Atlanta sludge doom trio, Zoroaster, are getting ready to release their second full album, Voice of Saturn, which will be the follow up to last year's highly praised Dog Magic, and which should hit around February 2009.
But that's really got nothing to do with the guest blog submitted to to us by bassist and vocalist Brent Anderson -- except that, in retrospect, both will surely be documents of chaos and adrenaline. Now, here's Brent:
In February, 2007, Zoroaster was in the middle of a 31-shows-in-31-days tour alongside Sour Vein in support of our (then) new album Dog Magic. It was our second time playing in Missoula, Montana. The show was really cool, but the club was on the basement floor of the venue, so an elevator was involved with the load in and load out.
[Guitarist] Will [Fiore] and [drummer] Dan [Scanlan] were loading the elevator and rolling the gear out to me at the bus where I was loading it into the bus. It was snowing at the time and was so cold that the gas was actually freezing in the bus so we had to keep it running at all times just to keep it warm.
As I'm putting a 2x15 Sunn cab into the back the bus suddenly starts down the street! I almost fall out onto the snow covered street and so does the cabinet. I start yelling, "What the f--k are
you doing?!" and before I know it, the bus stops at the first stop sign. I begin to walk up the side of
the vehicle, totally thinking that Dan or Will are “messing with me,” when, without warning, it takes off again! I grab the back door (which is swinging open) and “ski” behind the bus for a block or so, barely keeping the 2x15 cabinet from falling out til the next stop sign where the bus stops again.
At this point, I am completely pissed (and still thinking its Dan or Will behind the wheel because who else would be driving??).
At the stop sign, I walk up the side of the bus, hit the side and scream at the driver. But before I get to the front to see who the jokester is, it takes off again. I try to grab the door, but miss and a few more “choice words” fly from my mouth. By now, we’re a few blocks away from the club, so I start to walk back, still thinking Dan or Will are driving. The fact that someone is actually STEALING OUR BUS had still not registered in my head. It wasn't being driven haphazardly as if it was being stolen.
Then I see Sour Vein's merch guy Steve come out of the club running towards me and screaming
"Someone is stealing the bus!!”. I turn around and start running back down the street towards it and cannot believe what is happening. It is still stopping at every stop sign and staying well below the speed limit but is just far enough away that I can’t catch it.
While running full speed, I call 911. I am able to keep the bus in sight, but just barely. The 911 operator is asking for cross streets, but I can’t see the road signs and don't want to try because I don't want to lose the bus. I keep screaming that it’s “the only big black bus on the street!”
While all this is going on, Dan and Will are back at the cub thinking that they are getting messed with because they were inside while all of this started and had missed it (and me) taking off down the street. The operator insists that I stop and give her cross streets and as I do the bus drops out of sight.
Right then a cop rolls by, and by “rolls by”, I mean just that. I scream at him but I'm losing my voice at this point so he cruises on by. I give the operator the cross streets and begin to berate her with profanity because now the bus (and thief) have escaped! She cuts me off and says “Sir, they have recovered your bus,” and right as she says that, I see the bus on the other side of the river from me with three cop cars around it. I finally find a bridge to cross and by the time I get down there Dan is there (one of the cops gave him a ride…).
All of our gear was still in the back -- nothing fell out despite the fact that the door was wide open during the chase -- and the bus didn't have as much as a scratch on it. It turns out that an officer was pulling the bus over “because the back door was wide open” when the call came over the police radio. The guy who stole it was already in route to the pokey. The cops said he was “wasted drunk and didn't even realize that he had stolen a vehicle.” I actually hugged the male cops (as did Dan). We got in the bus and drove back to the club, where Will had stayed to watch the rest of our gear and finish loading out.
The whole scenario played out over about 30 minutes time. Someone had stolen our bus, taken it for a drunken joyride and we had it back in 30 minutes later without anything broken or missing (and we now had “The best tour story ever.”
We returned to Missoula this October for a gig and our first visit back to the city since the incident. Me and my band mates swung by the police department to drop off a thank-you plaque that we had custom-engraved for “Missoula’s finest.” I’m sure they’ve never gotten a plaque from a metal band before!
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