Photo by Doron

When bands are on the road — entertaining unappreciative hipsters that double-fist cans of PBR, no less — things aren’t always pretty. Sometimes they’re downright scary. Maybe even horrific. Considering that the scariest holiday (no, not Housewife Day, Bittersweet Chocolate with Almonds Day or Marooned Without a Compass Day) is almost upon us, we decided to give you some of those frightening tales straight from the ghoulish, possessed horse’s mouth. Muahaha… maniacal laughing, you get the point.

The Shackeltons
Why did we play a crust punk house party in Baltimore? Why not? The show was in the smallest basement we have ever seen. As we played to the stoned and drunken eight music lovers (the other six chatted upstairs), I got into such a sweating way that I didn’t notice the ceiling fan located eight inches above my head. I jumped up and down, then rolled around on the ground as if to incite a crust punk aerobic revolution — and it worked. Crust punks were dancing as if Richard Simmons himself had landed on their pot-hazed planet. I got baptized with a can of beer by a generous stoner during this revival… this was a perfect pairing with the blood and hair that exploded out of my skull thanks to the darling ceiling fan.

Nathan Burke of The Out Circuit/Frodus
Refused broke up on tour with us (Frodus) in the fall of 1998, less than a week into a scheduled six-week tour. Needless to say, it screwed a lot of things up for us. We had made a ton of preparation for that tour, and they couldn’t have cared less. We pressed on, but it was a very hard tour. Then eight years later, they came out with a self-celebratory documentary about how epic it was and didn’t even mention us or all the other people they screwed because of their drama.

Look Mexico
We get a show at the legendary CBGB, a dream come true, and the death rattle of Ray (our first van) is louder than ever. Within forty miles of New York, we’re stopping every fifteen minutes to pour water in his radiator, twisting off the cap and running as it spews boiling water behind us. Finally, with an embarrassed cough, Ray stops running completely. We had three hours until the show, and so we call AAA to tow us all the way to the Manhattan club. It seemed like a good idea at the time, but we’d been huffing radiator fumes for two hours. The AAA operator tells us that only two dudes can fit in the tow truck, and the others need to get a cab. But we are real low on cash, having poured it all into repairs and gas, so we get some Hooter’s wings and get to planning. We decide that Matt and Tyson (our old bassist) will hide inside the van while Slate and I ride up front all the way to CBGB. The guys get inside the oven of a van and hide under all our sleeping bags. We crack a window for good measure. With the tow truck in sight, Matt jumps out, running into the Hooters bathroom. He had the runs. Slate, unflinching, takes his place. The tow guy gets there and pulls Ray up on his truck. We still had two hours. We were going to make it. Matt and I get in the cab as the tow guy sneers over his shoulder at Ray. “There’s no f**king way I’m driving this thing into New York,” he says. “It’s to g****mn heavy. I can take you to an all night garage. I think about telling him the guys are in the back before he adds, “as much as a wind gust could knock this whole rig right over, KABLAM!” We keep quiet, and the guy takes us to this shady garage where it takes four dudes four hours to figure out it was our faulty radiator cap causing the problem. The whole time Slate and Tyson are cramped in the back. As we drive off they come out from beneath the blankets looking wet from birth. At four o’clock in the morning we take the somber trek through New York rush hour. Needless to say we missed the show at CBGB. We toured in Ray nearly a year longer, with some couple thousand dollars in repairs. Finally in Rochester, N.Y., he bit the dust. We should have buried him under that condo complex with CBGB.

Droo of Quietdrive
On Aug. 18, 2006, we arrived in Detroit to party with some friends one day ahead of our show. We woke the next morning to an absent van and trailer, and soon found ourselves at the Detroit police station reporting that everything important to us had been stolen. Meanwhile, our manager was receiving countless phone calls from an informant attempting to extort $100,000 from us in exchange for the whereabouts of our vehicle. With the FBI, Detroit PD and state police helicopters hot on their trail, we were able to track down our thieves. Kirby posed as our “hot shot” manager, and using the false promise of lots of money managed to find out where approximately one third of the stolen goods were hidden. The rest (including our trailer) was never found… A truly spooky story indeed…

Thieves & Liars
On tour with Saosin in February, we encountered our first blizzard driving to Nevada from Utah. It was the most brutal white-out I’ve ever seen. When we pulled over to put our chains on, we discovered they were way too small for the huge new tires we got on our van. We had to glide back to the nearest town on ice to pay $120 for chains that fit! Thought we were gonna die the whole 45 minute drive back — three miles.

Luke Nicholas of Through Solace
Our first ever tour was hard on our wallets, financially. We lost track of things and somehow ran out of petrol in our van on one of the busiest motorways in the UK, outside Glasgow in Scotland. We had to run across the motorway, dodging cars, with our van stalled in the middle of the road and cars swerving around it. It was then a walk to the nearest station to get fuel. Although we managed not to die, we were taught a lesson about keeping our tank topped up!

Becoming the Archetype
We had two experiences of vans throwing rods through engine blocks while on the west coast (we’re from Georgia). So after spening $8,000 on a vehicle, driving to the west coast, having something go wrong about every other day — and spending a couple hundred bucks to fix it each time — the van decided Oregon was a great place to finally quit. That happened twice! So after being out the initial $8,000, plus another grand or two for repairs leading up to the ultimate breakdown (no pun intended, ha), we had to spend $2,000 on a crappy minivan to get us back home, which was worth about a grand to resell at home. So we’re out another grand and back at square one with vehicles, meaning another $8,000-$10,000 to get a new vehicle that’s supposedly “reliable.” I think that amounts to around $11,000 for not even one whole tour in a van. Horror? Nearly dissolved our band. Twice.

Derek Barber of Perhapsy
Two years ago, Nathan, Caleb and I were on tour and needed a place to stay on the way to a show in Arkansas (I believe). The exact location, however, matters very little, because we ended up staying in a log cabin in the middle of nowhere with a distant relative of Nathan’s — a man who told us he was staying in the cabin because he could no longer stand the mounting pressures of his job and family. That night, we walked outside the cabin. With the twilight growing ever nearer, a full moon appeared and yet the sky was the color of crimson — the perfect cover shot for a Stephen King novel. Although we suffered a few chills that night, the caretaker turned out to be a real sweetheart and even made us pancakes the following morning… But made of what? We may never know.

For Today
On Halloween of 2006, our new van’s transmission was slipping on the way to the show. We were only able to go 40 m.p.h. in a 75 m.p.h. zone on I-90 in North Dakota. Needless to say, with our hazard lights on, a pickup truck smashed into our trailer at full speed while not paying attention to the road. We watched as all of our equipment flew hundreds of feet past our van!! We spent the next several hours cleaning it all up and watching cars run over broken CD cases spread out for a mile.

Joshua of Look Mexico
At our show in Riverside, Calif., our newest member Dave and I were walking back from the van to the venue when we were approached by two Hispanic dudes with their shirts off — who looked real fire-cracker pissed off about something. There was a whole gaggle of their friends behind them yelling various obscenities. One of the guys asked, “What’s are you doing?!?!” And we were all, “Nothing.” And then they said, “Give us your monies.” And we said, “We don’t have any money.” Then they took my fancy new hat I really liked, and they said, “We’re going to kills you. Runs for your lice.” And so I started running like a little girl. I’ve seen 187 enough times to know what’s up. I should say Dave also ran like a little girl, but in all honesty I didn’t see him run. I was too freaking fast. They gave chase but there was a cop around the corner. I told the cop some Hispanic dudes stole my hat. He seemed real impressed.

Sheer Terror
In the early 90s, Sheer Terror, Murphys Law, and Vision played at a cleared-out old supermarket in a strip mall in Allentown, Pa. What was previously a great, fun venue was filled with several hundred flag-waving Nazi skinheads. Show turned into a full-on riot before the band ever went on. Cop cars were burned, anyone who wasn’t a Nazi got beaten badly. Bands escaped with the money (and the beer). This is recounted in full by various members of the band on Sheer Terror’s Beaten By The Fists Of God DVD.

The Goops/Guttermouth
In Texas, The Goops and Guttermouth were given shelter for the night in such a dilapidated house that the place shifted when everyone was inside. To make matters super fun, there was some sort of major oil pipeline burst in the area, and the sky in the near distance was on fire. Oh, and the toilet in this joint was in the kitchen, with no door. Awesome. (I slept in the van.)

Kalel (Michael Wittig) of Stars Go Dim/ex-Pillar
I have a recent story we just experienced with Stars Go Dim. We showed up at a venue called The Vault, and it ended up being a video store. They didn’t say it was The Vault Video. They had a stage inside this little video store. The promoter didn’t even show up… his friend did who was on something. Nobody showed up, but somehow we still sold $100 in merch. It was terrible.

The Showdown
There was this one time this dude on this one website posted a video making fun of my heavy metal tattoos, gave me nightmares about not ever being able to play with jazz trios in coffeeshops. it was terrifying.

Mercy Mercedes
Early in the morning, after driving all night from a show the night before, Mercy Mercedes was in the middle of the desert in New Mexico. It had been a long night of driving, and everyone except Tom and Nate were asleep. They were the chosen ones for the driving/co-pilot adventures for their shift, and lo and behold, there was trouble afoot. It was 7 a.m. We had just stopped off for coffee and and a snack to keep us awake. The road started to look chalkier and chalkier by the minute. As Nate started to slow down a bit to 35 m.p.h. to be safe, the back end of the van and trailer started to spin out from behind. There was nothing they could’ve done to stop the deathly horror that was about to happen. The van ended up spinning into a complete full circle twice before ending up in a ditch where everyone awoke in horror in the back of the van. There was coffee everywhere burning each of our faces and chests. Suffered no casualties, but it sure was scary.

Look Mexico
We just bought a new shuttle bus that we were driving to a show in Gainesville. After the show, we planned on driving to Tampa and leaving the new bus to get outfitted with a fancy veggie oil system, so we were following the bus in our old van endearingly named HUEY LEWIS. Huey blows a tire, and we’re stuck on the side of the road. We call AAA and move all our gear from Huey to the new bus. AAA gets there, and we hit the road. I should say at this point, new-used bus — using the modifier new in a way that one might say that a vintage shop has new clothing in stock or Carlos Mencia has a new stand-up routine. Forty-five miles out of Gainesville, we blow a back tire. It’s a dualee, so we can ride on the outside one, but if we get over 30 m.p.h., the remnants of the tire start flapping against the bottom of bus. It’s very loud. We turn on our hazards. After going about 30 miles like this, a cop pulls up in our rear-view and flashes his lights. We don’t have insurance — we don’t have a tag. He asks us what we were doing, peering inside at five very sweaty, shirtless, hairy vagabonds. We tell him we are in transit to get the proper papers. He takes another look at us. He tells us to drive safe.

Every Man For Himself
We were driving through the night in Iowa, in the middle of winter… we hit black ice and our trailer swung completely around, smashing both sides of our van… bending back further than it was made to. We finally came to a complete stop, but we were now turned around, facing the traffic that was speeding towards us on the freeway. Our tires couldn’t grip the pavement and we sat there as the speeding cars got closer… and closer! Needless to say, we got out in the nick of time, and no one was injured.

Caleb Winn of The Winston Jazz Routine
It was the same tour a week later when we were off it, and it was just State Bird and Discover America. They had apparently stopped at a gas station on their way back home, and while two members were in using the restroom, a car drove by and opened fire injuring two people in the gas station.

The stabbing I saw happen fifteen feet away from me: We had just pulled up to a kegger we were invited to in Denton, Texas, and I saw three guys huddled around some kid. I then saw one of these kids shove a knife into this guys abdomen and run off. The victim kind of stood there, turned white while blood started pouring out, then toppled to the ground while his friends kept yelling “this guy got stabbed!” Luckily there was a police officer there right away, because they’d been watching the party. We were pretty much in shock and got out of there before the cops could circle the place off.

Lovedrug
Once upon a time, our van, trailer and all our possessions were stolen from us. It was just after a gig in Detroit (shocker), and we were playing a show with Sparta. Papa Smurf told us that he’d watch over our van for us. What I think he really did was stir up some wicked juju magic and put a curse on us instead. After the show that night, we were at a Motel 6 (the shittiest motel ever) and we all went to sleep, spooning as usual. In the morning, I awoke first (as I usually do) and went outside to have my morning cigarette and coffee. I noticed that the van was gone. I walked up to the front desk to see if by chance they had towed us during the wee hours of the night. The answer, of course, was negative. Our van and trailer with all of our equipment and our personal belongings were now gone forever. The cops found our van four days later. It was on fire. Had been for some time apparently. The rat-faced bastards who stole it decided to torch the living shit out of it after they were through having their tra-la-las jacking off on the back seat and what have you. Here’s the fucked up part though — despite the van stealage, we didn’t miss a single show that whole tour. After filing the police report that morning, we rented a car and booked it to the next show. Sparta let us use all of their gear for the rest of that tour. They were sweethearts. Now they’re broken up sweethearts. But whatever. The moral of the story is a) fuck Detroit. b) never stay in a Motel 6. and of course C) get high and get laid.

Lee from Sky Eats Airplane
We spent the night at an old mansion just outside of Baltimore, that supposedly had a haunted dungeon basement. Driving from New York City to the haunted mansion after our show was a few hours, and the whole time the band Our Last Night, my bandmates and I were talking about how excited/scared we were and who was going to be brave enough to go downstairs. We hyped it up so much, but by the time we got there we were so tired. We just walked in and passed out. No cool haunted stories, but they did have a really cute and cuddly Labradoodle puppy that everyone was fascinated with. Talk about bad cases of ADD!

Steve Poponi of Up Up Down Down Left Right Left Right B A Start
We were on our first U.S. tour, and after driving about 12 hours through Kansas overnight we got to our venue. When we pulled up at about 3:00 p.m., there was a cop car out front. Perfect. More perfect was that it was a cop with a hook for a hand and he was shutting the show/venue down. Thanks Ft. Collins.

Believe me…I wish it was fake. I think a few weeks prior, we shared a sleeping space with a dog named “Uncle Scabies.” This is why we are no longer a band.

Kevin Allen of One Small Step For Landmines
In the-middle-of-nowhere Ohio, we stop at a ‘rest stop’ so I can figure out some bowel situations, and I realize the toilet is merely a hole in the ground. Seriously, just a hole. I let the business happen and come out of the restroom. As I walk by the series of payphones, one starts ringing. I pick it up, give a casual “hello,” and a voice on the other end asks me if i want to “get blown.” This is odd, so I look around and realize there is a guy in a house, looking out the window at me from across the street. I got scared, jumped in the van and drove off, never mentioning a thing to anyone.

Caleb Winn of The Winston Jazz Routine
Ok, the robbed one was when we were on tour last summer. I was actually playing with a band called The Winston Jazz Routine at the time. It was us, State Bird (who i’m with now) and Discover America. We were taking a nap at a house we were staying at in Kansas City, and Chris Staples of (Discover america) and Ryan Straits (bass player for State Bird at the time) were on the front porch with their laptops. Two teenagers approached them and asked about the house we were at, as there was a for rent sign up. When they could provide no information on the house, one of the kids pulled out a gun. At this time, Nathan Phillips and Ryan Weberling (both of The Winston Jazz Routine) were walking up on the situation. The gunman had everyone get on their knees and took their wallets and car keys. Chris begged them not to take his laptop, and for some reason they relented. The kids then ran off, and Nathan came in and woke me up with the story. The police soon showed up with shotguns at the ready but were unable to find the kids due to everyone in the neighborhood being unwilling to help. The sad thing is this: All the neighbors were on their porch watching but knew the kids, so they didn’t want to get them in trouble.

Wrench In The Works
We set out on a two-week tour to this year’s Cornerstone. By the fifth day, we had already replaced our transmission and fuel pump. To make matters worse, we’re driving through Minnesota in the middle of the night, surrounded by nothing but cornfields. All of a sudden our whole electrical system stops working — no head lights, no trailer lights, no interior lights. It was pitch black, and we couldn’t see anything. Luckily, we got pulled over and the cop helped us get to a Walmart safely, but that was definitely a scary night.

11 Responses to “Horror Stories From The Road”

1. On 10/29/08 10:51 PM, Jordan said:

   

   Funny thing is that Lovedrug played in Detroit tonight. I guess we’ll find out tomorrow if all their gear is gone again.

2. On 10/30/08 9:46 AM, Sean said:

   

   LOL @ the Showdown one.

3. On 10/30/08 9:56 AM, andy said:

   

   Too many van stories.

   The Frodus one was awesome though.

4. On 10/30/08 1:14 PM, kyle u said:

   

   phew, becomign the archetype had the most controversial horror story from any band on a christian label. instense.

5. On 10/30/08 1:17 PM, kyle u said:

   

   also i call bullshit on Sky Eats Airplane’s story. they just didn’t have the balls to go downstairs.

6. On 10/30/08 1:45 PM, Jay DiNitto said:

   

   LOL kyle.

7. On 10/30/08 2:58 PM, MikeyS said:

   

   I played the for today show that they missed. that day was kind of a bummer

8. On 10/30/08 6:10 PM, Jordan said:

   

   probably way more of a bummer than that time my band was suppose to open for everybody on Buzzgrinder’s favorite band (Family Force Five of course) and their tour bus broke down.

9. On 10/30/08 10:31 PM, Paul A Harper said:

   

   more Look Mexico stories.

10. On 10/30/08 10:33 PM, andy said:

    

    Haha my band opened for Family Force Five. The one guy told us it was the “first time in a long time that I’ve seen a real rock and roll show”.

    Damn right.

11. On 10/31/08 1:38 AM, kyle u said:

    

    haha jay, just trying to drag it out as loooong as possible

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