We are awfully excited that Son Of Dave – a one-man beatbox band – has decided to leave his UK home to come back to Canada for a short run of dates, because that run will include his Halifax debut at The Carleton on Thursday, April 5th! Show time is 9 PM and advanced tickets are $12 or it’ll be $15 at the door. Trust us folks, this show will be a barn-burner!
Son of Dave isn’t your average blues player. He’s an international cult Bluesman on a mission to save your musical soul from modern hogwash. This one-man harmonica & beat-box genius beats his own path, turning rhythm and blues upside down and gathering a huge international army of devoted fans from all walks of life. He’s welcomed into everything from working man’s blues bars to pop festival main stages, from dive bars to the private parties of industry tycoons.
Besides the outstanding live show and recordings, he’s known for his columns in music magazines (a book was made of them), his provocative banter with an audience, and 45rpm radio show on Soho Radio, London. His albums are treasures, and his songs have been used as soundtrack to Breaking Bad, a Robin Williams film, huge brand campaigns and in the premier episode of Preacher on AMC.
Son of Dave – born Benjamin Darvill – is half a century old now, and started out in the blues + biker bars of Canadian mid-western city Winnipeg. Resembling an arctic Chicago and infamous for its artists such as film director Guy Madden and Neil Young, Winnipeg was also home to Grammy nominated Crash Test Dummies, in which he was a member as a young man. But keeping his roots in R&B, S.o.D has since released seven albums of his own, and performed over a thousand concerts on five continents.
It takes some kind of genius with just harmonica, beatbox, percussion and a loopstation to get on Later With Jools Holland (U.K.) and Taratata (France) as well as being invited to support artists as diverse as Iggy and The Stooges, Grace Jones, Heavy Trash, UB40, Supergrass and the Yardbirds.
In the UK where Son of Dave has based himself for 20 years, he’s toured seven albums, playing the biggest festivals, hundreds of cities and towns, and carved himself into the London subculture.
His current album, entitled Explosive Hits, is a collection of cover songs which people have come to love from the live shows. Ranging from Daft Punk to Lead Belly, it’s a mad collection of genres all put through his funky sausage machine to come out sounding like his own crazy good sound.
With a CV as long as your arm and a briefcase full of naughty tricks, this year he’s touring Europe, Canada, USA, and a couple runs through the UK. He’s a long distance Bluesman, not a quick burner. He’ll still be going strong through his next fifty years no doubt. It’s YOU that has to catch him before sinking into your golden years easy-chair.