By Jay Scott Kanes

HAMILTON, Ontario, Canada – Bang! Bash! Although not a mob enforcer, nor an ice-hockey tough-guy, Dave Gould, nevertheless, is a relentless hitman.

An Ontario-based musician with country-folk leanings, Dave writes clever songs and plays guitar plus other instruments. Specializing in percussion with a difference, he loves to “hit things", making them sound good while they take a rhythmic beating.

For the second time within weeks, Dave has released a new CD, this time called Adad (for Attention Deficit Artist's Disorder). Despite any disorder, he recently earned two nominations for Hamilton Music Awards.

Dave calls the latest album “an experimental collection of found sounds and quirky songs with twisted rhythms”. One track, “Twice Wanted”, arguably the best of Adad's 12 selections, was “field recorded” as Dave thumped, with woodpecker-like results, on “a pine tree in the woods”. The song has a mild Christmas theme.

I got twice what I wanted
Under the tree.
I only asked
For you to be
Half as beautiful
As you are to me.
From “Twice Wanted”, Dave Gould, Adad album, 2011

Elsewhere Dave “plays” on a screen door, tin sheets, saw blade and school bell, plus more conventional instruments like a didgeridoo, xylophone, congas and shakers. Some people admire Dave, the world’s leading “looist”, for his knack also to play music by beating on a porcelain toilet.

The steady thump of Dave hitting things persists in Adad's 40-minute playing time. “Naningo Songs”, based on an Afro-Cuban rhythm, has prolonged beating on “a 1917 bass snare in the natural acoustics of an old church”.

Smiley, happy faces
To meet you.
Smiley, happy faces,
So glad.
Smiley, happy faces
To meet you.
Smiley, happy faces,
So sad,
When you go home,
When you go back home.
You can't come back to my place
Because I can't live like that.
From “Naningo Songs”, Dave Gould, Adad album, 2011

“Everything”, dedicated to Dave's daughter, was recorded outside with congas and bird-noises. Aren't bird-songs and purring cats the sweetest sounds? (Note to Dave: what's wrong with you? Why didn't you recruit a purring cat too? Maybe on your next album, okay?)

I used to be blue....
Don't ask me why.
I ain't paintin' no sky.
Okay, maybe I'm still blue,
But I'm, I'm violet too.
You’re a teeny....
Teensy-weensy,
Everything.
From “Everything”, Dave Gould, Adad album, 2011

Dave describes one instrumental track, “Empiric Time Jam", as “strangers making noise together at the Skydragon Café". If listeners close their eyes, the results suggest a massive traffic jam amid road-construction as boats nearby sound their fog-horns.

A previous CD, Truck For Sale, highlighted Dave's songwriting. This one's much more about Dave hitting things, blending diverse sounds to work well together (they mostly do). The supporting cast is Gerry Gregg (bass), Tanya Amyote (vocal harmonies), Chris Cracknell (electronics) and Mitch Girio, Paul Swoger-Ruston and Snowheel Slim (electric guitars).

Dave has done backup work too. He played on dozens of albums for others, many when he lived previously on Prince Edward Island, which inspired his earlier album, The Passion of Bobby Bedeque (2005).

There's much to appreciate about Dave. Most hitmen (non-musical ones) don't give a damn how their targets sound, and few percussionists bash such unlikely objects.
 
For more information:www.reverbnation.com/davegould

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