In October of 1998, I got a job with a temp agency. They make you take a series of tests to find out what type of work they can assign you. You type, you screw bolts to blocks, and complete some timed puzzles. I really can’t remember. All I remember, was that I wasn’t cut out for office work (a subsequent assignment at Ugly Duckling proved this theory correct) and my first assignment was at a hotel.

I arrived early and ready to work and sitting in the lobby was a fellow temp-agency worker. He asked me if I played music and if I was in a band. I told him I play a little, drums and guitar, but I wasn’t that good. He told me that he was in a band called Jimmy Eat World. Having never heard of them I thought “yeah, everyone is in a band these days.”

We worked for a week together, unpacking old computers from their boxes and literally throwing them in a storage shed. This was the assignment. No joke. On the first day the guy took us over to this storage shed, opens a box, takes out the computer and chucks it at the back of the storage shed. He tells us it doesn’t matter how they get in there, they just need to fit.

Thursday comes around and my working buddy, Tom has a promo copy of his CD. We listen to it a few times and we talk about the recording process. They had just recorded it for Capitol Records and he was working to make a few extra bucks before they went out on tour. I remember him telling me that he wasn’t happy with Table For Glasses being the first track and how he thought the record should have opened with Lucky Denver Mint instead. He told me the label bought them a tour van (right there on the left side of the photo, actually). During one of our breaks, Tom and I jump off it into the massive piles of empty boxes and take a few pictures. He tells me to take this picture of him because one day he will be famous.

He was right. A few months later, Jimmy Eat World was on the soundtrack of a Drew Berrymore movie called “Never Been Kissed” and getting steady radio airplay.

I thought about running this photo through Instagram, but the years haven’t been kind to it enough as it is. Scanned as it is, this is a ratty and spotted photo of Tom from Jimmy Eat World in between recording and releasing Clarity.