From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Ian Michael D'Sa (born October 30, 1975 in the United Kingdom) is the guitarist for the Canadian band Billy Talent.

History

Ian's family moved from the UK to Canada when he was 3 years old. He is of Goan descent and grew up in Mississauga, Ontario learning guitar at the age of 13. While attending Our Lady of Mount Carmel Secondary School in 1991, he formed a band named Dragonflower with some fellow schoolmates ^[1] Two years later when Dragonflower broke up he formed another band named Soluble Fish and recorded a five song demo entitled Nugget Sauces. He eventually met Benjamin Kowalewicz, Jonathan Gallant and Aaron Solowoniuk in 1993 at the highschool talent show. While also playing in Soluble Fish, he started a new band with them named Pezz (later to become "Billy Talent") in which both bands played together for several years until Soluble fish broke up in 1996. While playing in Pezz, D'Sa went to Sheridan College where he got his degree in classical animation and even worked on the TV shows Angela Anaconda, Birdz, and the film Adventures in 3-D IMAX as an animator.^[2] As of 2000 the band had changed their name to Billy Talent after the fictional character in Bruce McDonald's film Hard Core Logo.

D'Sa co-produced Billy Talent II with Gavin Brown. He also did art direction and package design on the Billy Talent II album. He received co-direction credit for the video, "Fallen Leaves", for which the band was awarded Best Video and Best Rock Video at the 2007 MuchMusic Video Awards.

D'Sa recently produced the 2 singles on Die Mannequin's EP Slaughter Daughter, the songs being "Do it or Die" and "Saved By Strangers". He played guitar on Sarah Slean's "Lucky Me". He makes a cameo in The Operation M.D.'s single "Sayonara" as a doctor pushing Stevo in a wheelchair. He also makes a brief cameo as a year book photo in the K-OS video for ELEctrik HeaT - The Seekwill. He also sung guest vocals with Alexisonfire during a few live shows.

D'Sa has also been involved with Song for Africa, a project to connect Canada's youth to the AIDS pandemic, playing guitar on the song and in the video. In July 2007 he travelled to Kenya, Africa for 10 days to be part of the upcoming Song for Africa Documentary film.

When playing live shows, he plays a Montego Black Fender Stratocaster Fat Strat Deluxe with a red pickguard. This is from the American Deluxe Series which has SCN noiseless pickups. When recording in the studio, he uses a '52 Fender Telecaster Re-issue, a '62 Fender Jazzmaster, a '58 Gibson Les Paul Junior and several other vintage guitars. Also he owns a three colour sunburst stratocaster with a white pick guard, which is shown in the "Devil in a Midnight Mass" music video. He previously used a 1991 Peavey 5150 head until he received a 60 watt head custom made for him by Mark Stephenson of Stephenson Amplification in 2002 - 2003.

Ian is known for his unexpected appearances at fellow bands live shows. He is known to guest many times as vocalist in some random shows of Alexisonfire. He has also joined Sum 41 as a guest guitarist for a one-off performance of their popular encore song "Pain for Pleasure". He also performed as a guest in one show with UK band Reuben in 2006, while the band supported Billy Talent.

Ian is expected to guest and produce on The Operation M.D.'s second studio album, which is due for release in early 2010. Dave Baksh, formerly of Sum 41 has also hinted Ian might appear on his current band The Organ Thieves' upcoming full-length album.

External links

• Song for Africa

References

1. ^ ATTN: Read Before Posting! Juicey info in here!
2. ^ The Ongoing History of New Music. "Before They Were Famous" Original Broadcast date: 13-11-05 on CFNY.