BW&BK; scribe Carl Begai recently spoke with WOODS OF YPRES mastermind David Gold about the band's latest album, Woods III: Deepest Roots And Darkest Blues, joining GATES OF WINTER, and the new band line-up for Woods. Following is an excerpt from the story.

Gold confirms the reports and rumblings of the past six months that bassist Dan Hulse and keyboardist Jessica Rose are no longer part of Woods Of Ypres. An unfortunate turn of events, but nothing new given the players that have come and gone since Gold launched the band in 2002.

“Let’s say this: Woods as people knew it for the third album came to a crossroads. The band has been Dan, Jessica and myself, and we had a couple guys that filled in on drums and guitar but never came to a point where we felt they were serious enough to even make a permanent offer. We all had to work, we had other lives in Toronto, so we weren’t in a position to be a working, touring band, so the focus was on doing the record; that was the important thing. We decided to do it as a three piece, with me doing guitar, drums and vocals. Doing the record was a three year process, and as it was coming to an end I think all three of us were worn down. It was one of those things where you put the maximum amount of work you can into something but you have yet to receive anything back from it, which is a difficult place to be. I was going to be continuing no matter what, and more and more there was the feeling that the other two didn’t need the band as much as I do. Woods Of Ypres is the biggest part of me, it’s what I do, and as much as those guys are good people and I enjoyed working with them, they don’t need this band as much as I do.”
“Also, I don’t mind imposing this lifestyle on myself, but I’d have a hard time imposing it on people that have alternatives” Gold continues. “If you have an opportunity to work at a job that you enjoy where you’re making pretty good money, and you’ve got a husband or wife and you’re building a life, I’m not going to try and convince you that you should be on the road with me. It came to that point, and I needed to regain some focus on what was going to happen next. I took a year off to regroup and we were all in on it, but as I was gearing up to come home and we were getting offers to play here and there, neither those guys wanted to make a commitmen to any of those plans. There was this silence between the three of us, and in that silence I made some decisions. It came down to, if we can’t do those things as a band then what are we going to do?”

Go to this location for the complete story.

Woods Of Ypres' tour schedule is now as follows:

November

15 - St. Paul, MN - Station 4 (Heathen Crusade III)
16 - Winnipeg, Manitoba - Ozzy's
17 - Thunder Bay, Ontario - Kilroy's
18 - Sudbury, Ontario - The Serbian Centre
19 - North Bay - venue tba (NEW DATE)
20 - Montreal, Quebec - Café Chaos
21 - Ottawa, Ontario - Bayou’s
22 - Toronto, Ontario - DC Music Theatre
23 - Windsor, Ontario - Dr. Disc (at 2:00 pm)
23 - Windsor, Ontario - The Coach (at 8:00 pm)