What an awful piece of news to learn upon waking up this morning, but we’ve lost another incredible musician whose time expired far too soon. David Gold, who most referred to as David I. Ypres, the mastermind behind Woods of Ypres, was killed Dec. 22 in an accident near Barrie, Ontario.
Obviously this is horribly sad news regardless, but this comes at a time when Woods of Ypres were about to make a huge push, having just signed to Earache and completed their stunning new record “Woods 5: Grey Skies and Electric Light,” due in February. In fact, I’d been listening quite a bit to the album as of late, as Earache sent me (and many other journalists) a digital copy a few weeks back. I was really excited about their future and thought this album might really break them to a larger audience. And it still might, but sadly, Gold won’t be around to see this thing he worked so hard to build come to fruition.
Gold’s approach toward his lyrics and vocals are what stands out most to me. He was blunter than many other writers, sometimes sounding a little un-poetic in the process, but that was by design. He captured his emotion, sorrow and pain artistically in a way that anyone coming across his music easily could understand. It made Woods of Ypres’s music even more human. Vocally, he always reminded me a bit of Peter Steele, another one who left us way too soon, and the band’s music often sounded more friendly and approachable than what was being expressed, providing a strange backdrop for Gold’s dark words. It was perfect in that sense in that you often didn’t feel beaten about the brow with murkiness, but if you paid close attention, you realized what was lying beneath.
This may seem a little strange to do considering the circumstances, but I’m going to include a link below to buy their albums. The band’s music deserves to be heard, and they should have exploded to the next level. If you have a little extra money sitting around and you’d been mulling picking up some new music, definitely grab anything in the Woods canon. My sincere condolences go out to his family, his friends, his fellow musicians, and anyone else who was touched by his art or his friendship. Life is just pain and piss indeed, but Gold deserved to wring more out of it than he had a chance to do. Rest in peace. The metal world is a better place because of your contributions.
For more on the band, go here: http://www.myspace.com/woodsofypres
And here: http://www.ultimatemetal.com/forum/woods-ypres-386/
To buy their albums, go here: http://earache.com/uswebstore/advanced_search_result.php?keywords=woods+of+ypres&osCsid=4nbj4gcarp5efrnt8bekq0cqn4&x=0&y=0
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