‘Heart dropping to realize’: Band heartbroken after trailer with instruments & gear stolen while on tour

By Carly Haynes

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    RALEIGH, North Carolina (WRAL) — A Raleigh band is out thousands of dollars Thursday after they said their equipment was stolen while touring out of state earlier this week.

Harvey Street band members said they had parked at a hotel in Denver on Sunday. When they got up the next morning, their gear was gone. Band members said security footage from the hotel showed someone unhitching the trailer around 5 a.m. Monday then driving away with it.

“It kind of just hit me that this thing is gone,” said Ran Albright, lead singer and guitarist for the band. “It was just heart dropping to realize.”

According to the band, some of the instruments that were stolen were from childhood.

“Every piece of equipment, instrument, string, strap, was all in that trailer,” Albright said.

The band started four years ago while members were attending North Carolina State University.

“We started playing shows at fraternities for no money and sometimes no people and it was still a blast,” keyboarder Erich Kronschnabel said. “Now we’re lucky enough to play shows for a lot of people in cool spots. Music is awesome and we’re so lucky to be able to do it.”

Albright said two of the original members left the band after they got married, and new members joined about 10 months ago.

“January is when we started touring. A lot of this was weekend warrior stuff because some people were working, have their responsibilities [and] some people were finishing up school,” he said.

The band said the suspects stole $27,141.11 worth of instruments and equipment.

“It’s hard to sleep at night when you’re down $27,000. You’re just like, ‘How am I going to make this back? What am I going to do?’” Kronschnabel said.

Kronschnabel said the real loss comes not from the money, but the memories made with their instruments.

“We still have our fingers and our musical skills, so the money can be made back eventually, but those instruments can never come back,” he said. “That’s the sad part of all of this.”

The band said while they’re down, they’re not out and plan on performing tomorrow in Wrightsville Beach.

Kronschnabel said he is using a broken keyboard and other band members are using “suboptimal instruments” they don’t bring on the road and instruments others loaned to them.

“It’s going to be kind of hard to get things together, but we’ve made enough friends in music that have been generous enough to reach out and offer all of these different things.”

A GoFundMe has already raised more than $19,000 to help the band purchase new equipment. They hope to use that new gear when they perform at the Lincoln Theater in downtown Raleigh on September 12, which will be the first time they perform in the area since April.

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