and the show went great, Niespodziani tells me in an interview. However, the fun and excitement were cut short after their trailer containing thousands of dollars worth of instruments was stolen outside their hotel overnight.
As common as instruments getting stolen, Niespodziani and his bandmates took necessary precautions to ensure their belongings were properly stored and protected, but it was to no avail. "We were playing a concert in Houston, that was a fundraiser for a cancer research charity," Niespodziani explained. "And we're looking at the schedule, like ‘how do we make this show still happen?’ You know, we don't want to disappoint all these people and be a drag on the charity." in Houston.
Beebe noted how common it is for instruments to be stolen from musicians due to how hard they are to recover and lucrative a crime it is for thieves. "I have a friend who had a guitar stolen out of his car here in Houston, and he reported it to the police, and it showed up in a pawn shop, and he got it back," he continued. "So you can get it back, but if you don't have any sort of way to identify your gear other than ‘it’s a fender strat,' then you're gonna be out of luck." Carjacking and vehicle theft have reached epidemic levels in some parts of the U.S., rising by 24% in seven large cities from 2019 to 2022.