If you’re a fan of Bruno Mars or Andre 3000, perhaps ColinResponse is the next artist you should check out. A multi-instrumentalist and pop-soul singer, ColinResponse has already gained momentum by sharing the stage with big names like Wyclef Jean and Erkyah Badu. On October 27th, he will release his self-titled EP, a project he refers to as “everything I’ve ever felt—the hurt, the joy, and the laughter.”
We recently had the chance to send ColinResponse a few questions in anticipation of the new album. He opened up to us about everything from songs written in dreams to elementary school memories to racial stereotyping. Read on to learn more about the man who lies behind the clever name.
TYF: Your self-titled EP comes out on October 27th. Can you tell us a little about your favorite song on that EP?
ColinResponse: It took me a while to answer this question, because each one of these songs speaks to me in a different way, and speaks to a different period in my life. I’m gonna have to say “She Dances In The Rain” is my favourite. It’s the most mythical of the songs. It sounds like a fucking weird thing to say but I wrote that song in my dream, literally.
I wrote it when I was in college, living with two of my best friends, Matt Murray and Alex Brekelmans. I had a chord progression I was working on and I said to Alex, “Man, I gotta write a new song with this, but I’m struggling.” Then he’s like, “Go to sleep. The key is to stop trying to think about the answer yourself and just ask for it. Go to sleep and when you close your eyes just keep asking yourself questions like, ‘What’s my next song gonna be about?’ ‘What is going to inspire me to write something new?” And so I was like, “Alright” and “I’ll ask.”
Right before I took my nap, I opened up my computer and I recorded the progression I made, and put it on loop, at a volume that was quiet enough for me to sleep to, but loud enough so it could be heard. I wanted for this chord progression to find its way into my dream, just like when your alarm clock blares “BEEP! BEEP! BEEP!” and you know, it somehow finds its way to your dream, as a car alarm, or fire truck or something.
So I set that up, went to sleep and I continued to ask myself the same question in so many different ways and as I was falling into a subconscious state. I didn’t command myself to think of the answers, but I asked and simply allowed myself to be open to the universe (before I even knew what that meant).
In my dream, there’s a dude sitting on a wooden school chair, and he looked like a fusion of John Travolta and David Beckham. I asked him, “What’s my next song going to be about?” and David Travolta is like, “Your next song is about making a change”. – I replied, “What!? This is not helpful at all!” <laughs> and I just woke up, perplexed, turned off the recording I had on loop and I just decided to go back to sleep.
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Now the second time I dreamt was when the magic happened. I was in an auditorium watching a lecture and after it finished my first bass teacher, Mark Dunn, comes up to me and says, “You need to get a new bass.” He continues, “You need to sound a little bit better” (which was probably true at the time), so I agreed. And as we walk away I started to notice this catchy tune come over the auditorium P.A. system. I thought it was cool. It had a nice groove, and the chorus was like, “The way it works is you fall apart, she dances in the rain.” I didn’t think much of it, but I was like, “Who is this? This sounds pretty sick.”
When I woke up and paused, and realized I was dreaming. I frantically turned my voice recorder on, grabbed my guitar, and began singing that lyric, with the progression I was working on and I was like “…Holy shit!… This is same song from my dream.”
So yeah, that’s how I wrote the chorus to that song. You know, it doesn’t rhyme or anything, but it works, so then I wrote the rest of the song around it.
TYF: Is there a general theme that unites all six tracks?
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ColinResponse: Absolutely. It’s my life, you know. All these songs represent a story, a combination of thoughts, experiences I’ve had, or things I’ve witnessed, culminated into one. I wanted to get creative. From a musical perspective, the genres that inspire all of these songs are pretty diverse in most cases. The one thing that unifies each particular song however, is me – It all tells a story about my life and as the genres change with each song, it is my voice that remains consistent across each track.
From a lyrical standpoint, the general theme that unites all my songs is, without a doubt… life. All these songs depict experiences I’ve had throughout my life – That’s why I chose the art cover we created because it is genuine representation of me, and my life. I’m not trying to depict myself as anything other than what I am. On the cover I’m just wearing a white t-shirt, you know, it’s just me – I’m wearing the same dog tags that I’m always wearing, I’ve got my hair tied back and a little bit of the stubble. It represents me in my most neutral state, which is a state of optimism and curiosity.
TYF: Earlier in the summer, you went back to your elementary school to shoot a music video. What was that experience like?
ColinResponse: That was a trip, man! <laughs> I asked, “Why is everything so small? Why am I so big?” <laughs> It reminded me of that world in Super Mario where everything around you is like 3 times the size of you, except… in reverse – I’m like 3 times the size of everything. <laughs> I don’t know, but that was a trip, man.
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Literally, they’ve even got the same desks! I don’t know what’s with the Peel District School Board, but, like, you need to upgrade that shit. Well, regardless, like, it was sick for the music video, because we got to go back in time, and we got to really represent that time period.
It was honestly amazing. I went there with the DP (the Director of Photography) and the Director, and they’re all business at that moment, but basically, I was just losing my shit the whole time. I was like, “Yo, I remember this! This is the library, this is where I used to put my books back in that slot and shit”, and like they were just like, “Okayyy”. <chuckles>
I was like, “I don’t think you understand how significant this was for me.” I went back and it allowed me to go full circle. It was crazy and I realized, this is where I came from, you know? All the way from a little school in Brampton (a suburb of Toronto). I was born in Toronto, but that’s where I grew up, when I was really young. And I went all the way back there, and, like, I got to see where I came from. I saw Mr. Farley’s class, like, where he used to, like, pick me up, put me in the garbage to settle down, back with teachers used to take smoke breaks in the middle of class (still trying to wonder who was supervising us at that time), anyways. But so, it was a trip, it was crazy.
TYF: You placed second in Shaw TV and Fontana North’s Urban Star competition. What was it like being a part of that?
ColinResponse: It was a seriously valuable experience, travelling, meeting a lot of people, and building the relationships I did. I’m super grateful for it because it showed me so many reasons why I should always be kind to people. And also why it’s important for me to be informed and diligent about how I operate my own business. The day I left, that final performance, was defining for me. I returned to the van we were borrowing to find out that someone had broken into it and stole literally everything that I owned. (I was traveling for about 2 months by this point). So I flew back to Toronto with my wallet and my phone, and a giant poster of my face I took from the show. And it was from that point I had to decide how I was going to rebuild myself. So I started an Indiegogo (before everyone and their cousin’s dog had an Indiegogo <laughs>) to share my story to my fans and community. I was so grateful to see what people were willing to do to help support me on my journey. People could pledge for t-shirts, custom songs, I even gave away a lock of my hair <laugh>. Only sixty days later we reached our goal and my audience had grown significantly – everyone supporting me had pushed me further along than if I had never lost anything at all. Through that experience I learned a valuable lesson about asking for help, and about helping others in need and I’m so much better for it now. I couldn’t be more grateful I didn’t win that contest.
TYF: Recently, you were featured in a VICE News article about racial stereotyping. How did this opportunity come about?
ColinResponse: I was just at a bar, and this man asked me for a drug I never heard the name of. I replied, “Nah, sorry bro, I can’t help you.” So he then asked me for some weed as if it was his backup plan, and I politely replied, “Sorry bro”. And he responded to that as if I was trying to hold out on him or something. Honestly. I was just laughing because I thought it was ridiculous for this dude to be asking someone whom he’s never seen before in his life for random drugs, and then to have the audacity to be upset with me when I didn’t have anything to sell him as is it was my obligation to be caring around weed all the time. I was like, “Wha?” – the kicker also being I haven’t smoked a day in my life.
Anyways, I went back to the table where everyone else was sitting, and I’m laughing as I was sharing this story, because people ask me for weed 3 times a week (minimum). And Manisha, the writer of the article, turns to me and asked if I’d be down to share that story and I was like “sure, let’s do it.” And that’s how that article came about.
TYF: Out of all the shows you’ve ever played, is there one that stands out as your favorite?
ColinResponse: One that stands out as my favourite… You guys got me thinking back to the archives. It’s one of two. It was ether when we went to France to play at the Blues Passions Festival with Hennessy. That was a dope show, but honestly, I think it might be the first show I ever played, man. You know, I worked so hard to put together a band to play my music, and I said, “I gotta do something. Let me just start something.” I put a time limit on it, you know, I went to my school and asked if there were any performance opportunities, and I said, “I just wanna write and find people to play my music.” And I did. 6 months later I did this show for Humber’s Art Fest, and I won the art fest for Best Performance. To be honest, when they told me I won, I forgot it was even a competition. I was just so excited because I had really done it. It was that moment where I decided, “This is what I’m gonna do. This is what I’m gonna do for the rest of my life.”
I’d say that was my favourite.
TYF: You’ve mentioned that your love for music comes from your parents, and that your father had a large record collection. Growing up, which records did you listen to the most?
ColinResponse: Michael Jackson. There was a lot of Soul music too. A lot of Soul music and a lot of Reggae music. And a lot of Jazz, and I didn’t even know what all these genres were at the time. I wasn’t an active music listener, I was a passive music listener and what I mean by that is, I didn’t use the radio or buy CDs I just listened to what was around my environment and I realize now that it had an impact on my musical direction unknowingly. My Dad used to listen to all this stuff in the basement and I would hear it and dance to it ever since I was a kid.
As I got older my sister’s room was beside mine. She loved pop music, so every morning, I’d wake up to pop music and it also had a huge influence on me. I went to school knowing all the songs and all the lyrics, but I didn’t actually know the artist nor did I knew the names of the songs. I just like knew the lyrics. <chuckles> If the chorus had the name of the song, then I knew the name of the song. So I could suss it out like that but that’s about it. That combined with all the video games I played really gave me the blend of musical influences I have now.
My love for Jazz really came into the mix when I was about 18. I remember this one time when I first started college. I came home and I was playing this song from school on my guitar, a song called “There Will Never Be Another You”. A jazz standard. I was playing, and my dad came down and said “Oh, I know that song. That’s from “Ella Loves Cole”. So he goes to his record collection, he pulls out this record, and he says, “Yeah, Ella gave this to me.” And I was like “Cool. Okay, wait, what? Sorry? Ella who?” And he was like “Yeah, Ella Fitzgerald gave this to me.” My Father wasn’t a musician, but he has always loved music and he used to be a chef, and one place he was working, Ella was on tour and she had residency there. And I remember he said she ordered the same thing everyday when she came in, and then the last day before she left she gave him the record. I swear my brain just melted as he told me this! So he puts this record on and here I am playing guitar to this record of Ella Fitzgerald, that literally came from Ella Fitzgerald, and my mind is being blown, honestly.
TYF: You already play a variety of instruments, but if you were to pick up one more, which one would it be?
ColinResponse: I play a few instruments. Honestly I play enough. If I could play one more instrument, I would just want to play piano better. I would love to play the piano like some of my friends, like Matt Burnett, Thomas Francis… like, these guys can PLAY the piano.
I can play piano well enough to write music, and to communicate what I want to through my music, but I’m not that guy who’s playing all these crazy gospel changes and stuff and that would be sick. Maybe I’ll put in the time into learning how to do that, but for right now, you know, playing guitar and vocals is where my focus is.
TYF: Finally, what are you looking forward to most about fall?
ColinResponse: This release. This is the culmination of everything I have been working on my entire adult life. I couldn’t be more excited about this. The release of this is so significant to me. Yeah, there’s nothing more to say than, “I’m excited to play. I’m excited to go on tour, across the country, and have audiences sing these songs back to me.” Hands down, that’s the most exciting thing, ‘cause that’s why I made it all. I mean, my birthday is also October, you know, so, shout out to OVO. <laughs> But really those are the two things I’m most excited about for sure ‘cause you already know, legends are born in October.
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