With the final part of the No Pads, No Helmets… Just Balls anniversary tour, which will take place in Argentina and Brazil, being just weeks away, the question of David’s possible return on tour has arisen once more. You may recall that a year ago, at the end of May, right before the start of the European tour, David revealed his long-time struggles with depression and excused himself from touring with Simple Plan indefinitely in order to work on his mental health and get better as soon as possible.
Since then, the rest of the band have remained outspoken about the issue, usually mentioning at every show that David is still very much a part of Simple Plan and while giving their friend time and space to deal with his illness, they managed to perform as a quartet (with a little help of their friend Chady, who picks up the bass for a few songs at every show) for almost a year now. But what are the odds of David returning for the last few shows before the end of the tour cycle?
In a recent interview with Tento Mais Discos Que Amigos with Chuck Comeau, the reporter asked Chuck about David’s well-being and how he and his band deal with this topic when communicating with their fans. Read Chuck’s answer below:
At the same time, we think the right thing to do is make sure he stays well and gets better. So if he thinks he can not travel the world on tour now and prefers to stay at home, that’s okay. Stay at home, rest, work on the points you have to work with yourself and know that this is the number one priority for us. All the fans still want to see us, and we did not want to put any more pressure on David. Otherwise it would be like “Hey man, we’ll stop playing until you get better,” and that would put a lot of pressure on him. So we say, “Take the time you need, we can do good shows even with 4 people, we’ll have the bass guitar going there even if you’re not with us.”
We had explained to our fans what is going on, that he’s focusing on his recovery and I think they understood. I think the fans were incredibly understandable and respectful. I think they are also happy that we are still playing, although many would like David to be there, but for now he cannot do that.
We do not know yet whether he will be in Brazil with us or not. He has not done this show with us since touring the United States last year, but we have played a lot since then and we still feel the show is a great show. Obviously it’s a bit different because David is not there but it will still be a lot of fun for the fans. I’ll talk to him in the next few days and see how he feels. We hope he can come with us and be there, but if he’s not, we will respect this, go the same way and play the best show we can for our Brazilian fans. We hope you understand.
As you can see, the decision whether David would be going to South America with Simple Plan or not has not been made yet. However if we take in consideration the nature of touring in South America, which is often very crazy, it does not seem like the easiest place for David to return to touring. We’ll keep you posted once the decision is made.
