As one baseball season is set to begin, one Modern Baseball chapter has come to an unexpected halt.
The Philadelphia rock band last night announced it was taking “a break”, citing anxiety and declining mental health. Modern Baseball’s tour with Kevin Devine and Sorority Noise has been cancelled, and they have pulled out of Memorial Day weekend’s Boston Calling Music Festival.
“As much as it pains me to say this, we have decided to cancel our upcoming U.S. tour dates and festival appearances to take a break from Modern Baseball for a little while,” writes Jake Ewald. “Over the past few months the band has become an immense source of anxiety for me, and it wasn’t until I opened up to Sean, Ian, and Brendan about it that we realized we were all feeling the same way. The project we started as a source of joy and positive expression had become something that was slowly eating away at our mental health and our friendships. We have been championing the importance of mental health for a while now, and we recently realized that it would be wrong for us to ignore our own health any longer.”
Ewald says the decision to scrap their upcoming dates was a tough one, but something that needed to be done.
“Please know that we don’t take a tour cancellation lightly, and under any other circumstances we would not even consider it an option, but in this instance we have to put our health and friendships first,” he adds. “You’ve supported us unconditionally throughout this crazy ride and we could never thank you enough. We never really learned how to do this whole ‘rock band’ thing the right way, but you kept coming to the shows and talking to us and assuring us that we’d figure it out sooner or later. We could not have done any of this without you. Be honest with those you love and don’t be afraid to lean on them when you need to. Odds are they’ll need to lean on you pretty soon too.”
Modern Baseball signed their note with a link to a mental health hotline and a sheet with other crisis numbers.