Journey Cancel UK And Ireland Tour Amid Dispute Over Band Credit Card
From the outside, it looks like Journey are among classic rock’s most indestructible battleships. Iconic howler Steve Perry hasn’t been in the band since 1998, and they haven’t hard a chart hit since two years before that. Still, “Don’t Stop Believin'” keeps going through revival after revival, and Journey can continue to headline arenas, no matter who’s in the current lineup. But Journey do have one crucial problem: The two longtime guitarists who can’t stop suing each other over access to the band’s credit card. If that happens enough times, it’ll inevitably interfere with your touring plans.
Journey’s internal beef revolves around Neal Schon, the band’s lead guitarist and sole founding member, and Jonathan Cain, the rhythm guitarist and keyboardist who joined up in 1980. Schon and Cain wrote a bunch of huge Journey songs together, and they both played in the chart-topping supergroup Bad English during Journey’s one prolonged hiatus. In 2022, Cain sued Schon over access to the band’s corporate Amex card, and Schon countersued. (Schon also hit Cain with a cease-and-desist for performing “Don’t Stop Believin'” at a Trumpy rally.) Earlier this week, Cain sued Schon again. The band is still on tour right now; they’re scheduled to play New York’s Citi Field wth Def Leppard tomorrow. But now, Journey have cancelled an upcoming run of UK and Ireland arena shows, and you’d have to assume that the lawsuit has something to do with it.
In the latest lawsuit, Jonathan Cain accuses Neal Schon of things like maxing out the $1 million limit of the band’s corporate credit card and exceeding the $1,500-per-night hotel allowance, which just sounds like good living. The lawsuit claimed that Journey’s stage show hadn’t suffered, but that’s now up in the air. This fall, Journey were scheduled to celebrate their 50th anniversary as a band with an 11-date arena tour in the UK and Ireland. (Cheap Trick were on that tour, and they were also on the tour that Heart just cancelled because of Ann Wilson’s cancer diagnosis. Cheap Trick must be bummed out.) Radio X reports that all 11 dates have been cancelled. Ticket buyers were given no explanation other than “circumstances beyond the band’s control.”