Local band Phoenix Rise had to deal with losing their practice area when a nearby room was found to be housing a meth lab.
We were lucky enough to find a room in an industrial park in the northeast. It was a second floor loft and a comfortable size. but there were soo many windows that the heat we did have went right out in the winter. We got nailed with like a $290 heating bill trying to heat the whole thing so we had to rig a curtain and move the equipment beind that so we’d only have to heat part of the room and in the summer, heat rises… we were all in pretty good shape last summer! then the unbelievable happened.
We show up for practice and the entire building has been quarantined. DEA, police, and 10 other organizations had the building surrounded. TUrns out some guys were running a meth lab in a few of the rooms downstairs. we were locked out with out equipment for 3 1/2 weeks. finally we were able to get in and grab enough equipment to be able to gig and rehearse and we moved into a room at Ground Control Studios. Eventually after about 2 months of BS we were able to move into another room in the complex and it is slightly smaller but 10x better sound wise and comfort wise. this time it’s a basement office so we should be spared this summer.
Singer-songwriters don’t have these problems since we can usually play anywhere, but other bands are discussing it over at Origivation.