Giraffe Tongue Orchestra Cancel Tour Dates After Brent Hinds Breaks Leg

Over the Thanksgiving break we reported that Brent Hinds had broken his leg while starting up his motorcycle (!?), and that his upcoming tour dates with Giraffe Tongue Orchestra — the band’s first tour ever — were in jeopardy.

Now it’s official: Hinds will not be going the Dave Grohl, Axl Rose or Trap Them route by sucking it up and finding a way to tour in spite of his injury. According to a statement from Giraffe Tongue Orchestra, Hinds’ leg requires surgery and the travel would’ve been too difficult and dangerous:

We deeply regret to inform everyone that GTO has to cancel our U.S. tour. Brent Hinds broke his leg in a motorcycle incident. It requires surgery and traveling for him is both impractical and highly ill-advised. We can’t do our debut tour without our guy. In our view, this is a ‘Go all-out or don’t go at all’ situation. So we had to make the very tough call to cancel. The venues should be providing refunds. No words can convey how sorry we are to everyone who was planning on attending these shows, just as no words can express how much we were looking forward to bringing the songs from the ‘Broken Lines’ album to you live. The important thing is that, aside from his broken leg, Brent is otherwise okay. He will hopefully make a full recovery soon and we’ll all live to fight another day. And, with that, our goal becomes carving out our next opportunity to play. One thing is sure: We will let you know as soon as we know. Until then, keep jamming ‘Broken Lines’. Have a wonderful – and SAFE – holiday season. With love, Giraffe Tongue Orchestra.

The ultimate bummer here is the one hinted by the line “our goal becomes carving out our next opportunity to play:” with all the members’ very busy day jobs — Mastodon, The Dillinger Escape Plan, Alice in Chains — that’s going to be very, very difficult. Especially with Dillinger in the final go-round as a band and Mastodon getting ready to release an album. Real shame here. I’ll bet the other dudes are beyond pissed at Hinds.