Glamour Puss Blues Band bassist dead at 66 | CBC News

He would have turned 67 next month. 

Bandmate Travis Furlong said Boudreau discovered a lump about six weeks ago, which turned out to be an aggressive form of cancer.

“By the time they found out what it was, he only had days left,” said Furlong. 

“So it’s been pretty tragic and sad.”

Furlong described Boudreau as “passionate” about music, strongly opinionated but also a “sweet man.”

Band opened for BB King, won 3 ECMAs

Boudreau played in a number of bands before becoming one of the founding members of the Glamour Puss Blues Band.

While bassist for the band, they won three ECMAs for best Blues recording.

Their first self-titled album was released in 1997.

The band recorded four more, ending in 2005 with “Bluesman’s Prayer” an album recorded in a church in Upper Cape near Port Elgin.

Glamour Puss would go on to open for Blues legends like BB King and they provided the soundtrack behind Tourism NB commercials in the early 2000s.

Furlong said the band was active for 21 years, touring for 13 of those years, and playing their last show at the Harvest Music Festival in Fredericton in 2016.

Nine lives

He said he remembers his friend’s work ethic and ability to go on with the show, no matter what the circumstance. 

“We were playing [Nice, France] and we were inside the club on the dock and stuff…and he was electrocuted at the gig,” said Furlong. 

“We picked him up. We put him on a bench and revived him and we did the gig. He just was unstoppable.”

Furlong also remembers an incident where Boudreau fell off the stage, hurt his knee to the extent he was in pain for a year, but continued with the show.

‘Hearts and minds’

He said he was able to speak with Boudreau Friday before he died.

“I said, ‘you’re never going to be gone,'” said Furlong. 

“‘You recorded music that will last forever, and there’s always going to be fans of it somewhere … You’re always going to be in people’s hearts and minds.'”