I really have a deep mistrust for people anymore. I just had all my drum hardware and cymbals/stands stolen from me…..AGAIN! How many times does this have to happen to me? Both times that it happened I started out with 7 cymbals and ended up with nothing. This time I had beautiful cymbals…I loved them, they included: Paiste Dark 13" hi-hats ($350) MCS 16" ($50 cheap replacement) Paiste sound formula 10" Splash, Istanbul 17", Istanbul 20" I actually did get this one back! MCS 18", and a Paiste 14". All Sonor and Gibralter hardware. Why would anyone steal Sonor hardware?!?!? It ONLY fits Sonor drums morons! This stuff was at my old bassists house and I’ve been going over there for a while getting gear back (I have quite a bit of gear) and I went back there like three days ago maybe and he started yelling at me when he saw me taking cymbals from their set. First off, they are my cymbals, he had like 6 or 7 friends there and they were all over me too. No one touched me, I kind of owned the scene, of course I had my new ex-Navy bassist with me too. No one really wanted to start anything. The guy was telling me that I’ve had all my stuff at his house for 2 years and I expect to come over and get all of it back intact. Uh…..yeah. "I at least let you come over and get your amps and guitars and sh*t." At least!? uh, my Shure mic was smashed…my cables are gone, my Laney 412 now has 4 blown 12’s because of him, cymbals were broken, then stolen…and no sorry, more importantly…no compensation.

Is there anything legal wise I could do here? His mom is really nice and said she would buy me new speakers, but that was said about a year ago. There is no way I can rebuild and rebuild time and time again. I’m way sick of this. What insanely stupid thing did I do to get this kind of Karma? Trust? Must have been trusting people. Bad thing is, we cant have any practices until I get things rebuilt. People blow…..AND, he gets to go to the college that I wanted to go to on top of it all. Hes moving to Nashville and going to Bellmont (really good, $10,000 per semester music school). I have no clue how he’ll afford it, I’ve looked into it, they dont give Gov. funds as far they told me because it’s private. It’s a Christian College too, so you have to take a lot of Bible history classes and stuff I was sure I would fail. Why does he get to steal my stuff AND go to the college I told him about and get away with it? I dont get anything out of it….except for spending tons of money, when he gets a free ride! Is blowing him up illegal at this point?

RJ