James Collins (songwriter)
James Collins is a Canadian songwriter, actor and singer.
Life and career
Originally from Oshawa, Ontario, Collins moved to Toronto to pursue a film and music career. As a songwriter, Collins has co-written, with Vancouver-based songwriter Dave Pickell, over 20 Top 40 hits in Canada.
As a singer, Collins has had three Top 40 hits - "Do You Mind If We Talk About Bill", which peaked at Number 31 on the Canadian national BDS Hot Adult Contemporary chart and "Missing You at Christmas (That's All)", peaking at number 17 on the Canadian national BDS AC chart. Two years earlier, the original version of "Missing You at Christmas (That's All)" peaked Top 30, nationally. Collins' vulnerable, heart felt ballad, "Good Enough (To Love)" also peaked at number two on Quebec's provincial ADISQ Le Palmares Top 25 Pop Adult chart. "Good Enough (To Love)" sat at the number two position for four weeks, behind the hit "Bad Day" by Daniel Powter.
In 2003, he and Pickell co-wrote American Idol contestant Vanessa Olivarez's first single "The One", which reached number ten on the Nielsen SoundScan Canadian Singles Sales chart.[1] Soon after, Collins collaborated with American Idol Season 3 finalist Jon Peter Lewis on the song "It's Christmas." The song peaked at Number 13 on the national Pop Adult chart (BDS) and was featured on the Canadian gold selling Now Christmas 2. "It's Christmas" was also recently featured on a Christmas compilation released in Germany.
In 2006, Sony-BMG picked up Collins' Christmas song, "Missing You at Christmas (That's All)", as well as a Christmas song he wrote with Melissa Manchester, "My Christmas Song For You" and placed both tracks on their Platinum Christmas 3 compilation.
Collins scored a Number 1 SOCAN award (with Dave Pickell) for their tongue-in-cheek true story song, "Cyndi Lauper Said No." The song reached #1 on Quebec's Top 25 Pop/Rock chart for 5 weeks in 2009. It's the first time an indie reached Number 1 on this chart.
As an actor, Collins can be seen playing principal roles in TV series such as Falling Skies, The Listener, My Babysitter's a Vampire, Warehouse 13, "Covert Affairs," Copper, Flashpoint, Rookie Blue, Doc, Queer as Folk and This Is Wonderland. He also appears as Ralph, the town bully, in the Canadian feature film Lakefront and in the supporting role of Gary, the hotel manager, in Queen of the Zombie Punks. He played the farmer father character in Nickelback's worldwide number one rock video "Too Bad".
In 2013, along with Winnipeg born actor Jeff Wahl, Collins started the Canadian pop duo, Wahl Collins. Their first single is a cover of Helen Reddy's "Angie Baby".
References
- ↑ Paulsen, Wade (9 October 2003). "Vanessa Olivarez becomes third 'American Idol' finalist to reach Canadian Top 10". Reality TV World. Retrieved 10 August 2010.