Who: Colin Munroe
Where: Toronto
What: one man pop band
Contact: Marked Music, Andrew Kennedy, akennedy@markedmusic.com, 416-669-6070,www.colinmunroe.com.

After working behind the scenes, writing and producing for such R&B and hip hop artists as Glenn Lewis, Divine Brown, Saukrates, Ray Robinson, and Brassmunk, this 26-year-old Toronto-based musician is finally pursuing a solo recording career. Playing every instrument, his self-produced debut album, Don’t Think Less Of Me, mixed by Mark Needham (The Killers, My Chemical Romance), is not what one would expect from a guy who has been an important peg in Canada’s urban music community. His songs are pure pop with lyrics that are insightful and thoughtful, sometimes polar to the upbeat sound. From the incongruously chirpy “World of Pain” to the whoa-oh groove of “Will I Stay” to the more wistful and melancholy “Divine” and pounding pop of “One Draw (You Had Me),” it’s not all smiles for Munroe lyrically. After volunteering at a hospice in Calcutta, India in 2004, he realized just how good the lifestyle is in the western world. “I saw a lot of that coming into the music, a frustration with the day to day lifestyle that can be so mind numbing in its comfort, in its luxury, so life sucking. And so there’s a lot of frustration within a lot of the lyrics about that,” he says.

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