Jason Collett

Early life

Collett grew up in Bramalea, a suburb of Toronto, and started writing songs as a kid to fight off suburban dullness. He names Bob Dylan, Kris Kristofferson, and Nick Lowe as inspirations. After moving to downtown Toronto, he made a living as a woodworker and carpenter while chasing his music career.

In the late 1980s, he helped start the band Lazy Grace with Kathryn Rose and Kersti McLeod. They played every Monday at the Spadina Hotel as part of Radio Mondays, sharing the stage with The Weakerthans and Arts & Crafts acts. Around 2000, he joined the short-lived alt-country group Bird, which put out one album, Chrome Reflection.

Broken Social Scene

Collett became a member of Broken Social Scene as a guitarist after the band's album You Forgot It In People. Kevin Drew convinced him to join once the band moved from instrumental work to writing their own songs.

His involvement allowed him to leave woodworking for full-time music. Though he took a break from touring with Broken Social Scene in fall 2005 to focus on his solo career and family, he made many musical connections through the band. His 2005 album Idols of Exile featured contributions from Kevin Drew, Leslie Feist, Brendan Canning, and members of Stars and Metric.

Solo work

Jason Collett’s first solo album, Bitter Beauty, came out in 2001. AllMusic gave it three out of five stars, and Canadian Musician wrote a positive review. The next year he put out Motor Motel Love Songs. In 2005, he released Idols of Exile, his first record on the Arts & Crafts label.

Here’s to Being Here arrived in February 2008. Starting in 2007, Collett and poet Damian Rogers ran The Basement Revue, a concert series at Toronto’s Dakota Tavern where writers and musicians performed together without announcing the lineup ahead of time. The event later moved to bigger spaces, including the annual Luminato Festival. He used to tour with the band Paso Mino, whose members were Robbie Drake, Afie Jurvanen, Mike O’Brien, and Michael P. Clive.

In 2008, he formed a new backing group with Drake, O’Brien, Carlin Nicholson, and Neil Quin; those four also made music together as Zeus. In 2009, Collett took part in the interactive documentary series City Sonic, talking about his long connection to Kensington Market. His fifth solo album, Rat a Tat Tat, produced by O’Brien and Nicholson, came out in March 2010. Later that year he released Pony Tricks, which had re-recorded alternate versions of songs from his earlier albums.

Reckon, his seventh solo studio album, arrived in September 2012. In 2013, he acted in a stage production of Sam Shepard’s play Cowboy Mouth at Toronto’s Cameron House. Song and Dance Man, his eighth album, was released on February 5, 2016. The following year he organized New Constellations, a tour that paired established Canadian pop and rock musicians with emerging Indigenous Canadian artists.

In 2018, he contributed the song “Sensitive Man” to the compilation The Al Purdy Songbook. His ninth album, Head Full of Wonder, came out in 2022.

Did You Know?

• Collett worked as a woodworker and carpenter doing renovations and custom home building before becoming a full-time musician.
• In the late 1980s, he co-founded the band Lazy Grace, which performed every Monday at Toronto's Spadina Hotel as part of Radio Mondays.
• Collett and poet Damian Rogers started The Basement Revue in 2007 at Toronto's Dakota Tavern, with lineups not announced in advance.