Blue October – and my friend Tom T -2008

c.b.hudson iii

So 2007 ended with a smash concert and great auction (Tom Cochrane, Daniel Lanois, Jimmy Eppard) and the new year was in front of us.. time to find our next band! Somehow, I found Blue October – actually I think they found me on Myspace as did a lady who ran their Canadian Street Team. I listened to some of their music, liked it, liked what I read about the band, and saw that they were coming to Vancouver so sent out a request. I didn’t think I’d get an answer back; had to wait a few weeks (which is pretty quick actually), and because they were coming to town over a long weekend and I hadn’t heard yet, we made plans to go away. The answer came back – “yes of course we’d love to!” Suddenly I was stuck – I could not change my weekend plans; but I also didn’t want to say no to a band willing to help our charity project, so I desperately looked up their tour schedule and found that they would be in Portland as well. My friend Tom Tharp had helped me out previously when I was in a pinch with The Tragically Hip by doing a photo for me and emailing it. So I asked him if he’d be willing to help me out again with Blue October. He was more than willing.

my friend big Tom

I went on holiday, secure in the knowledge that things would work out fine and they did indeed. Tom ‘knew’ the manager at the venue in Portland from being there last time, and so showed up and was introduced to two band members – CB Hudson III and Jeremy Furstenfeld, and proceeded to take two very candid and fabulous shots of the guys and their comfort doll. He also convinced them to donate a pair of used, autographed drum sticks! Way to go Tom 🙂  I came home to find them in my inbox, and the autographed cards arrived a few weeks later in the post along with the sticks, and Tom opened another door for me – donated swag from the bands we worked with on the project – if they were willing to donate something.

I did not get a chance to meet either CB or Jeremy but it didn’t matter – the photos were fabulous, the fans bid on them and we raised $75 dollars in our 5th Auction (january 08) which I sent to Icross Canada (later that year – Nov 08 combined with proceeds from Aaron Pritchett’s auction)  in appreciation of them allowing us to use their Comfort Doll idea for our own charity project.

Jeremy Furstenfeld