Letter from Dan

Hey everybody.  Dan here, Decyfer Down’s tour bus driver.  I wanted to take a moment to bring you all up to speed on the latest and greatest regarding the new bus.

As you know, for the last decade the Decyfer Down guys have been rocking across the nation delivering the message of the Gospel and Gods love and they have been doing it via numerous Ford and Chevy vans with their equipment trailer in tow behind them.  After circumnavigating the nation countless times and placing almost a million miles on several very cramped, bumpy, and overloaded vans the Decyfer guys found themselves in a position where the need to upgrade to a proper form of transportation had become way overdue.  As they gained notoriety and an ever increasing tour schedule the demands of the road were taking their toll on the band members and they began to dread the long sleepless nights in the van only to arrive at their next show in the morning weary and fatigued from a long night bouncing down the highway taking turns at the wheel.  It was just a matter of time before the odds finally caught up to them and it did on blizzard covered highway in Illinois which resulted in a totaled van that nearly careened off a cliff, a trailer that sheared itself free from the van and some minor injuries to the fellas that probably should have been much worse had God not been looking out for them.   Understanding this need God made a way where there previously seemed no end in sight to the days of van and trailer travel.

Last Summer they learned of a bus in Nashville that had come up for sale by Angelos Mobile Ministries.  This bus came at an incredible price and as they prayed and sought counsel regarding this investment it became quite clear that God was opening doors to make this happen.  All the pieces started to fall into place in such a way that it became very plain that the hand of God was at work in this matter.  In fact, one of those pieces that fell into place was my unexpected availability.  In hindsight I can see that God has had his hand in this process for at least the past decade because when Brandon, Josh and I were young goofballs we jokingly made a pact that if they ever made something of this music career and one day acquired a tour bus they wanted me to be their bus driver.  So, a decade later Josh calls me up and….well, here I am.  Go figure!  God works in funny ways, doesn’t He?

Long story short is that they are now the proud stewards of a 1994 Prevost Motor Coach.  I say stewards because in the end it was God that provided this very timely and “not a moment to soon” acquisition for them and they understand it is theirs only in the earthly sense.  The bus is configured with 12 bunk beds, a galley, a small lavatory, and two lounge areas for work and relaxation.  It has an entire lower level dedicated to cargo and a towing capacity that has enabled them to upgrade to a true over the road bus trailer they acquired from the band Building 429.

During the Fall 2009 tour with Skillet and Hawk Nelson the bus not only paid its dues, but quite frankly made the entire tour possible for Decyfer Down.  After each show we loaded everything back into the bus and trailer and immediately hit the road to the next city without having to figure out which band member was going to drive the first leg, where they would stop for breaks or worry about getting any rest before they rolled into the next city.  Before leaving I would perform all the necessary safety checks, climb behind the wheel and hit the road while the guys grabbed some dinner, talked over the show, made plans for the next one, wrote music for the upcoming third album, conducted band business, performed radio interviews and any number of other things, including just simply relaxing.  All things that were totally out of the question in the previous van and trailer days.  As a result they arrived safely in the next city each morning rested and ready to rock another awesome show.…a welcome feeling that their fans deserve.

And while the bus has been an amazing blessing that God has put in their lives to bridge incredible gaps that would not have been manageable any other way, in the end the bus is really just a bucket of bolts shaking, bumping and vibrating itself down the highway with every nut, bolt, washer and gasket trying its hardest to separate itself from the main chassis.  When you take a complex machine such as this and subject it to easily 100,000 miles a year with a relentless touring schedule through all forms of weather North America can throw at it…well, things break and staying ahead of the needed maintenance is more than a full-time task and certainly a sizeable financial investment.
That’s where I come in.  There are times in your life when you can look back on the paths you have walked and see how God was grooming and preparing you for something.  When that culminating moment arrives and all of your life experience and skills are put to work is pretty exciting.  I had a moment such as this last Fall during the Awake & Alive tour.  It took every bit of experience and knowledge I had gathered over the years to keep the bus in shape and running healthy for the entire two and a half months and 22,000 miles we put on it.  After a career in aviation, security, the defensive tactics industry and commercial vehicle operations I find myself in a position to call on all these skills in my present position with the band.  Just another example of one of the many things that God has put in place to not only continue the ministry of Decyfer Down, but take it to the next level.

This bus is an amazing piece of machinery that God has blessed them with, but it requires constant preventative maintenance in order to stay ahead of what I lightheartedly refer to as the Gremlin Army.  Gremlins are mythical creatures with an insatiable desire to cause malfunctions and mechanical problems in all sorts of machinery.  As a result of chasing incredible quantities of “marauding gremlins” from one end of the bus to the next I have affectionately referred to our new bus as the Gremlin Nest.  Actually the bus has acquired a couple of different names, but I seem to come back to this one the most frequently.  With all the countless gremlins I have discolored my greasy hands searching and destroying in the past several months a few outstanding ones remain and need to be exterminated once and for all.

We have generated a list of remaining maintenance items that require professional level attention from the technicians at the Prevost service center in Nashville before we feel as though we can safely launch on the Spring tour this march with Disciple.  We are making our fans and supporters aware of this need in order that, as God provides, His people would be moved to help support, fund and otherwise offset these costly maintenance requirements.

These final remaining items requiring attention are the last in what once was a long list of continued issues we encountered during the Fall Tour.  Once these items are handled professionally, we will have arrived at a place where we will be able to simply attend to the ongoing preventative maintenance instead of trying to play catch up with the numerous inherited mechanical deficiencies that the bus came with.

If you would like to be a part of the new Decyfer Down “Pit Crew” please prayerfully consider a donation offering that we trust God to multiply exponentially to provide the much needed mechanical attention in the war against the Gremlin Army.  Pretty soon we would like to be able to officially rename her something more befitting her new status as a gremlin free zone!  Help us achieve this goal and keep Decyfer Down on the road rockin out for many thousands more sharing the Gospel and salvation of Jesus Christ in their music and their message.

Looking forward to many more thousands of miles of spreading the Gospel together,
Dan Curry