The Dillinger Exacape Plan guitarist explains leave of absence

"We were only about a week into the U.S. tour that included the show above, and as always a good number of the band/crew were sick with the typical 'colds' from traveling to different climates and working on little rest. Like clockwork, my cold progressed to bronchitis, which eventually led to pneumonia, and again I didn't realize the severity until we finally came home from the tour.

"Well, let this be a lesson to everyone reading this (especially guys in the 30ish range). Since I took so long to finally get treated, my immune system went berserk trying to beat the pneumonia on its own without the help of antibiotics, and it actually started to attack the good stuff as well, in my case my nervous system. This is actually a rare condition, but when it occurs, it happens mostly with men in their late 20s/early 30s. It's called neuritis, specifically brachial plexus neuritis with me, which is medical terms for in the shoulder blade. There is a network or cluster in the shoulder blade area which connects the nerves from the neck to the nerves which continue down through the shoulder, arm, and hand. So, basically I now suffer from mild nerve damage (non-permanent, I'm told by multiple neurologists) which stems from mostly my shoulder blade and upper back on my left side down my arm and into my hand. With the addition of the ruptured disc in my neck, this is not helping the healing factor progress as fast as I'd like, and what was originally supposed to take about 18 months to heal, is now taking 24+. Consequently, I had another nerve related injury in my left elbow that I was dealing with for over a year which I eventually had surgery for a couple months prior to the mess above.

"Some of you might have witnessed my freak episodes of hand cramping preventing me from playing parts of songs, whole songs, even full sets (sorry) and as luck would have it , this all correlates with one another.