Journey's frontman vows to quit band pending online fan vote
Singer's decision to create poll comes after video of disastrous Rio concert surfaces
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Journey’s lead singer is asking the band’s fan base to hold on to that feelin’ after a recent trouble-filled performance at the Rock in Rio Festival in Brazil.
Arnel Pineda, the classic rock band’s Filipino frontman recruited from YouTube, recently found video footage circulating online that showed him having issues with his ear monitors and struggling to reach the right notes during last week’s show in Rio de Janeiro.
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The vocalist, who has been with Journey since 2007, was so affected by his performance and subsequent criticism that he offered an online poll for fans to determine his future with the rock band.
“No one more than me in this world feels so devastated about this,” Pineda wrote on Facebook. “It’s really amazing how 1 thousand right things you have done will be forgotten just cause of THIS.
“Mentally and emotionally, I’ve suffered already, and I’m still suffering … but I’ll be ok.”
The singer is asking the Don’t Stop Believin’ band’s fans to vote on how the group should move forward after the forgettable Rio show.
“So here’s the deal here now,” he wrote. “I am offering you a chance now (especially those who’s hated me and never liked me from the very beginning) to simply text GO or STAY right here.
“If GO reaches 1million … I’m stepping out for good … are you game folks?”
He thanked “all of the fans and friends” who believed in him since Day 1.
Journey guitarist Neal Schon discovered Pineda on YouTube years ago. He encouraged his bandmate to forget the haters.
“Arnel dont listen to these blogs,” he wrote online. “They are all bought. You’ve kicked ass!”
The band’s original lead singer Steve Perry — known as “The Voice” — left the band for good in the late 1990s.
Journey, whose others major hits include Faithfully, Open Arms and Wheel in the Sky, recruited Steve Augeri as the new frontman and he left in 2006 due to vocal issues.
Pineda was flown to the U.S. from Manila to join the band in 2007.
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