Jake Vaillant and the Town

What's is your style/genre: Jake Vaillant: Gallows humour music for crowded broken elevators and other awkward situations and environs. How long have you been around: JV: Well, I was born in 89, and Kyle… I’d say collectively about 66 years—more if you [count] the other guys. Who's in the band: JV: The most current all-star fantasy draft boasts the virtuosic artillery of Olivia Korkola on the seemingly enchanted five-string fiddle. And of course the inimitable Kyle Shushack, my real-life cousin, dear bud, and Confidante Comrade-A-Primo in all matters concerning music or the abject violation of canon and future-law. Kyle Shushack: It has been a bit of a revolving door at times—or, like a series of cameos. Jake and I are consistent fixtures so long as geography permits. We have got to work with a ton of unique musicians and acts as sort of stage features in the past, but the new quintet is something special I think we gotta hold onto. JV: Danny Erickson is my favourite kind of drummer: sensitive, enthusiastic, lyrical. An absolute beauty. Then there’s Jess Horricks, a bona fide legend and true troubadour. It has been an elucidating honour to collaborate closely with the both of them. Favourite song you cover: JV: Generally we don’t cover tunes, however; we are in the process of trying to get someone to let us mount a theatrical production of Tom Waits’ Nighthawks at the Diner. Best song you’ve written: JV: The best song I have written is always the song that I am trying to write or have just cracked and finally realized—the thing continues to grow, takes on a life of its own and comes to teach you and learns alongside you—but the truly best song and moment is that wherein the thought becomes the thing.

If you could collaborate with any musician/band, living or dead, who would it be and why: JV: Hildegard von Bingen…for secret reasons. What would be your dream gig: JV: Keeping true to our carousel spirit of collaboration-lust and local lore, the dream gig I hold closest to my heart is a sorta Thunder Bay take on The Last Waltz by The Band. KS: Like a symposium of local bands and acts each joining us to work a tune of ours, everyone bringing a different flavour to the table in one massive showcase and celebration of collaboration and our region. What’s new: KS: We are in the laboratory stage with much of our catalogue, polishing, experimenting, writing, and plotting out some proper chats and arrangements. JV: It feels natural and a bit challenging, but in the most exciting of ways: raptured in discovery. We are also going to be working on a film score for a tasty dead-pan comedy dance flick my younger brother Jasper Vaillant has written and will be producing in Burnaby, B.C.

What is the best thing about being part of the TBay music scene: JV: There is a magnificent air of interconnectivity here. People are willing to take risks creatively and personally and even when artistic differences abound, the artists themselves champion one another and lift one another up with a titanic strength Beethovian vigour.

Contact: Facebook: facebook.com/jake.vaillant