Celebrating their 14^th Anniversary, Stomp Records put on an electrifying show at The Opera House on Saturday night (February 14th) featuring The Creepshow, The Snips and headliners, The Planet Smashers. For those of you who haven’t heard of The Planet Smashers shame on you – these guys are veterans in the industry having been around since the early 90’s and toured all over the world. Originating in Montreal, Quebec, this ska punk band consists of Matt Collyer (guitar/lead vocals), Neil “Lonestar” Johnson (saxophone), Andrew Lattoni (trombone), Dave Cooper (bass) and Fred Benton (drums) and together are the most-toured ska band in this country. I was lucky enough to catch Matt Collyer (who also happens to be the founder of Stomp Records) in between shows and we talked music, Stomp and how Planet Smashers came up with their unique name.

iheartthemusic: I wanted to start off by wishing you a happy anniversary!

Matt: Oh thank you that’s very nice! Yah it’s been 14 years and still going strong, so it’s been a good run.

iheartthemusic: So this anniversary kind of coincides with the band’s anniversary too, right?

Matt: It kind of does, I mean The Planet Smashers are more like 14-and-a-half right now – our real anniversary for is in October if you want to get technical.

iheartthemusic: How did you guys come up with the name for your band?

Matt: It’s a good story, basically we were stoned in October of whenever that was that we started the band, and really drunk and people were shooting names around and one guy, probably the drunkest, was talking gibberish and was like “oh, eh, spaceships and smashing planets” and we were like “oh that’s a great idea.” So that’s how it happened.

iheartthemusic: Well thank you drunken slang! You guys have had quite a few members come and go since the beginning, has this affected the band at all?

Matt: This is actually the longest running line-up we’ve ever had. It’s been like this for five years now. It’s been hardest to keep the horn players. Normally our horn players are professional, good musicians and they have other things that they want to do so they are the hardest to keep, I find. We’ve always had good turnouts though and we get along and everyone knows us. That’s what The Planet Smashers are: a good time band. We aren’t here to save the world or anything so as long as we keep that in mind everything is fine in smasher world.

iheartthemusic: So being someone who has never been to a Smasher show, what can I expect to get out of it?

Matt: Drink a lot of water because you are going to need it! You are going to be dehydrated and we’re just going to party and dance a lot. Enjoy it, have fun and it’s not a lot of moshing, it’s more dancing but there is a pit. It’s not like a punk rock show, people want to have fun, dance and get pretty loaded. It’s high-energy and we’re just going to try and play a fun set.

iheartthemusic: You’ve been fortunate to be able to be recognized internationally and toured all over the world. What has been your favourite moment while touring?

Matt: It’s hard to say because we’ve done a lot. If I had to choose between going to Moscow and going to Japan, I don’t think I could. It’s hard to judge which one was better because they are both so different. Concert wise we just played in Montreal and there were 22,000 people there. I was blown away, I was like this is ridiculous, so intense. That was the biggest show we had ever played and it was a real kick.

iheartthemusic: You’ve also been able to share the stage with some heavy hitters in the ska scene, any favourites?

Matt: Actually, a lot of our favourite bands that we’ve toured with are smaller and more unknown. In the world of ska I loved Mustard Plug who we toured with and who are such good guys. Back in the day we toured with The Flashlights who we played with a lot and were fun. There are lots of smaller bands that we also get a long with very well – Billy Talent, The Mighty Mighty Bosstones – tons of great bands.

iheartthemusic: Any crazy fan moments that you care to share with us?

Matt: There isn’t one that beats them all because every show is different; something hilarious happens all the time. Most recently, though, was last night there was this girl who had a crush on our trombone player and was pretty much chasing him around on stage. It was very funny because he was like “get off, I’m married leave me alone!” Stuff like that comes up all the time, I could go on forever.

iheartthemusic: Where do you see the whole state of ska music right now?

Matt: Ska is going to remain a subculture for another good 10 years or something so right now I would say it’s pretty healthy. There’s always a good support for it within the subculture, you know. There are tons of different takes on ska styles, like the whole reggae thing, similar to what One Night Band are doing, is definitely a little bit more,  I don’t know what you want to call it, it’s more marketable. Ska punk is definitely up and down right now. We’ll see more scenes of ’ska this’ and ’ska that’ over the years.

iheartthemusic: What does the future hold for The Planet Smashers?

Matt: Some more touring, we just started again so this is the first little bit we’ve done. We did Warped Tour last summer and there is always talk of what we are going to do next. We’re going to write some songs and discuss – if they suck we will throw them in the garbage can.

iheartthemusic: So after having now officially been to a smasher show, I have to say it was well worth it. The crowd was intense, but intense in a good way and everyone seemed to know the words to all the songs. Having been the only non-tattooed person at the venue, I definitely stuck out. As soon as they hit the stage I got lost in the shuffle and heavy dancing that accompanied each new song. Matt was right, water was definitely needed! I am now a true fan and will be sure to check them out when they hit up the T.dot again!

www.myspace.com/theplanetsmashers