Jason Collett
Rat A Tat Tat
Release Date: Mar 9, 2010
Genre(s): Indie, Rock
Record label: Arts & Crafts
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Album Review: Rat A Tat Tat by Jason Collett
Very Good, Based on 4 Critics
Based on rating 7.0/10
Indie-folk may typically foreground words and voices, but that doesn't mean all lyric sheets and vocal cords are created equal. For every hauntingly poetic Sam Beam (Iron & Wine) or piercingly larynx-blessed Jonathan Meiburg (Shearwater), there are a million and one singers a little too in love with their pens and pipes. Jason Collett isn't going to blow you away with his imagery, and his voice-- while sturdy and appealing-- doesn't stand out from the alt-troubadour pack.
Based on rating 7/10
Canadian indie-rock veteran Jason Collett tends to give listeners what they expect, but that doesn’t mean the results don’t also tend to be tremendously enjoyable. Following the well-blazed trail of boho-folk-roots legends like Neil Young, Bob Dylan, and the Band, Collett situates himself in a fairly traditional milieu when compared to the leading-edge ambitions of his Arts & Crafts labelmates. He’s a straight-arrow singer-songwriter, and excels easily at both sides of that hyphenated calling.
Based on rating 6.8/10
Toronto guitarist writes more happy-sad songs If “happiness is for amateurs,” as Jason Collett sings on his fifth solo album, then this Broken Social Scenester has gone pro. Heavily steeped in ’70s classic and lite rock, Rat a Tat Tat may sound easygoing and vampy, but only because Collett knows there’s joy to be found in sad songs. So the teenage-dream T.
Based on rating 6/10
Jason Collett rarely tires of exploring the limits of his 1970s songwriter fascination, and Rat A Tat Tat finds him evoking the rootsy, sun-dappled sounds of George Harrison, Bob Dylan, and Kris Kristofferson. By now a major player in Toronto’s indie scene, he ambles through these 11 tracks with help from a number of local musicians, including Robbie Lackritz (Feist’s former sound engineer) and longtime partners Carlin Nicholson and Michael O’Brien -- who, after recording 2008’s Here’s to Being Here, began pursuing their own interests by launching the pop band Zeus. Rat A Tat Tat has its share of poppy moments, too, but Collett is more concerned with appropriating the sounds of yesteryear’s rock staples, from the classic rock slide guitars that fill “Lake Superior” to the elegiac “Long May You Love,” which could’ve been lifted from Harrison’s All Things Must Pass.
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