Spiritbox Guitarist on Shinedown Singer’s $10,000 Donation: “I’m Still Speechless”

Spiritbox guitarist Mike Stringer recently joined The MetalSucks Podcast to discuss their new album, Eternal Blue, the strategy of releasing standalone singles to introduce the project to fans, how a Canadian government program helped them start Spiritbox, and his hopes to tour nonstop in 2022.

Stringer also shed some light on the band’s summer tour with Limp Bizkit, which was canceled only a few dates in due to Covid-19 and left Spiritbox, who had already spent money on merch, gear, touring crew, etc., high and dry.

Relaying how Shinedown frontman Brent Smith gifted the band $10,000 out of the blue after learning of the tour cancelation and how We Came As Romans decided not to charge for renting their lighting package, he explained:

“Oh man. So we’re two for two [tours getting cancelled mid-way], which is a shame.

“For instance, Brent [Smith] from Shinedown, he just came out of nowhere. We never even met him before, and he just wanted to help. He hit up our management and was like, ‘I felt horrible what happened and I would hate for this band to not be able to continue due to this and I just want to contribute.’ And he sent us $10,000… which is just. I’m still speechless. I don’t even know what we could ever do to repay him and those guys. And even just him thinking about us in that way is just so incredible.

“So many other things… like We Came As Romans, they lent us an entire light package, we rented it from them for the tour and when we gave it back to them they didn’t even charge us. They were like, ‘You know what, don’t worry about it. We feel horrible.’ And just the companies that helped us, like [bus rental company] Bandwagon.

“There’s so many people that are so kind these days and it’s just amazing to see musicians helping out other musicians. It’s definitely a great opportunity for us to pay it forward when we can. That’s the first thing I thought about. Man, I just can’t wait until, if we ever get to be in the position to do this for someone else, I can’t wait until we can do that. Just a wild situation to be in.” [laughs] 

You can listen to our full chat with Stringer here or via the embed below.