The Collectors' beginnings trace back to September 2002, when two Chicago area childhood friends, Michael Mazza and Tim Mix, decided to start jamming together again after many years. The duo recruited fellow Northern Illinois University alumni friends Dan Domanus and Chris Ness for casual Sunday afternoon acoustic jam sessions, mostly as an excuse to hang out and drink beer. The foursome focused primarily on performing acoustic covers of artists such as America, The Beatles and The Hollies and played a handful of open mics at local pubs.

In January 2003, Mazza and Mix decided to start writing original material and early on the duo made a decision to establish two separate entities in order to allow each to fully realize their respective creative visions. Mazza dubbed his original project Collectors. The duo met every weekend to flesh out the original material each had been working on and in March 2003 they purchased a 16 track recorder and began recording early demo versions of their songs. The first song written by Mazza under the Collectors moniker was "One More Day", inspired by his wife Cathy. "So Many Times", "Jane Doe" and "It's All Alright" soon followed.

Through friend Steve McFarlin, Mazza and Mix recruited Eric "Big Red" Prester on drums. In August 2003, the trio started jamming together weekly at Metro Studios rehearsal space in Chicago with new Collectors' songs written during this time period including "Brand New" and "Staring Into Space". In November 2003, the Collectors entered Mazza's basement studio to begin recording their debut DIY seven song EP titled "Reverberation". The sessions took place between November 2003 and March 2004 with time spent recording, producing, engineering and mixing totaling over 300 hours.

The band played their first show at Wise Fool’s Pub in Chicago in April ’04. Buoyed by their debut success, Collectors played Wise Fool’s again in June ‘04, this time on a Saturday night. Shortly after the show, Mix amicably left the band to focus exclusively on his solo project. Disappointed but by no means stymied by his departure, Mazza and Prester decided to continue on. Their steadfastness was rewarded shortly after Mix's departure, with two new members joining the band in July 2004 through ads in ChicagoGigs.com. Joe DeBord replaced Mix on bass and Rob Oliver joined the band on keyboards and backup vocals - replacing Mix, and adding a unique and critical live keyboard sound that up until that point had only been captured in the studio. Also in July, the Collectors' "It's All Alright" was featured on the Chicago based Hostage Radio program, a show devoted to the showcasing of local music.

The Collectors' influences are many and various, among them Blur, Superdrag, The Charlatans UK, Wilco, New Order, Spiritualized, The Beatles, Jellyfish, Splitsville, King's X and Cheap Trick. There is a common thread in all of The Collectors songs however, and that is catchy hooks and great melodies that keep the listener wanting more. The Collectors are currently playing live shows and writing new original material, with the goal of releasing another EP in 2005. New songs under development at the time of this writing include "Soon", "Now That You Know" and "Permanence".

www.thecollectorsband.com

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