David Usher was born April 24th, 1966 in Oxford England. The only son of a Jewish-Canadian economics professor and Thai-Buddist artist, David has only one sibling; a sister, Ann. After travelling extensivly in Thailand his family settled in Kingston, Ontario when David was 3 years old, but continued to spend periods of time visiting in his mother's homeland of Thailand. He lived in Kingston until he moved to Vancouver, British Columbia to attend Simon Fraser University where he earned a B.A. degree in political science. He now resides in Montreal, Quebec.
In the late 80's / early 90's David was in a band called True Hype Crue . The band released one video on Canada's musice station, Much Music, for the song "Look". The video is very reminiscent of MC Hammer's "Can't Touch This", and features David in a bright orange turtleneck sweater and baggy pants, his hair pulled back in a pony tail under his leather hat, dancing in a fashion that can only be described as "an interesting attempt at ballet".
Moist was formed in Vancouver after the breakup of David's band and the original Moist line up. They started writing songs together in November 1992 and played thier first live shows in January of 1993. They recorded thier first album, an independent release, over two days in February 1993 to rave reviews, and were signed to EMI Canada in October of that year. The band has released 6 albums to date, including the independent release "Moist", "Push", "Silver", "Creature", "Mercedes Five and Dime", and the greatest hits compilation "Machine Punch Through".
In 1998, between "creature" and "Mercedes Five and Dime", David married his long time girlfriend, Sabrina (1997) and released his first solo album entitled "Little Songs" (1998). Most of the album was recorded in his kitchen, giving it a very homey, intimate feel. This, at times, stripped down, acousticand at other times, dance oriented album is a big leap from his work with Moist.
In 2001 David released his second solo project, "Morning Orbit", a much more "mainstream" sounding album. David says of the difference between the two, "With Little Songs I very much wanted to make a record that felt intimate as if the person was sitting right next to me and with Morning Orbit I wanted to experiment more with soundscapes each time I do a record I try to set up different loose parameters for myself about the way I want to work." He is currently touring the album across Canada.
�b hartling 2002 |
