YouTuber Steve Terreberry (Stevie T) has pulled out as DragonForce’s touring bassist. Stevie T cites serious anxiety issues and panic attacks as the primary reason why he chose to relinquish his spot.

The Stevie T / DragonForce saga began when a fan jokingly asked guitarist Herman Li during a live stream when the YouTuber would be invited to join the group. Li said Stevie would make a fantastic triangle player, which led to a video where Stevie T crushed the triangle to DragonForce.

Following Frederic Leclercq’s departure from DragonForce, the power metal giants capitalized on the viral momentum, inviting Stevie T to play bass on their upcoming tour. Fans of metal and YouTube rejoiced, but the uber collab never took shape.

“I started having what I can only describe as almost mental breakdowns,” Steve said in a new video. “It would get to the point where all I could think about was this tour and it was consuming my mind and my anxieties were just doing crazy. I couldn’t even work on my videos anymore because I was just thinking about the tour constantly. I knew that I was going to have some kind of mental breakdown sometime before or during the tour and I didn’t want that to happen, so I had to call off the tour.”

“It’s not one of my proudest moments, allowing myself to succumb to my anxieties again,” he continues. “And of course I felt like a huge asshole to DragonForce after completely agreeing to do this … This was 100-percent my decision. DragonForce wanted me to be there so bad and I apologize so much for anyone who bought a ticket to come out to see DragonForce with me. I can’t say sorry enough.”

Watch Stevie T’s video above and for DragonForce’s full list of tour dates, click here.