Those of you who have been following my #VanLife adventure since my professional pivot into the wild last year may have been scratching your head about why I seem to have not really gone on any sort of adventure at all.

Some of you have reached out to see what happened to our fall tour plans, or why I haven’t come to visit, even recreationally. Some of you just think I’m being a lazy rich kid who can’t be bothered (and have told me so). But those of you who know me in real life have picked up on the fact that not everything has gone as planned out here, expressing concern that I seem to be parked and isolating in remote corners of the Pacific NW.

The reality is, #VanLife is fucked.

This narrative doesn’t match a lot of my photo shoots and public posts because I’ve remained committed to finding beauty in nature and making the best of it, while holding onto the dream I first set out to realize and working to see it all through. It’s not miserable because I have somehow changed my mind about wanting to tour. I haven’t. I very much still want to promote this record and sing these special songs for (and with) all of you. And it’s not because I don’t like the small space or the sometimes-rugged complications of full-timing in an RV. I’m game for all of that anticipated (and un-anticipated) adventure stuff. That is not what’s happening here, either. And oh my god it’s not because I’m lazy or rich. Ugh. I wish! Unfortunately, neither of those things are true anymore (though they definitely have been before, so I get the perception). And it’s not even that I’m depressed or sketched out about the constant online bullying and death threats, which would normally be a major contender after so much time out here alone and so many thousands of homophobic trolls piling on with the release of this new record.

Sadly, what’s actually happening is much more heartbreaking (and potentially sinister).

I will start by officially announcing that we have to cancel our 2019 tour plans that were included in all of the “My Movie Star” album press over the past year. We were supposed to announce the bands and cities March 1st for shows beginning in spring, but instead, it’s canceled. All of it. I’ve been dodging questions and playing along, but no more.

I’m really sorry to my tourmates Matt Alber and GLASYS, who have been so patient and cool about the whole thing as it has gone from one stall-out to another since last summer when I first asked them to come with me. I’m also sorry to all of the other artists, venues, promoters, crew, and community groups my team and I have been engaging for months in an effort to transform these live experiences into local advocacy opportunities for issues close to my heart in every city. Thank you to the National Council and so many others for helping us form these plans along the way. I hope it works out for us to partner on some sort of magic together in the future.

I know none of these people would want me to feel this, but I am also heartbroken for Jay Mohr, Tiffany, The Dandy Warhols, Jarryd James, Stose, Rian Lewis, DoublePlusGood, Madison Montgomery, Aaron David Gleason, Scott Simpson, Jarryd James, and everyone else who has been (and still is) counting on me to promote this album they all gave so much of themselves to during the creation process. I’ve tried everything I can think of to make this tour work, but it’s just not going to – at least not this year — and here’s why:

For some time it has been my dream to purchase a RoadTrek Class B Motorhome from Erwin Hymer Group, the company famous for converting these oversized industrial vans into luxury homes on wheels. I realize this still sounds really bougie and it’s because it was. I had finally hit a level of success and financial savings where I could afford to purchase a like-new, current year, souped-up 2018 RoadTrek Simplicity SRT, leave the grind of executive life, and begin planning a tour of the entire United States in support of the “My Movie Star” release – something I have never been able to pull off at any point in my career, as those of you who live outside of big cities already know.

Lots of you followed along back in August as I said goodbye to my entire professional identity and made my way from Portland to Las Vegas with Pretty Baby, where Best Time RV, a dealer who specialized in RoadTrek sales and rentals, had my Canadian beauty, in granite, with just 33,000 miles on the Dodge Ram 2500 chassis, an under-hood generator/invertor electrical system, gray leather interiors, flatscreen/blu-ray setup, and a 6 year, unlimited mileage, peace of mind warranty – the absolute selling point for purchasing it, and THE ONLY reason I was willing to fork over the kind of cash it took to buy a slightly used, current year model outright. (These things aren’t cheap. MSRP starts at $78,995 for models with no features, and mine is fully loaded).

This was the first-ever moment I could finally make it happen, so I went all-in on the big dream. I did really thorough research and found online groups of RoadTrek users who were cult-like in their adoration for the company. Most of these people had owned multiple RoadTreks since the 1970s and were still in love with their rigs, with the company, the culture, and the community of fellow RoadTrek owners. There were literally no negative reviews that I could find at that point, which seemed remarkable. All of the major RV reviewers had them listed as “Highly Recommended” and the few negative experiences people had shared online had swiftly been taken care of by way of the peace of mind warranty and stories of really extreme, positive customer service. I was HOOKED.

Since all of my #VanLife social media posts look super fun and so beautiful (thanks Oregon!) and so many of you keep asking me for info about this adventure, as well as advice on whether you should buy one — and especially since Erwin Hymer has been continuing to use my name, likeness, specific vehicle, and owner story to sell more RoadTrek Simplicity SRTs to others with big dreams following along all over the world on their public channels — I feel like I have a responsibility to share what has actually happened with their company and affiliates, particularly since it is continuing to happen even as I write this.

I purchased my RoadTrek on August 22nd 2018 and felt really proud that I had finally made an impossible thing come true. I let my house get snatched up on the market immediately, put all of my belongings into climate-controlled storage (I know, I know. Bougie again.) and hit the road with the dog. Adventure calls. Meaning awaits. We were set to have the best time in our new rolling home!

Except, there were several things wrong with the coach, which only really became apparent once we were on the road back in Oregon. There appeared to be some minor things happening throughout, but there were a couple major things, too. The most major issue was that the macerator hose had been modified and was spraying piss and shit everywhere underneath the van whenever I pushed the button to clear the holding tanks, so I still had to stay in hotels on summer tour and for the first month of owning it. LUXURY!!! (And professional exterior vehicle detailing)

I contacted Best Time RV repeatedly and they had me send photos, then again assured me everything was covered under RoadTrek’s peace of mind warranty, which they had done before, during and after the all-cash sale. I paid a local RV shop at the coast to come temporarily fix the macerator hose on-site at the resort so that the bathroom would be functional until I could get the whole thing replaced. My warranty work is supposed to be covered until 2023. My vehicle is a 2018. At the time of purchase, these exact vehicles and warranties were still being sold on lots all over the world, and frankly, they still are.

I called and emailed Erwin Hymer / RoadTrek’s warranty department on the day my warranty transfer went through from the dealer, nearly a month after the purchase. The Erwin Hymer warranty rep sent me a link to one of their company-approved, local Oregon dealers, named Johnson RV, located in Sandy, Oregon, to have the work assessed — the first step in the process to getting it repaired.

The soonest Johnson RV could get me into their shop was the end of October 2018, so I booked that service appointment and (again) patiently waited more than a month for the next step to take place. At that time, Johnson RV repaired the macerator hose (free, because peace of mind warranty!) and they seemed super helpful, but told me since they hadn’t heard back from RoadTrek yet regarding the rest of the cosmetic issues that needed addressing, we would still need to wait on doing anything about the rest.

When the Oregon fall rain really started coming down in late December, it was clear that the fantastic fan (the main ventilation fan on the ceiling of the rig) was leaking when it was closed. I reached out to Johnson RV who told me to bring it in that week over the Christmas holiday even though they still had not heard back from Erwin Hymer about the warranty work approvals. They had my vehicle from December 23rd until the 27th.

During Johnson RV’s inspection, they discovered that the leak was happening because of defective (and completely non-existent by this point) factory seals around and inside of the fan. My heart sank, and to this day I remain really confused, because this is a 2018 model!

In order to repair the seal on the van in advance of the warranty work being approved, Johnson RV had me sign something that said I would not hold them responsible. They did not charge me for this work either, again (I thought) because of this amazing RoadTrek peace of mind warranty — but why was it taking so long for the other approvals? Johnson RV told me they had sent everything to RoadTrek once again, just as they had been telling me they had been doing since September.

On January 23rd, after another entire month of Johnson RV supposedly going back and forth with Erwin Hymer / RoadTrek’s warranty authorization department, a representative from Johnson RV sent me an email saying that they were sorry but “due to some legal matters” involving Erwin Hymer not reimbursing them for work “for the past year”, they would not be able to do my warranty work after all.

Fucking hell. It would have been so great to know this back when they had my vehicle in their shop for 5 days in December, or when I was waiting for service approval at their dealership the entire month of November, or better yet, when they had my vehicle in for inspection the very first time waaaaay back in October.

Anyway, I forwarded that email to the service and retail departments of Erwin Hymer, alongside the man-at-the-end-of-his-rope message, “Do I just need to drive to Canada? I’ve been trying to get help since September of last year. No one will help me.” and received a response from an official RoadTrek representative, saying that said there were no warranty claims submitted for my vehicle, no outstanding invoices with Johnson RV and that, and I quote, “They are lying to you about their reasons”.

THIS LUXURY RV DRAMA IS SOME NEXT-LEVEL SOAP OPERA SHIT, AIN’T IT?!

The Erwin Hymer warranty person then connected me to their factory service people, who requested I send them all of the photos and take a bunch of videos of the issues in the coach, which I sent that day. I felt hopeful for the first time since purchasing the RoadTrek back in August. Finally real people who were actually helping me in real time! Sure, driving 37 hours to their factory in Canada during the dead of winter and putting another 5,000 miles on the van for no reason isn’t ideal, but we were way past ideals at that point. I just needed to get things fixed and sell it so we wouldn’t have to cancel our upcoming tour plans all together.

That hopeful feeling was short-lived. They just never got back to me.

2 weeks after Erwin Hymer was supposedly arranging for me to come to the Canadian factory, I received another response, saying they were “currently involved in a company-wide audit and full inventory count,” and that “any transactions / authorizations, shipment of parts etc, are temporarily suspended.”

They also suggested that I could contact my local RoadTrek dealership to do the work: JOHNSON RV IN SANDY, OREGON. The same person at Erwin Hymer Group who had just called Johnson RV “liars” on the same exact email chain just recommended that I contact said liars again.

You can start screaming now. I certainly have been.

We already postponed all fall and winter tour plans, and now winter has come and is well on its way to turning into spring and at this moment I’m nowhere closer to having this resolved than I was back in August. I am, however, almost out of money, having paid for the $78,000.00 album release bill and associated videos out of pocket myself, and then having invested the entire rest of my savings into the RoadTrek, which was specifically purchased to make all of that money back. Instead of touring and bringing in income from album and merch sales generated by those in-person appearances, I have just been floating my entire existence generally since last July while I try and figure out a regroup. It’s been super expensive and stupid and I’m over the whole thing.

Having been strung along for exactly 6 months, this past week I finally decided to again circle back and contact the dealer who had originally sold me the vehicle: Best Time RV in Las Vegas.

I spoke with the manager of all 5 Best Time RV locations this past Wednesday. Even though he or anyone else there had never taken the time to respond to any of my desperate pleas for warranty assistance at any point along the way, he was very sympathetic and apologetic on the phone. He said that he was going to contact the owner of Best Time RV to see what they could do to help. Again, I felt hopeful. I knew that these people who took my money for this thing under the guise of “peace of mind warranty” could absolutely take this situation off of my hands, work with the warranty folks at Erwin Hymer themselves, give me back even $60,000 of my dollars, and we could just call it good. I was willing to eat the loss of income from the months of postponing tour, all of the travel expenses, and all of the upgrades since purchasing it (extra bed from RoadTrek, interior upgrades, supplies, etc.) if they would just let me drive it back to them and just start over. He told me the owner lives in Switzerland, but that he would talk to him the following morning and get back to me.

He (of course) did not get back to me, so I called the next afternoon and left a message. When he called me back that evening, he told me that the owner was not willing to accept the vehicle back. He also said that Best Time RV is partially owned by Erwin Hymer and that the owner was going to contact them the following morning on my behalf to get the warranty work approved – which is the only way they will do the repair work at their shop.

I told him I felt like they were really screwing me over by not offering to just do the coach warranty repairs or take it off of my hands since clearly Erwin Hymer North America is in some sort of trouble, and he told me he “didn’t want to hear that”. I asked the Best Time RV Manager when I would hear back from him about whether or not this repair work was approved by RoadTrek and when it was going to happen. He said he would get back to me that following day. He, again, did not. I left a voicemail the day after that and just never heard back.

At this point I was fresh out of ideas. I still don’t exactly know who is really to blame. I’m fairly certain that title is shared; but what is certain is that I bought a current year, 2018 RoadTrek Simplicity SRT during 2018 LITERALLY BECAUSE OF THE WARRANTY, the supposed warranty process hasn’t worked at all up to this point, it has been impossible to get anyone to be straight with me so I have no idea who to believe, and from August until February, no one would actually help me.

For whatever reason, I decided to begin frantically Googling Erwin Hymer North America. Here’s where this story gets interesting. (It’s actually completely uninteresting, but it’s so fucked up and terrifying, it’s important you know.)

This week, the trusted RV Reviews website I used for much of my pre-purchase customer review research, issued the following statement:

“Effective immediately: Avoid these two motorhome manufacturers: The big news in the RV world recently revolved around the acquisition of the german mega RV company, Erwin Hymer Group SE, by U.S. mega RV company, Thor. Aside from expanding Thor’s empire to another continent (Hymer is a major player in Europe), Thor had big plans to introduce the Hymer name to the U.S. market via Hymer’s existing manufacturing facility in Kitchener, Ontario – which also builds the popular RoadTrek Class B coaches. In a deal rumored to exceed 2 billion U.S. dollars, all systems were go -then things got weird. Apparently, while reviewing the financials of Hymer’s operation in North America, Thor’s bean counters found something truly alarming: lots and lots of invoices for RoadTrek Class B motorhomes that didn’t exist. A Vehicle Identification Number or ‘VIN’ is exactly what it sounds like, a singular number applied to a singular vehicle -forever. Think of it as the fingerprint of an RV. Thor’s due diligence revealed lots of sales for RVs with fictitious VINs. The current theory implies that Hymer and /or RoadTrek sales weren’t nearly as good as the company wanted them to be, so somewhere along the line they came up with a solution: just make up lots of sales, attributed to non-existent RVs with fake VINs. One source put the number of bogus invoices at 1,700 and the deception dollar amount in excess of $100 million. If true, this could mean that Hymer (North America) had falsely (and purposely) inflated their figures in an effort to give the appearance of healthy sales. As if that weren’t enough deception, RVDailyNews has now reported that forensic accountants have also ‘uncovered a number of bogus invoices paid by the company into bank accounts owned by relatives of corporate officials.’ The latest word on the street is that Hymer has fired the CEO, CFO and COO of Hymer North America -effective immediately- and that the intent-to-purchase offer from Thor was clawed back (quickly, one would assume) and revised to exclude any part of Hymer’s current North American presence. Surprisingly, the deal appears to have gone through and Hymer (Europe) is now -or soon will be- a part of Thor. Hymer North America, though, remains a very lonely outpost with a very uncertain future. Embarrassingly, those of us here at RVReviews.net have highly recommended RoadTrek for years now. The last month or so has made it glaringly obvious that we were being fed bad information -and then passing it along to our readers with a ‘Highly Recommended’ rating. For that we are truly sorry. Going forward we will be revising our RoadTrek article in the Motorhome Comparison Guide, as well as the ratings in our RV Reports for RoadTrek and Hymer’s new-to-the-market Aktiv Class B coaches. Until then we are issuing a ‘Do Not Buy’ for all offerings from Hymer North America and will continue to post legitimate updates as they are made public. Kind Regards, The RVReviews.net Team”

Upon reading that and several other similar news pieces I became convinced, as anyone would, that I had been sucked into what now appeared to be some sort of wild international criminal scandal, while simultaneously sinking every other penny I had (and roughly $10,000 in additional debt) into producing deluxe edition vinyl, CDs and PR for an album no one will hear or buy copies of until we are able to get out on the road to promote it.

The first draft of this post ended with:

“As for Erwin Hymer and RoadTrek, it’s obvious that all of these dealerships everywhere have been, and are going to continue trying to unload all of their new and used inventory with super sales and discounts that are going to seem too good to be true: That’s because they are too good to be true. DO NOT BELIEVE ONLINE ROADTREK REVIEWS. NONE OF THAT SHIT APPLIES ANYMORE. DO NOT BUY ANYTHING FROM ERWIN HYMER, ROADTREK, OR ANY OF THEIR DEALERS. PERIOD. Until their company scandal and financial crisis is worked out, you should all assume there is no RoadTrek peace of mind warranty, and you should absolutely NOT spend 5 (or, more likely, 6) figures (most are well over $100,000.00) on a vehicle/home built by a company going under, misrepresenting themselves as they circle the drain, and using 100% proprietary technology that will absolutely not be able to be serviced or replaced once they don’t exist as a company.”

Before hitting that publish button and alerting the media that our tour was canceled, I decided to send it to each of the brands involved.

And guess what happened?! Everyone suddenly found my phone number and email address.

When I woke up the following morning I had a voicemail from Erwin Hymer’s resolution center and immediately called them back. The Resolution Coordinator I spoke with was very apologetic for my experience and was super professional and compassionate. He let me know that Erwin Hymer is very sorry this has been my experience, that he had only just heard about my case at the very end of January, and that he was sorry it had taken him longer to get back to me than he had hoped from there. He reiterated that Erwin Hymer North America has been in a company-wide inventory process that has slowed response time because regular operations have ceased all together for the time being. He also assured me that Erwin Hymer and RoadTrek are committed to bringing my rig back to their factory in Canada to fix everything. I did my best not to burst into tears upon hearing the news that perhaps this warranty isn’t bullshit after all, and while I’m hesitant to get back on any sort of hope roller coaster related to this situation at this point, I am choosing to believe that, after all of this actual nighmarish insanity, a hard fought for happy ending is still en route.

Even with this good news, he also told me that there is no way of knowing when exactly Erwin Hymer North America’s factory operations will resume and that it could be “days, weeks, or months”. While Erwin Hymer Group has given me their word that they will be honoring my warranty and they will not be letting my owner story end in tragedy like this, that conversation was days ago now, and now a new report from CTV News has confirmed that all of the Erwin Hymer Group North America employees have been terminated. I assume this means the guy who called me, too. It reads:

“Employees at Erwin Hymer Group North America say they have been fired effective immediately. They say they got their notices on Friday afternoon. An employee at the location on Shirley Avenue who did not want to be named took a video of what they say was them being notified. In it, a man in a suit appears to tell the employees that the company was put into receivership. ‘In court this afternoon in Toronto about half an hour ago, the company was placed into receivership, which is a form of insolvency,’ the man says. ‘The effect of that is a court order essentially terminates everyone’s employment effective today.’ In the video he says that wages would be paid through Friday and that they hoped that vacation pay would be paid out within two weeks. He says that the company would idle for six weeks while it tried to find a buyer. Erwin Hymer Group did not respond to a request for comment.”

So…the “My Movie Star” tour is still canceled.

I’ve got to get this work done on the van before we can sell it, and there is no timeline currently for if Erwin Hymer North America is even going to be a thing anymore, much less when (or if) they will approve my warranty work, so we are pumping the brakes and I am just going to handle this shit myself.

Today I sent the following update email to representatives from all of the brands involved:

“I was contacted by Erwin Hymer Group, who has no warranty claims on file from Johnson RV or Best Time RV for this vehicle. Apparently no work requests or claims have ever been submitted by either dealership in all of these months. Our hope is that Erwin Hymer’s inventory is completed swiftly in the coming days so this can finally be resolved.”

In response, I got an email from Johnson RV that was apologetic for my experience, expressing that they understand my frustration and wanted to clarify the repairs they had taken care of in October and December, saying “we did decide to do those as a ‘goodwill’ to you in hopes we could help out in some way” and that I “may find that there were no claims submitted for the small repairs” they did make, and that the “reason for this is that they were easy ‘goodwill’ repairs” and they “didn’t want there to be any liability on us…”

With regard to what Erwin Hymer had said, Johnson RV wrote, “I apologize they referred to us as liars…we have always had a great business relationship with Roadtrek. For them to jump to conclusions was disappointing to see. With that said, we do have some outstanding invoices that have not been paid. Whether they are current or past due, it’s a moot point at this time. I think we can all agree that the situation currently being investigated at Roadtrek leaves us all with unanswered questions or concerns.”

That’s great and all, I suppose, but I didn’t come to Johnson RV asking for goodwill. I came with a very clear set of issues and a warranty for a RoadTrek, after having been sent to their dealership directly by the manufacturer to assess the work order locally and make their recommendations.

Johnson RV had that full list of problems in the coach since the very first conversation we ever had. They had that full list each time they had my unit in their shop. When the first repairs were made in October, if it was not the right job for Johnson RV to handle, someone should have told me that then and there. And if their dealership wasn’t submitting the warranty claims on my behalf like they said they were, which is absolutely how the process is supposed to go according to Erwin Hymer Group, someone should have told me that then and there, too. Erwin Hymer’s Resolution Team only heard about me when I finally got fed up after 4 full months of total inaction and started making noise at their corporate office directly instead of trusting that all of this was happening. Pretending we are in a process isn’t “goodwill”. It’s bullshit, and it absolutely made this much worse than it needed to be by arbitrarily sucking entire months out of the timeline and, more importantly, my entire budget.

Do I believe Johnson RV did this to make things worse for me on purpose? Hell no — but that doesn’t change the fact that, for whatever reason, they decided to string me along. That is the part of this whole thing that sucks the most, I think, but whatever. I don’t have a time machine.

I also received an email response from Best Time RV in Las Vegas, the dealer who sold me the unit, which included charming gems such as “I was actually just emailing you,” “We have always acted in good faith and according to the law, rules and regulations,” “Now that Erwin Hymer Group is taking care of you, I hope everything goes smooth so you can get on with your tour and not have to worry about your RV,” and some song and dance where he tried to sell me an additional warranty — I guess so Best Time RV can get paid for this AGAIN?! Nothing has ever been more Vegas than this part of the experience in the history of the world. NOTHING!

With all due respect, sir: FUCK YOU.

At this point, if Erwin Hymer doesn’t resume operations and do what they have promised soon, since my Full-Timers RV Insurance (designed for retired couples who live on the road) does not cover manufacturer’s defects, I guess I will fix some things up out of pocket and sell it…but I’m going to sell it for cheap, and I’m pissed about it.

In the meantime, I’ve decided to pivot again professionally. I can’t say more about that just yet, but I have been exploring several pathways toward something super exciting and meaningful, and will absolutely share all of that once I can. My priority right now is reuniting myself with the regular world and I’ve been working diligently to make that happen without having to tour, since touring right now is clearly not one of the options. I somehow have managed to take on all of the stress of a major tour this year without actually going anywhere. Pretty special stuff!

It’s not too late for my part of this horrible story to have a happy ending and, as I mentioned before, even though this has been a really disappointing experience, I am still focused on nature being beautiful in the midst of it all, I still feel thankful that I’ve had such an extended period of time to really sort things out internally, and I still believe that the Erwin Hymer Group intends to do right by me in the end…if they exist. (Which they don’t, so whatever.)

Most of all, in the moment I am just hoping — trusting — that you all know I would come play these songs for you if I could. That was literally the entire point of doing any of this sweeping life change in the first place, and I would have been having release shows back in October when the record came out had our plans worked. I have been really looking forward to seeing you, and we have worked so hard to create such an intimate live show experience. Actually realizing the vision and work in front of you all is just not in the cards right now. I’m really sorry, everybody.

I’m not sure exactly what my next chapter will look like, but whatever my life becomes over the coming weeks and months, I promise you that it won’t be me sitting in this van, waiting for something to happen.

I’ve been feeling like I’m fucked, but really my plans got fucked by somebody else’s scandal. I’m not fucked. I am, however, getting the fuck out of here.

Logan

P.S. If you have ever felt like maybe you should buy one (or all!) of my albums, now would be a REALLY great time to do it. CLICK HERE AND I’LL SEND YOU SIGNED THINGS! 🙂