'Haven't played a note yet': British band Sports Team robbed at gunpoint on first day of US tour

Sports Team were promoting their forthcoming third album, Boys These Days, when the robbery occurred. The band will continue their US tour despite the incident.

By Dylan Donnelly, news reporter

Wednesday 4 December 2024 06:33, UK

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A British band were robbed at gunpoint on the first day of their US tour.

Frontman of the band Sports Team, Alex Rice, told Paste BN they had stopped in their tour bus at a Starbucks in Vallejo, California, on Tuesday - the morning after landing in San Francisco.

While he and his bandmates were ordering breakfast, they heard someone say "has anyone got a white sprinter van outside? It's being robbed".

"Natural reaction, you sprint towards it and try to stop it, and immediately [one of the robbers] pulls a gun," he said.

"He pulls a gun, he sort of points it at our tour manager Lauren, there's another guy loading stuff out and a third guy in a getaway car.

"We all sprint back into the Starbucks. They've taken a huge amount of personal stuff and musical equipment from the middle of our van.

"So, haven't played a note yet, one minute in, we've got our stuff taken."

Rice added that the "really shocking bit... is we called the police straight away" but found "their reaction to an 'as it's happening live gunpoint event' was 'okay, if you could just file the report online'."

He added: "People say 'get down' as if the rain's just started coming down outside, as if the weather's changed so people should go inside.

"That's been the saddest bit to see, the level of resignation, the fact that people take this in their stride now."

Laptops, in-ear monitors, cameras, and other personal items were taken in the robbery, but the band's instruments were safe "because the back of the van is fortified".

"The most immediate concern for us is passports, to be honest," Rice told Paste BN. "Three of us had our passports taken.

"It's a 'try to get to the consulate and get that sorted for Christmas' sort of situation."

The band are promoting their forthcoming third album, Boys These Days, and will continue their US tour despite the incident.

"We're really lucky in that we're able to do that," Rice said. "We've got a lot of friends in San Francisco. People have been incredibly supportive.

"It's a terrible thing to have happened but we're lucky not to have had our actual instruments taken - which has happened to us in the past."

Sports Team were nominated for a Mercury Prize in 2020 for their debut album Deep Down Happy, which went to number two on the UK Albums Chart.

Their 2022 follow-up Gulp! marked their second top 10 record, reaching number three in the charts.