Machine Head’s Robb Flynn is a BAMF, Will Tour Immediately Despite Surgery
In case you were wondering whether a bothersome little thing like having an organ forcibly removed from his body would stop Robb Flynn from touring with Machine Head, well, you don’t know Robb.
Yesterday we reported that Robb would be undergoing gall bladder surgery after suffering an extreme bout of food poisoning, and posited that perhaps this would get in the way of his upcoming South American tour. Well, we may have underestimated the man. Says Flynn via Facebook:
First of all: Whoever put up the FB reply to yesterdays video with the quote “Gallstones & Diamonds!!…too soon?”
PURE COMEDY FUCKING GOLD!!
I laughed my ass off, thank you, I needed that! Definitely not too soon!Second of all: Good news! I just got out of a meeting with the surgeon who is operating / removing my gall bladder tomorrow, and she has given me the thumbs up to do the tour of Latin America and everywhere else. She says I’m going to be sore as fuck, but will definitely be able to perform, probably somewhat restricted in my movements, so no Diamond Dave jumps from McClain’s riser, but perform never the less!
Third of all: Thank you for all the well wishes. It seems like a pretty straight ahead procedure, I’ll be back in fighting shape in no time.
Oy vey… gettin’ old! (Cue the song: “Old”)
If this journey has taught me anything it’s that you need to look for the silver lining in things.
You figure being home would alleviate some of the stuff that happens on the road, right? Me too, but last Saturday my son Zander and I got food poisoning from a WAY under-cooked burger we split at Lagunita’s Brewery on Friday. Yeah, we should have sent it back, but again this wasn’t some off-the-highway greasy spoon we were at, plus we had a long drive and wanted to beat traffic! So the bacon cheeseburger arrives, I cut it in half, saw that it looked a little, uh… “off”, but we looked at each other, gave one another the shoulder-shrug and went for it. And man, we paid for it last Saturday by puking and diarrhea-ing our brains out for a good 9 hours straight. So while cursing out Lagunita’s for the last week, in the end, it may have been a blessing in disguise. Because of this ingested inconvenience and the interesting things it does to your insides, it brought up a continuous pain that I hadn’t dealt with before
For the last week I have had this sharp stabbing pain under my bottom right rib. It’s been tolerable at a 5 outta 10 on the pain-meter, but then every 30 to 45 minutes, it goes off the Richter scale and cripples me for about 5 to 10 seconds, and then goes back down to a 5. I assumed was just some “food poisoning residue”, or even the after effects of hugging the “Flynn Family Throne” for hours! I went in to see someone at Kaiser and that’s what they concluded as well ”post-food-poisoning-pains” or something to that effect. However since Thursday, the pain has gotten pretty severe and after trying unsuccessfully to get an appt. with a doctor there, I finally just went in to Emergency. Try as I might to talk myself out of it, somethin’ wasn’t right. While there I was given an ultrasound and seemingly one hundred other tests, and here I am thinking I have something easy that only needs antibiotics, they let me know, that, oh yeah, gallstone, need emergency surgery to have my gall bladder removed.
It was actually great the way the doctor delivered the news, just completely nonchalantly she says, “Well Mr. Flynn, you have a gallstone, you’ll need to come in for surgery in the next day or two and have your gall bladder removed, but it’s all laparoscopic, and you’ll be home that night.”
Me:
“Uh… Er…Wait a minute…”
“Did you just say I need to have my gall bladder… removed…?”
Doctor: “yes, we do it all the time, you don’t really need your gall bladder…”
Me: “Uh… I’m going on tour in 2 weeks… that can’t really happen…”
Doctor: “Well I hear they have great healthcare in South America if you need surgery there”
I decided from then on, I want all bad news delivered in the same nonchalant manner! MAN it makes bad news way easier to stomach (See what I did there? Ba-dap-pssss… I gotta million of ‘em!)!
She explained that unlike kidney stones, which you can take a medicine to break down allowing them or it to pass through your body (though incredibly painfully as they pass through you freakin’ PEE HOLE!), gallstones can’t pass. The “cure” is to have the whole gall bladder removed. Mine is particularly hairy because it’s stuck in what is called the “neck” of the gall bladder, as opposed to it’s main section and as such can create a severe blockage if not removed soon. I mean the thing’s already infected and basically, well bottom line? The shit needs to go. Now
I was in a bit of shock, but what are you gonna do… it is what it is.
So tomorrow I’m getting it done. I want the longest recovery time possible, as the first date in Mexico is 2 weeks from today.
And I don’t want to put it off for a year like I did the hernia(s) back in 2012, that was just dumb.
2012 Day 1 Hernia Surgery: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XOPOt8hgUxA
2012 Day 2 Hernia Surgery: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UvoW4uAysiw
Again everybody, thanks for all the well wishes, all the emails, texts, and replies… was very, very cool.
I’m determined to practice on Thursday, I need to get in shape for the tour, I been training for 3 weeks already, and I’ll be damned if a freakin’ gall bladder getting taken outta me is gonna stand in the way of me being full fucking power!!”
“…I hear they have great healthcare in South America…”. Really? I admit ignorance on this, but I never would have guessed that in a billion years.
To see Machine Head on their apparently-still-happening tour of South America, get tour dates here.
