Keep a look out for combinations of this gear turning up for sale wherever you may be, and tip the band off on their facebook page, I guess.

I don't know this band, but I think we all sympathize with anyone in this predicament.

https://www.facebook.com/pillageandplunder



The tour has been great until now. Someone broke into our trailer last night while we were sleeping and took everything except for one speaker cabinet. That was about $16,000 worth of equipment that we've saved up over the years. If anyone in Austin has any leads on this please please please let us know!!
This is a list of all the gear we are missing that we can account for:

- 1970 Ampeg SVT Head
- 1967 Red Rickenbacker Bass Guitar
- Ibanez Artcore Bass Guitar
- Ampeg Micro SVT Head
- Ampeg 2x10 speaker cabinet
- Orange Dual Terror Head
- Orange 2x12 speaker cabinet
- Red Airline 3PDLX Guitar
- Fender Deluxe Telecaster Guitar with Spalted Maple Top finish
- Red Gretsch Drum Kit: Snare, Bass, Rack, Floor, Cymbals
- Green Big Muff Bass Pedal
- Polytune Pedal
- Fuzz Factory Pedal
- Digitek Whammy Pedal
- Orange foot switch
- (2) ELXP112 speakers
- A&H Mixer Board
- Fender Acoustic/Electric Guitar
- Equipment/Hardware Cases
- 3 Tripod Mic Stands
- 2 Round Bass Mic Stands
- 2 Speaker Stands
- Cable Bag

Please share this status everyone! We are in the process of filing a police report and will be checking local pawn shops as well. We need all the help we can get.

Thank you,
P&P

You might want to tell them to contact Screaming Stone.

http://screamingstone.com/

The owner(s) should monitor Ebay...

I absolutely HATE thieves!

+1

that sucks they need to contact local pawn shops so they can be alerted to the stolen gear.

Thieves know you have expensive gear and they know the best times to get it. We had our rooms broken into, a few times, while we were on stage.

With vehicles, a cube van is more secure then a trailer, just be sure to not put any band logos, etc. on it.

Also, if you can avoid it, don't load out the night before. Do your load out the morning you are heading out and load in the moment you arrive. That way the gear is always either in the club or with you.

I hope these guys get their gear back. I know what's it's like to lose all your gear.

Part of why I keep a list of all my gear, and a folder with all my receipts. If anything gets stolen, I can easily print out a list, with serial #'s and descriptions, and I can prove where I originally bought the gear.

Making some kind of distinctive mark inside your gear can help, too - band logo, somebody's phone #, something that thieves won't think to look for right away. Anything you can do to 'fingerprint' your gear will help.

Yeah, having Fender, Vox & Marshall decals all over your vehicles is the equivalent of writing "Steal Me" on your gear.
Back in the day when broadcast video cameras cost $60,000+ each, I heard of a cameraman who had "Johnson Fish Byproduct Corporation-Demo Samples" stickers made & attached those to his video camera case, which he checked as baggage when flying to gigs. Never had a problem with theft.
I believe being low profile is the best protection. Don't let anybody know what you have.

They make alarm systems that will transmit from the trailer/van to your hotel room. The only sure way, is to take turns on guard duty and keep the trailer/van in sight...I really hope these guys get some of their stuff back as I hate thieves too. I also wonder if there might be insurance companies out there that would cover this kind of loss?

there is some kind of insurance, I think, if you register your band as a LLC... but then you might have to get the vehicle insured differently.

there's a company that makes small transmitter stickers that can be scanned and can be put into places on instruments and then registered in their database, which slightly increases odds fo recovery.

I had a bandmate once whose apartment was broken into and all his gear stolen. A month later a cop called him because it was all in a canal at the end of the street, where they'd probably ditched it immediately... some water damage, but he was able to get it all back in gigging shape. He had his name woodburned into spots on everything, but I doubt they even took the time to look. They probably drove a block away and decided it wasn't worth the trouble of trying to sell.

Thieves don't make much money on what they steal... but they haven't spent money acquiring it, so I guess they think anything is a gain. In Texas vans and trailers get stolen... like the entire band van and trailer... and then the contents and instruments are ditched somewhere in a field because the thieves thought it was construction crew equipment that they could sell more easily. Happens a lot from what my friends in Austin and Houston tell me.

Here they are:

http://www.micro-trax.com/microdots/

We were on a three month tour and had everything we owned in our cube van. All of our cloths, tvs, vcrs, movies, cassette tapes and other personal belongings along with our gear (Cerwin Vega mini earthquake PA system and monitors, 24 channel Hill studio mixing board, Full lighting system with controllers, stands and trusses, drum riser and backdrop, drum kit, multiple guitars, mics, stands, cables etc. etc. etc.....) For whatever reason, the truck started on fire. I burned my hand on the doghouse, trying to get at the fire to put it out. Our bass player was running down into the ditch and grabbing handfuls of snow to throw on the engine (It was winter so we had no source of water. Everything was frozen).

After it was evident that the fire was going to consume the truck, we moved to the back and started to unload everything onto the road. Within minutes we started to suffer from smoke inhalation and I recall the bass player had to stop to puke every few minutes.

After we finally emptied out the truck and thought at stuff was safe, we got into the Guitar player's car and watched the fire consuming the truck. Suddenly, the wind changed direction and blew the fire around to light the pile of stuff on the road. Everything we owned went up in flames while we sat and watched, helpless to do anything about it.

I contacted my insurance company and they agreed to cover my belongings under our home insurance (home insurance will often cover the contents of your vehicle as well). While it didn't help out my other band mates, I was at least able to replace some of my stuff.

I learned that day that, if you plan on having lots of very expensive equipment, it's well worth having insurance in some form or another.

Oh...on a much more related note, there was the time that our rooms were robbed while we were on stage (never leave anything expensive in your room. Thieves know that, while you are on stage, your rooms are empty and unguarded. They can often hear you playing, from the room, so know that there is no chance of you suddenly showing up. They can take their time and root through everything. As long as they can hear you playing, they know they are safe). When we found our rooms had been broken into, the club owner said there were a couple of guys who were "passing though", he agreed to "peek" into their room to see if it needed "cleaning". Sure enough, our stuff was in there. He locked up the door and called the cops. We got most of our stuff back (The bastards drank our bottle of run), but my cassette deck has had fingerprint dusting stuff on it ever since!

http://www.musicguard.co.uk/band-insurance.asp <---- something like this may help. There are companies (google on band insurance) out there that will insure bands for theft, loss, liability, etc. You'll need this if you go on tour in the UK. Hopefully there are some companies closer to home that offer insurance for the little guys at a decent price...sorry to hear those sad stories Astring...

I don't want to laugh but when they drank your bottle of rum, that was the last straw! Also, the fire on the side of the road reminds me of Trains, Planes and Automobiles...

It was the last straw! They could have kept my cassette deck; I wanted that rum! It was a nice bottle of Eclipse (Mount Gay) rum. Give it a try if you haven't had it before. Right from Barbados!

Yes, the truck fire was a bit like the scene from Trains, Planes and Automobiles. I only wish John Candy had been there; it would have made it a much easier pill to swallow.
"Everything we own is on fire!!!"
"Holy crap!!"
"Hey, is that John Candy!"

Loved that Hudson Bay 151 rum but can't find it anymore, will try the Eclipse one of these days...I love it when John Candy looks at the car on the side of the road after going between two semi's and says "oh, that'll buff right out"...

I know that helpless feeling. My buddy and I were watching his 58 Chevy sinking in the ocean at Daytona Beach...we bailed the guitars, amps, mic's etc. out of the trunk to higher ground before the tow truck arrived in the nick of time. The tide was coming in and the water was almost up to the windows...we were on the road for 4 months (California to BC to Montreal to Key West to Mexico back to our home in San Jose) and that was a very scary close call...

Was doing the Peppermint Lounge in New York (beside Johnny Maestro and The Crests) with Corky on drums way back before Mountain, parked a station wagon in front of a gypsy fortune-teller store-front for about an hour and when we got back to the car it had been broken into.

Fortunately they only took suitcases, left the instruments and amps - it was daylight/afternoon.

NY cops just laughed it off when we reported it - don't know if it was the fortune-teller guys but in any event there was no chance of recovery - we had insurance.

Did the gig anyways that night without clean underwear but at that age the stage was more important than our clothes.