Ben Weinman Comments on Brutal Stage Fall That Went Viral

By now you’ve surely already seen it: Ben Weinman, Suicidal Tendencies guitarist, attempting to step up onto a speaker cabinet during a performance, planting his foot on a caster wheel instead, and laying out for an absolutely BRUTAL fall. Weinman is no stranger to painful stage mishaps from his days in The Dillinger Escape Plan, whose legendary shows were notoriously batshit crazy, but this one was particularly “oof”-inducing, making for the perfect viral moment of the summer:

Now Weinman has spoken about the moment to New York radio station Q104.3, shrugging off the fall as garden variety until he saw it making the rounds on social media. The incident happened during the very first song of the set, and Weinman got up like nothing had happened and finished the show like a champ before finally licking his wounds:

“I definitely felt it as soon as the show was over and did some serious ‘Batman-fix’ on my own spine the next day, but I’m used to it. I got up so quickly and the show was so nuts I don’t think most people saw it. Nobody in the band did. But our friends on the side of the stage were like ‘holy f–k.’”

That the incident took place a day before Weinman’s 44th birthday, an age beyond which most musicians can rock so hard, is an irony not lost on him:

“I’m married with two small children. And my doctor said I have no cartilage in my knees. My spine is covered in arthritis and scar tissue. I’ve had a bunch of concussions, rotator cuff surgery, broken ribs, feet, metal in my wrist. I’m 44. But I just can’t not rock.”

Elsewhere in the chat Weinman talks about his most gruesome injury ever (back in 2005), his current work at an animal sanctuary and more. Read it right here.