Blue October

Tickets for this must-see concert go on-sale to the general public for all shows on June 5th. However, exclusive Pre-sale tickets for fans are made available via each of the four band’s websites on June 1st. The highly anticipated trek is currently scheduled to run through late-August, and includes shows in Dallas, Los Angeles and New York City.

Blue October released its new studio album Approaching Normal in March, the follow-up to the band’s 2006 platinum plus -certified Foiled. Produced by Steve Lillywhite (U2, Dave Matthews Band, Peter Gabriel) Approaching Normal is bracing and untrammeled, anguished and cathartic, brilliantly melodic with a variety of musical textures that bring together the bands trademark sound of rock guitars, violins and lyrical story telling.

The second single off of the album, ‘Say It’, is currently climbing the alt-rock charts and continues to build on the powerful strengths heard in the band’s albums and modern rock hits, “Hate Me” and “Into the Ocean”. Blue October is Justin Furstenfeld: vocals; CB Hudson III: guitars/vocals; Ryan Delahoussaye: violin/mandolin/piano/vocals; Matt Noveskey: bass/vocals; Jeremy Furstenfeld: drums/vocals.

Switchfoot is currently putting the finishing touches on its seventh studio album, Hello Hurricane. Produced by the band and Mike Elizondo {Eminem, Rilo Kiley, Fiona Apple), the album is by turns explosive and elegant, a transcendent work that finds Switchfoot exploring new musical textures. Founded in San Diego, CA in 1996, Switchfoot released three independent records before its breakthrough album, 2003’s The Beautiful Letdown, which was certified multi-Platinum. Each of the band’s subsequent studio albums – 2005’s Nothing Is Sound and 2006’s Oh! Gravity – debuted in the Top 20 of The Billboard 200 and elicited critical acclaim. Alternative Press hailed Oh! Gravity as a “sparkling, focused album bursting at the seams with giant hooks and even bigger ideas” while Spin praised it as “their liveliest yet, full of dive-bombing guitar fuzz, juicy arena-alt choruses.” The Best Yet, the band’s first-ever greatest hits collection, was released in November of 2008.

On June 27, 2009 Switchfoot will present the Fifth Annual Bro-Am, a surf contest and concert, in Encinitas, CA. The event will benefit StandUp For Kids, a national nonprofit volunteer outreach organization that began in San Diego and is dedicated to making a difference in the lives of at-risk, homeless, and street kids. Committed to dealing with vital issues on both local and global levels, Switchfoot has partnered with Habitat for Humanity, the ONE Campaign, To Write Love on Her Arms and numerous other charities. Switchfoot is Jon Foreman (guitar, vocals), Tim Foreman (bass), Chad Butler (drums), Jerome Fontamillas (keys, guitar) and Drew Shirley (guitar).

Crazy Makin Summer Tour Dates:

7/26 – Stir cove @ Harrah’s Casino – Council Bluffs, IW

7/27 – Fillmore Auditorium – Denver, CO

7/28 – The Great Salt Air – Magna UT

7/30 – Moore Theatre – Seattle, WA

7/31 – Crystal Ballroom – Portland, OR

8/1 – San Jose civic auditorium – sanjose, CA

8/5 – The Wiltern Theatre –Los Angeles, CA

8/6 – House of Blues – Las Vegas, NV

8/8 – Marquee Theatre- Tempe, AZ

8/9 – Abraham Chavez Theatre- El Paso, TX

8/13 – L’Auberge Du Lac Casino- Lake Charles, LA

8/14 – Verizon wireless Theatre- Houston, TX

8/15 – House of Blues- Dallas, TX

8/16 – House of Blues- Dallas, TX

8/20 – 4th Street Live- Louisville, KY

8/21 – The Masquerade- Atlanta, GA

8/22 – House of Blues- North Myrtle Beach, SC

8/23 – Rams Head Live! – Baltimore, MD

8/27 – House of Blues- Atlantic City, NJ

8/28 – Terminal 5- New York, NY

8/29 – Hampton Beach Casino Ballroom – Hampton Beach

Hi there, how are you?

Switchfoot has launched a video contest asking fans to create a music video for the track “This Is Home.” This song was featured on the 2008 movie soundtrack for “The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian”. One fan has already created a touching video about the troops reuniting with their families. Now Switchfoot wants to see what “This Is Home” means to you! Switchfoot will choose three top videos who will win signed “This is Home” lyrics plus autographed copies of The Best Yet CD.

The band has written a personal note with the details below.

Letter From Switchfoot:
Thank you for all the great comments so far on the new video for “This is Home”. When we wrote the song, we had always hoped that it would touch people in some way, and it seems that it has. One such person created their own version of the video and uploaded it to our YouTube group.

It really touched us, so much so that we hope it might inspire some of you to do the same. We want to see what “This Is Home” means to you. With the Holiday’s coming up, it seems very appropriate. So, create your own video, and upload to our This Is Home group channel. From all the entries, we’ll pick our three favorite, and those people will win signed “This is Home” lyrics plus autographed copies of The Best Yet CD. Be sure to get them in soon, the contest will end January 3, and we’ll pick the winners during that first week of January. We look forward to hearing from you!

Sincerely,
Switchfoot

US Tour Dates
12/09: Pikeville, KY @ Eastern Kentucky Expo Center
12/12: Charlotte, NC @ Cricket Arena
12/13: Hampton, VA @ Hampton Coliseum
12/17: Greensboro, NC @ Greensboro Coliseum Special Events
12/18: Fairfax, VA @ Patriot Center
12/20: Duluth, GA @ Gwinnett Arena

For all their achievements, including a half-dozen acclaimed albums (with global cumulative sales of more than 5 million) and more than twice that many signature chart singles and album tracks – Switchfoot has yet to release a ‘greatest hits’ anthology. For the first time, THE BEST YET pulls together Switchfoot’s history representing all six albums they recorded on the two principal labels of their career: the indie re:Think Records and Columbia, where their 2003 breakthrough broke the platinum barrier.

The 18-song collection THE BEST YET – featuring one newly-released song, “This Is Home” (from the summer 2008 movie soundtrack of Disney’s The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian) – will be available at all physical and digital retail outlets starting November 4th through Columbia/Legacy, a division of Sony, and Credential Recordings, a division of EMI Christian Music Group. The release of THE BEST YET follows (by two weeks) Switchfoot’s conclusion of the groundbreaking 23-city “Music Builds” Tour. A portion of the funds raised during the tour benefits Habitat for Humanity affiliates located in the tour cities.

In addition to “Dare You To Move” and “Meant To Live,” THE BEST YET also turns to The Beautiful Letdown for four other tracks: “This Is Your Life,” “On Fire,” “Twenty-Four,” and the title cut, “Beautiful Letdown.” At the Gospel Music Association (GMA) 2004 Dove Awards in Nashville, The Beautiful Letdown won for Rock/Contemporary Album of the Year, and “Meant to Live” won for Rock/Contempo¬rary Recorded Song of the Year. Across the country at the San Diego Music Awards, Switchfoot earned Best Pop Album and Album of the Year honors, as well as Song of the Year for “Dare You To Move.” (At the 2005 Dove Awards, “Dare You To Move” won Rock/Contempo¬rary Recorded Song of the Year and Short Form Music Video of the Year as the band also took Artist of the Year honors. In 2006, “Dare You To Move” made ASCAP’s Top 50 list of Most Performed Song of 2005.) The Beautiful Letdown was certified RIAA double-platinum in December 2004, and Switchfoot followed up less than a year later with the RIAA gold Nothing Is Sound, which debuted at #3 on the Billboard 200. In addition to the RIAA gold single “Stars” (which won Short Form Music Video of the Year at the 2006 Dove Awards), the album was the source for “Lonely Nation” and “The Shadow Proves The Sunshine.”

Switchfoot – Jon Foreman (vocals, guitar), his brother Tim Foreman (bass, backing vocals), Jerome Fontamillas (guitar, keys, backing vocals), Drew Shirley (guitar), and Chad Butler (drums) – has maintained a strong commitment to social and humanitarian causes ever since their ascendance into the rock pantheon. Since the band’s inception, they have been actively involved in such projects as DATA, Bono’s THE ONE Campaign, Invisible Children, Habitat for Humanity, and To Write Love on Her Arms. They also founded the Switchfoot Bro-Am, a surfing and music benefit-event. In conjunction with their new indie label, lowercase people records (formed in October 2007, after their departure from Columbia).

Although more than a dozen of the tracks on THE BEST YET are drawn from Switchfoot’s Columbia years – The Beautiful Letdown (2003), Nothing Is Sound (2005), and Oh! Gravity. (2006) – the collection also reflects the band’s earlier years. After playing only a handful of gigs around Southern California as Chin Up, the band was signed to Charlie Peacock’s new indie label, re:Think Records in 1997.

Renaming themselves Switchfoot (a surfing term), the band released their debut album in June 1997, The Legend Of Chin (with “Concrete Girl”). That year, they received an ASCAP Award and San Diego Music Award, both for Best New Artist. The industry began to take notice of Switchfoot with their second album for the re:Think label, 1999’s New Way To Be Human (“Only Hope,” “Company Car”). With New Way To Be Human, Switchfoot cracked the Billboard Heatseekers chart (at #31).

The next album, 2000’s Learning To Breathe (with “Learning to Breathe” and “Love Is the Movement”) again scaled the Heatseekers chart (#34). It received a Grammy Award nomination and at the San Diego Music Awards it won Best Pop Album and the band won Best Pop Artist. In 2001, Jon Foreman went on to win the Les Paul Horizon Award for the Most Promising Up-and-Coming Guitarist.

A giant break came in 2002, with A Walk To Remember, the high school love story starring Mandy Moore. The movie soundtrack featured four cuts by Switchfoot, including “You” (from The Legend Of Chin), “Only Hope,” “Learning to Breathe,” and a new song, “Dare You To Move.” In addition to Switchfoot’s original version of “Only Hope,” Mandy Moore recorded a version that she sang in the film.

Switchfoot was on the rise. Another San Diego Music Award, Best Adult Alternative Artist for 2002, and the exposure from the movie led to their signing later on in 2002 with Columbia. The Beautiful Letdown, their first major label album, was an instant pop sensation, riding into the Top 20 (#16) on the Billboard 200 chart. It took nearly a year, however, for Switchfoot to notch their first pop hit in 2004, “Meant To Live” (#18), which scored big on the Alternative and Top 40 charts and earned RIAA gold. A second Top 5 Alternative hit followed six months later, “Dare You To Move.”

The Beautiful Letdown was certified RIAA double-platinum in December 2004, and Switchfoot followed up less than a year later with the RIAA gold Nothing Is Sound, which debuted at #3 on the Billboard 200. In addition to the RIAA gold single “Stars,” the album was the source for “Lonely Nation” and “The Shadow Proves The Sunshine.”

Switchfoot’s final Columbia album was 2006’s Oh! Gravity. (with the title single, “Awakening” and “Dirty Second Hands”). The album rose to #1 at iTunes, #18 on the Billboard 200, and was named Album Of the Year at the San Diego Music Awards in 2007. Switchfoot’s legions of dedicated fans patiently await news of their band’s first independent new album on lowercase people records, expected in the spring 2009.

THE BEST YET by SWITCHFOOT (Columbia/Legacy 8869738346 2)
Selections: 1. Dare You To Move (D) • 2. Meant To Live (D) • 3. Stars (E) • 4. Oh! Gravity. (F) • 5. This Is Home (G) • 6. Learning to Breathe (C) • 7. Awakening (F) • 8. This Is Your Life (D) • 9. On Fire (D) • 10. Only Hope (B) • 11. Dirty Second Hands (F) • 12. Love Is the Movement (C) • 13. Company Car (B) • 14. Lonely Nation (E) • 15. The Shadow Proves The Sunshine (E) • 16. Concrete Girl (A) • 17. Twenty-Four (D) • 18. The Beautiful Letdown (D).

Album key:
A – from The Legend Of Chin (issued June 1997, as re:Think 51595)
B – from New Way To Be Human (issued March 1999, as re:Think 51688)
C – from Learning To Breathe (issued September 2000, as re:Think 51736)
D – from The Beautiful Letdown (issued February 2003, as RED Ink/Columbia 71083)
E – from Nothing Is Sound (issued September 2005, as Columbia 94581)
F – from Oh! Gravity. (issued December 2006, as Columbia 82880)
G – from The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian original soundtrack (issued June 2008, as Walt Disney Records D00074202)