"Song And Dance Man", the
title track from Jason Collett's sixth full-length album, finds the iconic
singer-songwriter back at centre stage, with three-minutes-and-change and a
story to sing. Featuring the bright production touch of Bahamas' Afie Jurvanen,
“Song And Dance
Man” covers the trials and
triumphs of the modern musician with poignant poetry:
If you can tweet something brilliant,
you got a marketing plan
Song And Dance Man’s thirteen songs bear the wit and melody of classic Jason Collett: contemplative
reflections on getting older, backed with an affinity for freewheeling 70s
dance music. The album’s conspiring themes of love & loneliness, sun &
shadows, are buoyed by its soaring sound. Each song rises into an easy,
spacious groove, lead by Jason’s languid melodies and Afie’s sun-drunk bass.
“There’s a cool
economy to Afie’s approach that lets the record breathe and allows it to say
more with less, something I worked hard at hardly working at in writing strolling the songs,” says Collett. “Keeping a light touch, keeping it short.”
Having spent the years since
2012’s Reckon finding himself further
engaged in the growing success of his Basement Revue concert series – a
cross-pollinating musical & literary mash-up of Canada’s premiere contemporary
artists – the Toronto indie-troubadour describes this record as a liberating
process distilled in long stretch
of domestic reverie.
“I like writing songs and for
the first time in my life I felt no rush to hustle them or myself out the
door,” says Collett. “I let some dust settle, some weeds grow, puttered about
at home…”
The result is a dynamic
addition to a strong body of work. Song
And Dance Man may be Jason Collett’s finest effort yet – back in the
spotlight, more comfortable than ever in the guise of entertainer:
You got to do what you can when you’re a
Song And Dance Man.
Song And Dance Man was recorded in spring 2015 with long-time collaborators
drummer/engineer Don Kerr (at his Rooster Studio), Christine Bougie on guitar
& lap steel, Zeus’ Neil Quinn on backing vocals, and Afie holding it down
on the bass, sometimes two.
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