Back in June, it was revealed that Swedish harlequinade Avatar would hit the road with nu-core act Tallah opening for them. Now, it appears that Tallah have been, in their own words, “removed” from the tour due to a COVID outbreak within their ranks and a miscommunication with Avatar’s management, and have launched a crowdfunding campaign to help them pay for tour expenses.
Tallah’s GoFundMe has a goal of $10,000, which the band need to help pay for unsold tour merch, gas home, et cetera. In the official statement on the campaign’s page, Tallah wrote, “We need help from our fans to pay for hotel rooms so band members can rest up, isolate properly and then get home safe. For a new band like Tallah, every single date of the tour is very important to us. Not only to play to our fans in each city but also to make the tour work financially.
“Because this tour is likely to come to an end now we are going to be down a huge amount of money as stuff has already been paid for. Anything you can afford to give would really help us out. We hope we can get back on the road soon and sorry to anyone who was looking forward to seeing us in the next few weeks.”
However, in a follow-up statement on social media, Tallah seem to express discontent with Avatar for this move, writing, “As you already know, some of our members caught COVID-19.
“Due to some miscommunication about Avatar’s COVID guidelines, their management has decided to remove us from the rest of the Going Hunting Tour.
“We would have loved to continue the tour once we got better and tested negative, but that decision was not ours to make.”
On the one hand, this is a huge bummer, especially given what a promising young band Tallah are. On the other, this is standard procedure for tours at this point — if someone gets COVID, they’re off, no question, out of respect for the safety of bands, crew, and audience members. So we don’t know what Tallah expected here.
In any event, if you have a few bones, give them to Tallah to help them get home. Avatar will continue touring with Magic Sword at the following dates:
9/28 – Houston, TX x House of Blues Houston
9/29 – San Antonio, TX x The Aztec Theatre
10/1 – Albuquerque, NM x Sunshine Theater
10/2 – Denver, CO x Summit Denver
10/3 – Salt Lake City, UT x The Depot, SLC
10/5 – Phoenix, AZ x The Van Buren
10/6 – Los Angeles, CA x The Wiltern
10/7 – Las Vegas, NV x House of Blues Las Vegas
10/10 – Grand Junction, CO x Mesa Theater
10/12 – Billings, MT x The Pub Station
10/14 – Spokane, WA x Knitting Factory [Spokane]
10/15 – Portland, OR x Roseland Theater
10/16 – Boise, ID x Revolution Concert House in Boise
10/18 – Seattle, WA x Neptune
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Words by Chris Krovatin
