Jason Collett Talks About The Replacements (In His Band)

Toronto singer/songwriter Jason Collett has long been a fixture of the city's music scene. Since the release of 2005's Idols Of Exile, Collett has relied on Barrie, Ont.-based crew Paso Mino to round out his live sound. For his latest effort, Here's To Being Here, he actually recorded with Paso Mino, capturing the immediacy and feel they'd developed after 18-plus months of shows together.

Since recording the album, Collett has had to make some additions to his backing crew after two Paso Mino members took a leave. The new lineup debuted at Collett's recent three-night residency at Toronto's Dakota Tavern.

"It was a bit of a challenging evening," says Collett. "It would kick off at 9:30 p.m. and it wouldn't end until 2 a.m., but it was just a lot of fun.

"I played with my new band, but we hadn't rehearsed yet, so that was part of the experiment, to just to have everybody listen to the songs. It was a bit of a train wreck for us, but it was good. You kind of need to throw some caution to the wind and do some stuff that could completely fail.

"But I find that you kind of endear yourself to audiences more when you fail because the whole thing is a shared event. There's less of a space between the performer and the audience."

The changes to Collett's touring lineup were well outside of his hands, and in all cases due to individual success on the part of band members — both musical and professional.

"AC [Afie Jurvanen], the guitar player, has been playing with Feist for the last year, so he's gone in that direction," explains Collett. "Hard to argue with those Grammy nominations.

"And Michael P. Clive, the bass player, he's got a cooking show in the works right now. It's all touring with bands and eating their favourite meal somewhere in the world, and then he brings 'em back to Toronto and they recreate it. And he's perfect for it, he's so highly entertaining."

Collett admits missing his bandmates, though he wishes them success. In the meantime, the remaining backing crew of Mike O'Brien and Rob Drake have been bolstered with a pair of new players.

"We've got a whole new chemistry cooking in the band," says Collett. "We've got Gregory MacDonald, who plays keys with Sloan. He's been sitting in with us and it's been great.

"This guy Jeremy Little, he's a great bass player and all-around awesome dude. And keyboard player Mike O'Brien, he's moved to lead guitar and he's just an amazing guitar player. So it's working out great, actually."

Here are Collett's Canadian tour dates:

Feb. 27 Hamilton, ON @ Casbah
Feb. 28 Waterloo, ON @ Starlight Room
Feb. 29 Peterborough, ON @ Red Dog Tavern
March 1 Kingston, ON @ The Grad Club
March 6 Toronto, ON @ Lee's Palace w/Rebekah Higgs, 6ixty8ights and Birds Of Wales (CMW showcase)
March 8 London, ON @ Call The Office
March 22 Vancouver, BC @ Plaza Club
March 24 Calgary, AB @ Broken City
March 25 Edmonton, AB @ Starlite Room
March 26 Saskatoon, SK @ Amigo's
March 27 Winnipeg, MB @ Park Theatre
April 18 Montreal, QC @ Le Petit Campus
April 19 Ottawa, ON @ Zaphod Beeblebrox