It’s often said that band life can be as significant and emotionally fraught as in a romantic relationship and for touring bands the common backdrop to all this human drama is often the van. 

In the underground, every expense counts. Any mishap can have major consequences for a touring band (both emotionally and financially)—a truth vocalist, guitarist, and bandleader Conan Neutron knows only too well. 

October 2025 and rock band Conan Neutron & The Secret Friends are a few days from playing the annual Rat City Recon at the Southgate Roller Rink in Seattle in support of their latest record The Way of the Neutron. 

This would be the culmination of the band’s fourth tour of 2025; see them share a stage with bands like Pissed Jeans and God Bullies and expose the band to folks who might not know them, and significantly, not already own all the records and t-shirts. 

As usual, the mode of transport is Conan’s van, The Supernaut. “Not just a van,” he emphasizes, “but the same van since 2007 that I got with 17,000 miles, that I basically put over 300,000 miles on.”

But driving down a rural, two-lane highway, towards the final dates of the tour, disaster strikes as another driver veers across lanes in front of the van. “I had to put us in the ditch to avoid literally everyone getting killed,” recounts Conan. 

No persons were harmed, but The Supernaut was less fortunate. “I knew immediately, insurance is going to total it,” Conan says, “which changes the world considerably, but also we’re like, ‘Oh, we’re supposed to be playing in Eugene tonight.'”   

Without time to mourn the loss of the van, decisions must be made. How to finish the tour? 

“Our entire tour for this leg was built around playing Rat City Recon,” says Conan. “We’ll play a good show, and we’ll sell a good amount of merch because that’s, historically speaking, what we do.” 

Fortuitously, Ralph Spight of hardcore group Victims Family came to the band’s rescue via Bandago, a North-American van-rental company catering to bands on the road. A toe-truck driver was sent out and able to transport the band, plus some equipment, but crucially, no merch—“The one thing,” says Conan, “that actually makes this sort of, at best, cost-neutral, if not making money.”

With the band operating in the realms of “the working poor,” as Conan puts it, there’s not just hours of work around the insurance and the trauma of the accident, but the headache of reorganising the last tour dates, a task that for a larger band would be the remit of a tour manager if not a whole team.  

“There’s no money for any of that,” states Conan. “So it’s one of those things where that’s internalized pressure that I just have to deal with in a constant state of strain for hours on end.” 

Could anyone really be prepared for such a traumatic event? Maybe not, but what reasonable planning should bands be making for life on the road? 

 “So spreadsheets are your friend,” says Conan. “I developed a formula years ago which sets up cities, the miles, average price of gas, how much the gas tank holds. So I can calculate how much it will be in gas to get from point A to point B.”

Added into these calculations are projections of what the band can expect to earn, where they might stay and the costs, and all the other unromantic, but important planning.

“This is the kind of stuff that most people don’t articulate, especially for younger bands,” says Conan.

“When you’re starting off, you’re not going to know to look for that, or if you are, you’re not going to care, but if you want to be built to last, that’s the stuff you should care about, because that’s the stuff that will be able to get you through the harder times.”

Plan hard, play hard? 

To quote Conan himself from “The Way”— from the band’s 2025 album The Way of the Neutron, available from Seismic Wave Entertainment:

“Do the work, but don’t forget to have fun. It always seems impossible until it’s done.”

Visit NeutronFriends for upcoming Conan Neutron & The Secret Friends shows and news.

The Way of the Neutron available to buy now from Seismic Wave Entertainment.

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