Dominic ''Forest'' Lapointe is a bassist-composer established in Montreal since the end of the 90s and originally from the North Shore of Quebec/Canada. Evolving in the styles of progressive and extreme metal music, having a window into the metal international scene through his albums, recordings session, playthroughs, videoclips, and so with his arrangements, compositions and bass solos, his work to create a different and specific playing to each of its different bands and projects. ''Forest'' by the nickname given to him by his musician friends, always sets higher goals for himself and his collaborators. His current sponsors include Elixir strings, Aguilar (preamp) and Darkglass Electronics (effects)!
Dominic started playing bass in 1991 when he heard bass players like Cliff Burton, Geddy Lee, Jaco Pastorius, Chris Squire, Tony Levin, and extreme metal bassists like Steve Di Giorgio, Sean Malone and many others who influenced him in his early days. Since then his determination to explore low frequencies have remained relentless.
After starting up with local bands and a three years in jazz/classical music interpretation study, he started composing and always wanted to bring out the bass line stand out rather than simply follow the guitars, experimenting with various harmonies, and thus forged his own phrasing, as much melodic as percussive, using many techniques and possibilities.With a few demo appearances, he begins his first works in the world of progressive and extreme death metal with Atheretic, producing the albums ''Adhesion/Aversion'' (2001) and ''Apocalyptic Nature Fury'' (2005) then joined Augury to co-write and record the albums ''Concealed'' (2004), ''Fragmentary Evidence'' (2009) and ''Illusive Golden Age'' (2018). At that time, he was already the resident bassist for long running Montreal local legends BARF (Since 1986) and he appears on their albums ''Brûle, Consume, Torture'' (2014) and ''Mantra'' (2018). He was also session bassist for Quo Vadis (from 2004 to 2007) and Dominic appears on the live DVD show ''Defiant Indoctrination'' (2005).In the meantime, he also became Beyond Creation's original bassist and appeared on their two first albums, ''The Aura'' (2011) and ''Earthborn Evolution'' (2014). Finally, he also founded with 2 others musicians the instrumental mathcore trio Teramobil and they produced ''Multispectral Super Continuum'' (2013) and ''Magnitude of Thoughs'' (2016). And we don't count the multiple session recordings he partook, including recently for the band Nader Sadek from Egypt with Karl Sanders of Nile last year 2020.Overall, you can hear his bass playing on more than 15 albums and he traveled 23 countries on five different continents, including countries like Japan, India and Australia ! The last formation joined is First Fragment in 2017, who has clearly already put his mark in ''techdeath'' scene and extreme music during the last 10 years!
Dominic also lent his bass playing to legendary band Gorguts during their 2018 European tour and he also played as a theatrical musician for the avant-garde play called ''Jean Dit'' at Le Théâtre d'Aujourd'hui in Montreal. He also made TV appearances alongside comic Mike Ward on Musique Plus. Outside his native country, he performed in various festivals abroad such as Summer Breeze (GE), Brutal Assault (CZ) and Bangalore Open-Air (IND)! He also visited and permormed in ten-countries (23 shows) in Europe with First Fragment for their last tour before that time and currently prepare their next album for fall 2021.He also recently performed in virtual shows during this period that we all know and currently working on future albums and session projects, teaches bass on Skype with students around the world and is working on his next bass playthroughs.Dominic ''Forest'' Lapointe constantly work to find new sounds, new ideas and to make known this magnificent instrument including the 6 strings fretless bass! Stay tuned for even more material from this hardworking bass player!
How did you discover Nordstrand? I discovered Nordstrand while researching pickups reviews on the web, for those who were the most punchy, and also which keeps the note for a long time during quieter passages, while keeping the tone of the wood, and those who would make it even better and I realized that Nordstrand had this way of doing things!
What Nordstrand products do you use? The Big Rig 6 for 19mm bridge, P4 Size
How long have you been using Nordstrand? Recently for my new fretless bass hand made by my luthier in Montreal! I'm heading for a more percussive sound for all techniques and this new bass won't have time to cool down with these new pickups! This will be very useful for the next recordings and for the next shows/ tours, because I intend to make it my main working tool for the next few years!
Describe your rig or instrument of choice. I use this new 6-string fretless bass made by luthier Jacques Simoneau (same luthier as my previous fretless), with Nordstrand pickups, Elixirs strings, Darkglass Electronics gear like Harmonic Booster, X7, Super Symmetry compressor, thé B7K preamp and also the Tone Hammer preamp from Aguilar, it depends on the bass I use, and finally a Mesa Boogie amp for shows!
What do you like about Nordstrand? I like the frankness of the pickups, important to give the exact accent you want to create, to pick up the notes quickly and give them the chance to express themselves!!!
