended high school at Kingston Collegiate and Vocational Institute at the same time that Gord Downie of The Tragically Hip and Hugh Dillon of the Headstones attended the school.[ citation needed ] Usher attended Queen's University for one semester before transferring to Simon Fraser University in Burnaby, British Columbia, majoring in political science. [3]
While studying in Vancouver, Usher helped form the band Moist, composed of Usher on vocals, Mark Makoway on guitars, Jeff Pearce on bass, Kevin Young, who, like Usher, had moved to Vancouver from Kingston, on keyboards, and Paul Wilcox on drums. Usher became the principal songwriter for the band.
Moist's debut album Silver was released in 1994 and went on to achieve quadruple-platinum status, selling 400,000 copies in Canada. Their sophomore album, titled Creature , was released in 1996 and reached triple-platinum status, selling over 300,000 copies.
In 1998, Usher took a year to work on his own recordings. [4] [5] He released his first solo album, Little Songs . Most of the album was recorded in the kitchen of David's apartment. The album contains a track titled "Baby Skin Tattoo", which bears no relation to the song of the same name on the Moist album Creature.
In 1999, Moist released their third album, titled Mercedes 5 and Dime , once again achieving multi-platinum status. They followed this with a compilation album and DVD in 2001, titled Machine Punch Through: The Singles Collection , and thereafter entered a hiatus period that would last twelve years.
Usher continued with his solo career, releasing his second solo album, Morning Orbit , which sold 90,000 copies. The song "Alone in the Universe" was released as the first single, and the album featured collaborations with some members of Moist and with several figures of the Canadian music scene including Jagori Tanna and Bruce Gordon of I Mother Earth, Gord Sinclair of The Tragically Hip, and the rapper Snow. The album also included a cover of the Tracy Chapman song "Fast Car". A Thai version of the record was released, and included Usher singing in Thai on two of the tracks.
Usher's third solo album, Hallucinations , came out in 2003, and includes a cover of the Manic Street Preachers song "If You Tolerate This Your Children Will Be Next".
Hallucinations was followed by If God Had Curves , which includes collaborations with Tegan Quin of Tegan and Sara, and Bruce Cockburn.
Usher continued to release solo albums throughout the first decade of the 2000s, with Strange Birds (2007) and Wake Up and Say Goodbye (2008). Strange Birds contains themes inspired by New York City, where Usher had moved with his family. It also includes extensive collaborations with other members of Moist. Wake Up and Say Goodbye includes a bonus track featuring Quebec-based singer Marie-Mai, and the album was nominated for a Juno Award.
In the early 2010s, David Usher released two more solo albums before reforming the band Moist. The Mile End Sessions came out in 2010, and Songs from the Last Day on Earth in 2012. The Mile End Sessions is composed mostly of previously released songs re-recorded in acoustic arrangements, is produced by Moist member Jonathan Gallivan, contains Usher's first French-language recording, and features contributions from Marie-Mai and Cœur de pirate. Songs from the Last Day on Earth is also produced by Jonathan Gallivan.
In 2013, Moist returned from a twelve-year hiatus and recorded their fourth studio album, Glory Under Dangerous Skies , the following year.
In 2016, Usher released his ninth solo studio album, titled Let It Play . The album features English translations of French-Canadian songs, [6] [7] re-recorded originals from Usher's repertoire, as well as high-profile collaborations with artists such as Marie-Mai, Alex Nevsky, Monogrenade, Karim Ouellet, Dumas, Ingrid St-Pierre, Caracol, Daniel Lavoie, Dominique A, and Baden Baden.
Throughout his musical career, Usher has sold more than 1.4 million albums, won four Juno Awards and had several #1 singles singing in English, French, and Thai.
Usher is also the founder of Reimagine AI, an artificial intelligence creative studio based out of Montreal. Reimagine AI integrates interactive and AI technology to build virtual beings.
Usher is the co-creator (with Damon Matthews) of the Climate Clock. Climateclock.net [8]
In 2012 Usher made a presentation about the creative process at the Mesh Marketing conference in Toronto. [9] In 2015 he published a book on creativity and the creative process, titled Let the Elephants Run • Unlock Your Creativity and Change Everything. [10]
He is featured in the 2001 MuchMusic special Musicians in the WarZone, a humanitarian documentary directed by filmmaker Liz Marshall, in which he journeys to the northern border of Thailand to visit a large Burmese refugee community.
As of 2018, he lives in Montreal, Quebec, with his family.
| Title | Details | Peak chart positions | |
|---|---|---|---|
| CAN | |||
| Little Songs |
| 19 | |
| Morning Orbit |
| 9 | |
| Hallucinations |
| 6 | |
| If God Had Curves |
| 12 | |
| Strange Birds |
| 10 | |
| Wake Up and Say Goodbye |
| 12 | |
| The Mile End Sessions |
| 18 | |
| Songs from the Last Day on Earth |
| ||
| Let It Play |
| ||
| "—" denotes releases that did not chart | |||
| Title | Details |
|---|---|
| iTunes Live from Montreal |
|
| Year | Title | Peak Chart Position | Album | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CAN [11] | GER [12] | NED [13] | SWI [14] | |||
| 1998 | "Forestfire" | 27 | — | — | — | Little Songs |
| "Jesus Was My Girl" | — | — | — | — | ||
| "St. Lawrence River" | — | — | — | — | ||
| 2001 | "Alone in the Universe" | — | — | — | — | Morning Orbit |
| "Black Black Heart" | — | 82 | 87 | 45 | ||
| "A Day in the Life" | — | — | — | — | ||
| 2002 | "My Way Out" | — | — | — | — | |
| 2003 | "Time of Our Lives" | 16 | — | — | — | Hallucinations |
| "Surfacing" | — | — | — | — | ||
| 2004 | "Galaxy" | — | — | — | — | Single only |
| 2005 | "Love Will Save the Day" | — | — | — | — | If God Had Curves |
| 2007 | "The Music" | 17 | — | — | — | Strange Birds |
| "Ugly is Beautiful" | — | — | — | — | ||
| 2008 | "Kill the Lights" (featuring Marie-Mai) | — | — | — | — | Wake Up and Say Goodbye |
| 2010 | "Je repars" (featuring Marie-Mai) | — | — | — | — | The Mile End Sessions |
| "I'm Coming Down" (Acoustic) | — | — | — | — | ||
| Title | Year |
|---|---|
| Silver | 1994 |
| Creature | 1996 |
| Mercedes 5 and Dime | 1999 |
| Machine Punch Through: The Singles Collection | 2001 |
| Glory Under Dangerous Skies | 2014 |
| End of the Ocean | 2022 |
David Nesta "Ziggy" Marley is a Jamaican reggae musician. He is the son of reggae icon Bob Marley and Rita Marley. He led the family band Ziggy Marley and the Melody Makers until 2002, with whom he released eight studio albums. After the disbandment, Ziggy launched a successful solo career, releasing eight solo studio albums on his own label, Tuff Gong Worldwide. Ziggy continues his father’s practice of recording and self-releasing all of his music. Marley is an eight-time Grammy Award winner and a Daytime Emmy Award recipient.
William Mark Wainwright, known professionally as William Orbit, is an English musician and record producer who has sold 200 million recordings worldwide of his own work, his production and song-writing work. He is a recipient of multiple Grammy Awards, Ivor Novello Awards and other music industry awards.
Hallucinations is David Usher's third studio album. It was released on September 9, 2003 via EMI label. Two singles, "Time of our Lives" and "Surfacing" were released off the record. Hallucinations follows two other solo albums, Little Songs (1998) and Morning Orbit (2001), and precedes a fourth solo album, If God Had Curves (2005). The album debuted at #6 on the Canadian Albums Chart, selling 6,300 copies in its first week. It is Usher's highest position on that chart of his solo career.
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Moist is a Canadian rock band that formed in 1992. It consists of David Usher as lead vocalist, Mark Makoway on lead guitars, Jonathan Gallivan on guitars, Kevin Young on keyboards, Francis Fillion on drums, and Jeff Pearce on bass. Drummer Paul Wilcox left the band just before its hiatus in 2000.
Morning Orbit is the second solo album released by Canadian musician David Usher. The album's lead single, "Alone in the Universe", was first made available for streaming in May 2001. The album was released on July 31, 2001 and was certified Platinum by the CRIA in April 2002. "Alone in the Universe" was the 35th most played song on radio in Canada in 2001. "Black Black Heart" and "A Day in the Life" were also released as singles, and both songs were among the top 100 most played songs on radio in Canada in 2002.
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"Black Black Heart" is a song written by David Usher and Jeff Pearce and released as the second single off Usher's 2001 album, Morning Orbit. It became a minor hit in Germany, the Netherlands, and Switzerland, and rose to number three in Greece, spending over 25 weeks on the country's singles chart. The music video won two MuchMusic Video Awards.
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Jonathan Gallivan is a Québec-based producer, musician, and multi-media developer for Gallivan Media.
The Mile End Sessions is the seventh album by solo artist David Usher. It was released on September 14, 2010 and is composed mostly of previously released songs re-recorded in acoustic arrangements. There were two singles released off the record.
Glory Under Dangerous Skies, originally titled Moist IV, is a 2014 studio album released by the Canadian alternative rock band Moist on October 7, 2014 through Universal Music Canada. The album is Moist's first studio offering since their 1999 album Mercedes 5 and Dime, and the first album to feature new members Jonathan Gallivan, Louis Lalancette, and Francis Fillion. Original drummer Paul Wilcox had left the band just before its lengthy hiatus in 2000, and bassist Jeff Pearce left in early 2014 during the production of Glory Under Dangerous Skies.
Songs from the Last Day on Earth is the eighth studio album by Canadian solo artist David Usher. It was released on October 2, 2012 via MapleMusic Recordings label.
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