Collin Hegna is a Portland, Oregon-based musician, composer, and recording engineer. Hegna founded the Spaghetti Western-themed indie rock combo Federale and remains their principal songwriter. In addition, he has played bass with The Brian Jonestown Massacre since 2004.
As co-owner of SE Portland's Revolver Studios, Hegna has produced releases from Joel Gion, Matthew J. Tow, and David J. He has also served as engineer for artists and events ranging from acclaimed neo-psychedelia acts The Quarter After and The Richmond Sluts to exurban roots festival Pickathon.
His songs, both with and without instrumentation by Federale, have appeared on a variety of film and television soundtracks including The Bad Batch, The Lego Movie, and Breakthrough. He oversaw the music for the Emmy-nominated Super Bowl commercial "Halftime in America".
Early life
The native Oregonian spent much of his youth outdoors around the state's varied natural environments – the high desert, trout creeks, his grandfather's farm – and has said that upbringing helped instill an appreciation for the romanticism of the west. As a teenager, Hegna attended Beaverton High School, where he played bass in the jazz band. His father, Gailen Hegna, has owned and operated Rainbow Recording Studio for more than 30 years.
Gailen served as mixer and engineer on recordings for a variety of Portland-area acts including jazz bassist David Jay White, Christian metallers Godspeed, Susan and the Surftones, and 90s Caleb Klauder/Jenny Conlee band Calobo. He also provided additional engineering on the third album (The Blood Flowed Like Wine) of Collin's band Federale.
From 1996 to 2001, Hegna attended the University of Oregon's School of Music and Dance. His studies included Electronic Composition within the Future Music Oregon program, and he graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Music Technology.
While still attending school, Hegna began playing bass for Cocaine Unicorn, a tambourine-spiked retro-chic combo formed by singer/songwriter Paul Burkhart whose membership included Carl Werner, Dasa Kalstrom, and Ryan Sumner. Willamette Week described their sound as "swagger-heavy Anglophile pop … ready to ride the garage wave straight to the Strokes' sex, drugs and rock-'n'-roll after-party."
After two years in Eugene, during which Burkhart complained the act was labeled "a fashion band", they relocated to Portland and attracted strong local buzz, though intra-band strife would eventually end the group before they could record a proper album. The Pains of Being Pure at Heart founder Kip Berman was a friend of Burkhart's and wrote the song "Hey Paul", off of their self-titled debut album, as an "homage" to Cocaine Unicorn.
Brian Jonestown Massacre
Since 2004, Hegna has played bass for critically acclaimed psych-rock act the Brian Jonestown Massacre. The band, which gained an unexpected mainstream notoriety following the release of Sundance-Grand-Jury-award-winning documentary Dig, endured regular changes of membership under the volatile leadership of founding singer-songwriter Anton Newcombe.
Following the resignation of his band's drummer and bassist, Newcombe posted a note on then-popular social media site Friendster seeking replacements. Cocaine Unicorn drummer Ryan Sumner responded volunteering himself and Hegna for the positions, and the pair drove to Los Angeles for auditions. Though the original drummer ended up returning, Hegna soon became an integral member of their rotating "rogues' gallery of past lineups and psychedelic standard-bearers".
He would accompany the band across the globe and play a key role in their performances. Even at the height of BJM extravagance, when their live sets swelled to include four or five guitars, critics praised "Hegna's tight rhythm work" as an indispensable grounding element. Once the group scaled back their touring personnel, Hegna's presence served as an increasingly important component as the line-up became, in Newcombe's words, "much cleaner and defined".
Nevertheless, though he has longest continuous tenure with the band of any current BJM member, performances remains fraught with tension. On-stage strife between Newcombe and Hegna nearly ended a June 2018 concert in Brisbane Australia.