INDIANAPOLIS — Allegedly touring pop punk band Deaf Hippos is really blurring the line between actively playing shows outside their hometown and not having a consistent place to sleep at night, concerned for their welfare sources confirmed.
“I don’t think it’s fair to classify us as homeless just because we don’t technically have anything you could consider a mailing address, much less a safe place to sleep and keep our belongings. We’re a touring band. Would you call fuckin’ U2 or whoever homeless when they embark on a global stadium tour? It’s not any different when we live in our van while playing three shows over five weeks,” said Deaf Hippos singer Poppie Graziani. “This is what punk rock is all about. Taking baby wipe baths in Sunoco bathrooms, sucking on ketchup packages for sustenance, and sleeping five deep in a 1997 Astro Van.”
More recently, the band has been crashing on the basement floor of local man and naive supporter of the local music scene Bryant Vaughn.
“I first met the DH crew when I caught them stealing a drink from my garden hose. I always like to help out touring bands, so when they said they had a gig in town I gave them a place for the night. That was almost a month ago,” said Vaughn. “I became really suspicious after they brought their bindles in the house and started complaining about ‘railroad bulls,’ whatever that means. And they have yet to play a gig unless you count playing harmonica while begging for change on my front porch as a gig.”
Local advocate for unhoused people Abby Robinson expressed her frustration with bands “cosplaying as hobos.”
“People experiencing homelessness deserve to be treated with dignity just like everybody else. Well, everybody else except musicians. They can go straight to hell,” said Robinson. “Touring bands have made my job infinitely harder. We want to help people who are struggling to get back on their feet. Not prop up some shitty avant-garde noise outfit from Cleveland that got paid negative $212 at their last gig because their theremin blew out the venue’s PA system.”
Recently, Deaf Hippos announced via their Facebook page that they will be extending the tour after Graziani learned her mom still isn’t letting her back in the house because of that awful thing she did in her birdbath.