To Follow A Band Around the World...

In case of an emergency, the first place to look for Jaime Wojdowski would be at the front of a line to a Tegan and Sara concert.

On Saturday, March 27, 2010, Wojdowski lined up early in Royal Oaks, Mich. to see indie rock band Tegan and Sara perform live for the 81st time. Most fans that follow their favourite bands on tour are not necessarily “famous” in their own right- Wojdowski however, found a way to become well-known for doing just that. Wojdowski videotapes every concert she attends and uploads the content onto YouTube so that Tegan and Sara fans worldwide can experience the concerts as if they were there themselves.

“I sometimes wonder where my life would be now without that...” said Wojdowski, 29, of her past girlfriend dragging her to her first Tegan and Sara show in November 2004. Wojdowski immediately became “hooked” and wanted to see them again as soon as possible “Tomorrow, can we do that? How can we make that happen? Oh they’re playing in Philadelphia in three days? Cool, we’re going to Pittsburgh.”

When Wojdowski broke up with her girlfriend, she took the settlement check she received from the house they bought, and financed her first drastic trip to participate in a Tegan and Sara music video filming in Vancouver. After having travelled that far to see them, distances didn’t seem as challenging.

“Once you fly across the country to go be in a music video by yourself and not knowing anybody- two weeks before you’re supposed to take the bar exam [test to practice law] - like the bar is set pretty high on what’s called crazy, and after that you’re just like ‘Well that’s nothing I can drive to New York. It’s like four hours away, and it’s a Saturday what’s hard about that?’”

Now, six years later, Wojdowski has travelled to Scotland, the United Kingdom, Canada, and all over the United States to see Tegan and Sara perform. Next, she hopes to follow their tour to Australia in May, “I feel like this is the ultimate leap of insanity, after this there’s no higher bar and I’m not really sure what I’m gonna do to challenge myself because that’s pretty damn crazy.”

Wojdowski admits that her family worries that she makes irresponsible decisions about what she is doing with her life, though she is determined to make her current lifestyle work for as long as she can.

What separates Tegan and Sara’s performances from being the same song night after night, is their onstage persona, “It was just so captivating, I think any fan could tell you that. It’s just so easy to draw you in...Their music is great, but their live shows- each one is special for a different reason.” Wojdowski began by filming 5-7 minutes of the humorous banter Tegan and Sara have become known for, and now records the concerts almost in their entirety.

She gradually became an Internet success and directly, or indirectly, contributed to the success Tegan and Sara have seen as well, “The impact that I’ve been able to have on Tegan and Sara’s career itself... the massive exposure that they’ve gotten through what I have... God it’s a lot of free publicity for them... I feel kind of like in some ways like a proud parent somehow, like I’ve helped them in some way to get where they are.”

Wojdowski’s YouTube account, “Wojo4hitz” has had 3, 334, 720 total upload views since joining YouTube in December 2006, and has had her videos featured on numerous blogs including Stereogum, Yahoo Music, and Chart Attack.

Wojdowski has become such a valued part of the Tegan and Sara experience, that fans around the world have contributed to help Jaime continue: people have let her stay at their homes, a fan in Australia offered to pay for her concert ticket, and when she fell asleep in an airport and missed her flight, fans sent her enough money to pay for another ticket.

“I want to thank you for making me feel like I have been to a million concerts before I even got to my first one,” wrote a fan on Wojdowski’s YouTube account.

After having been the valedictorian of both her high school and college classes, Wojdowski found that upon graduating, it was hard to find the approval and attention she thrived on. She feels that following Tegan and Sara, and building a video archive of their concerts gives her a role and a purpose.

“I’m doing something that matters to people, that’s really hard to find I think once you get out of college... I wanted to be a lawyer because I saw that as a way of having the biggest impact... but maybe that’s not the way I’ll be able to do it.”

How do Tegan and Sara feel about these fans that follow them to show after show each night? In an interview in Ottawa, on January 23, 2010, Sara referenced the travellers as being similar to seeing friends in the audience.

“We’ve been seeing these guys for years... you see these same people and there’s something about them that anchors you at every show,” said Quin, “They sort of represent where you’ve been and the past and the loyalty and the support.”

After following Tegan and Sara around the world for so long, Wojdowski can’t imagine being put back to work in an office, “I feel like when your world gets bigger, you’re not happy going back to it being littler.” She’s hopeful that what she is doing now will be beneficial in the long run, although she knows that she could be one of the many that “crash and burn,” and don’t get anywhere.

“It’s kind of funny like the whole line in ‘Someday’ where Tegan’s like ‘I don’t wanna know what I’d be without you’ I’m like, yeah, kinda, in some way, I’m not too sure,” said Wojdowski, “ I’d go back to trying to figure out how to have an impact on something- something else I guess.”

By: Brittany Morgan

Source: http://britt49.blogspot.com/2010/08/to-follow-band-around-world.html