Thursday, September 3, 2009
Hot Goss / Wow Local Rocker Ben Harper Robbed
Posted by Ashley Spurgeon on Thu, Sep 3, 2009 at 10:00 AM
Local musician and excellent fellow Ben Harper found himself on the bad side of a break-in last night and lost pretty much every instrument and electronic recording device he owned.
Ugh.
The silver lining, if you're looking, is that being an excellent fellow tends to gather a lot of friends who are happy to do you a solid in your time of need. Local drummer Sam Smith (another great guy) has already set up a fund to help Ben cover the cost of his loss.
Be a good person and keep an eye out for his gear (list after the jump). And buy the man a drink if you see him out.
His Facebook note:
Well friends, as many of you already know, my house was broken into tonight. It was within a 2 hour window of time between 8pm and 10pm. They took most of my music gear/instruments as well as a bunch of my roommate's instruments. They came in through my window. I foolishly did not have renter's insurance, so unless it's recovered...I'm pretty screwed.Here are some of the things that were taken:
-My Gibson SG custom: This is a guitar that I've had since 1996. I saw it and fell in love with it. I saved up for a long time as a kid to buy this thing and I've never seen another one like it since. it was a 3-pickup custom. Burgundy with a white pick gaurd and gold hardware. it also had a volume knob missing.
-My Takamine electric/acoustic guitar: I've had this guitar since I was a sophomore in highschool. I loved the way this thing sounded. it was also a burgundy color and had some scars on it's face.
-My Roland 18 track digital studio: I'd wanted a big multi-track machine for a looong time so I could have something with which I could really explore my ideas. I finally got it a year or so ago...but now I'm back to square one. I had just had Sam come over and record some drum tracks for some new demos....arggghh! a Roland VS-1824CD.
-assorted mics
-My friend's Taylor acoustic, which I asked him to bring when we worked on some songs the other day. He accidentally left it here...and now it's gone!
-my Sony studio monitor headphones
-My roommate's 79 SG that he'd just gotten, his Strat and some other instruments of his.
If you see any of these out at pawn shops or anything please call me...don't notify the pawn shop!
There may be more...I haven't had a chance to sort and clean up yet.
So as of now, I have zero guitars. They took them all. and no more recording machine. =(
Thanks for caring everyone. I'm hoping and praying that I can at least get my SG custom back.
I'm glad my sweet cheesy kitty didn't run out the back door (which was left open)
Conan was hiding under the bed and came out when I came home.
I'll try to keep you posted.
-Ben
Comments (6)
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Does Ben still live in West Nashville? Hopefully he filed a police report so he can get the gear back if it ends up in the Charlotte pawn shops or on craigslist.
Renters insurance is not expensive, please get it if you don't have it.
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I'm sorry for your misfortune.
Seriously, I pay $5.50 every month for renter's insurance. That covers up to $20,000 of my stuff, which includes an upright bass that I myself could not afford to replace. Another perk is that since I get the insurance through the same company that does my car insurance, I get a discount. If you are a musician, DO IT.
You can also help support Ben by going to his site http://thecomfies.com/ and entering a sum for the 'pay what you want' download of his new EP.
I hope he recovers his stuff...
Man... I hate to hear this happen to anyone. A friend of my mine just had his prized collection of guitars stollen out of the trunk of his car (was recording with them that day). Renters/car insurance may cover the $, but never the personal value. sucks. Multiple bad karma points for them.
WHERE does Ben live because I JUST got home to two police officers answering an ADT call to my house. Someone tried to literally bore a hole through a side door and set off the alarm... which is very very loud and scary. Person left the junk he/she/it used to bore said hole. The I.D. person is coming over now to dust. By the way, alarm system gives you another discount on insurance. My thoughts go out to Ben (who I have not met, I don't think) especially in light of what I've just come home to.
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