A very unpleasant situation :(

[electracoyote]

+1 to everyone saying his lack of desire to play out and his apparent health and wellness issues make him a liability. The needs of the other members must also be taken into account. If you have 4-5 people who want to gig, and 1 who can't/won't, it's a simple crossroads parting of the ways. Remain friends, no hard feelings, but you're going a different direction.

 

[Evil Undead]

+ A Billion! I dont understand this myself. Why form a band with the intentions of gigging but have members who are not interested in playing gigs?

This is one of the first things you should do when forming,auditioning or trying out someone for a band. Find out their commitment to practice and gigs from the start. This person has no interest and is holding you back so let them go..simple.

The band was originally formed as just a few folks having a jam - this is the first venture in to this sort of thing for all of us, so there wasn't really any plan to gig at first. It's just something we want to do now that we've been together for a year and are evolving and enjoying it.

Yes. Figure what is going on in your first paragraph. Sounds very serious. Worry about THE INDIVIDUAL FIRST. Then think about the band. Do to others as you'd want done to you.

It does sound pretty serious, and we have been worried about him, but as I mentioned above, he's been very vague about everything.

We've tried contacting him as mates and as bandmates but some messages he doesn't even bother replying to.

Can't just hang around forever waiting for him to get better/decide what he wants.

IME, while he may truly be ill, not contacting you for three months and the level of anger in replying to your message remind me of people who I have personal experience with that have become heavily involved with drugs.

The part where you describe him as being unable to get through one song without getting tired is, to me, a serious sign of the addiction.

When you try to pin them down as to what is happening, they are vague. While they believe they have everything under control, it is they who are totally out of control.

What's happening in is non-band life? His he still working? Relationship gone bad? Any other big changes in his life? I mean, if he's still function with other parts of his life, then his retreat from the band is something other than what he says it is, IME.

Then again, I could be wrong. Hope he gets well.

Sorry to hear that your band mate didn't work out.

I'm pretty sure he's not got any sort of drug or alcohol problem, but after being in a band with him for a year I still don't know him that well (not through lack of trying, he just hasn't seemed interested in being friends)

I'll also add that you could tell him (if you want to) that the door is open for him to jam with you guys when he's available and that if he wanted to show up at a gig he would be welcome to join you on stage and step in for your drummer on a song or 2. Hopefully his illness isnt serious.

I think after the message he sent us this morning, leaving the door open for him to jam with us is off the cards totally!

 

[Thunderthumbs73]

As a cancer survivor, and band member, I appreciated the other members of the band inquiring about and caring about my situation, even to the extent that although they didn't have to, they offered to hold the spot in the band for me if I needed/wanted to stop playing. I don't think that was lip service. Such a concession, if the individual is fighting something serious, could mean the huge difference between a mindset that says "I'm fighting and I've things worth fighting for and things to look forward to", and "oh great, I have to deal with X and now the band is giving up on me too???".

Seriously, until you and the rest of the band know exactly what is going on with this person, think REAL hard about making any decisions. You want to play some gigs. Yay. The band member may be wondering if he'll live. The band member you are speaking of may have some life-threatening illness, and will clearly need your friendship and support, and even an outlet that may all this individual to live just a little and forget his/her serious troubles for a while.

 

[Evil Undead]

+1 to everyone saying his lack of desire to play out and his apparent health and wellness issues make him a liability. The needs of the other members must also be taken into account. If you have 4-5 people who want to gig, and 1 who can't/won't, it's a simple crossroads parting of the ways. Remain friends, no hard feelings, but you're going a different direction.

Yeah, that's what we all wanted. And even though we thought about it long and hard and talked about it many times, he has jumped to the conclusion that we have replaced him as fast as possible cos he was ill. Which just isn't the case. It was a really tough decision.

We all wanted to stay friends with him, and have him come to sit in on our practices on the odd occasion etc, but he's gone off on one and deleted us from his Facebook friends list, called us colourful names, etc... it really is a shame that he couldn't understand why we all needed to move forward.

 

[Evil Undead]

Seriously, until you and the rest of the band know exactly what is going on with this person, think REAL hard about making any decisions. You want to play some gigs. Yay. The band member may be wondering if he'll live. The band member you are speaking of may have some life-threatening illness, and will clearly need your friendship and support, and even an outlet that may all this individual to live just a little and forget his/her serious troubles for a while.

I totally know where you're coming from on this, trust me. But as I've mentioned, we have tried and tried to talk to him about what's going on, tried to offer our friendship, ask how things are going etc. But the responses have been minimal, and the ones that we have received have been extremely vague. He's not given a single thing away.

If we knew more about what was going on with him, we would be in a completely different position. We've sent him messages asking if he's coming back, no response. He's not made any attempt to keep in contact with us about the band, or as a friend.

Whatever he's going through right now really sucks, but not being his friends, what choice did we have? Could be hanging around forever waiting and not knowing a thing. And then IF he did come back, and still didn't want to move forward with the band, then what? We carry on and be unhappy ourselves?

 

[Thunderthumbs73]

I totally know where you're coming from on this, trust me. But as I've mentioned, we have tried and tried to talk to him about what's going on, tried to offer our friendship, ask how things are going etc. But the responses have been minimal, and the ones that we have received have been extremely vague. He's not given a single thing away.

If we knew more about what was going on with him, we would be in a completely different position. We've sent him messages asking if he's coming back, no response. He's not made any attempt to keep in contact with us about the band, or as a friend.

Whatever he's going through right now really sucks, but not being his friends, what choice did we have? Could be hanging around forever waiting and not knowing a thing. And then IF he did come back, and still didn't want to move forward with the band, then what? We carry on and be unhappy ourselves?

It's cool. I hear you. It does take two to tango. If he's not taking any reasonable to communicate whatsoever, then, you're doing the best you can do with the best information you have.

 

[Randall]

Your old drummer should have bailed as soon as he found out you guys want to play gigs and he did not want to. I know I would have let you guys off the hook if we did not have the same goals. Plenty of jam bands around who only play for fun anyway.

 

[KrisH]

. . . he responded calling us very colourful names and laying it on thick trying to make us feel extremely guilty, when in fact we've only done what anyone else would do - we got on with it!

Oh... and he's also deleted us all as friends on Facebook which is a bit petty from a man in his thirties I thought...

Hey, I think I've worked with this guy before! Oh wait . . . my guy was in his late 40s.

Relax. No guilt. Move on.