Our pals at Noisecreep picked up a story about one Dayton, Ohio man on the lam after skipping paying more than 100 bands at last weekend’s Thunder of the Gods Festival in Dripping Springs, Texas. Will Pruett allegedly fled the four-day fest after its second night, leaving the bands and venue owner without pay and canceling the remainder of the event. The fest promised the first US appearance of Stahlhammer as well as performances from Chant, Absu, Helstar, Impaler and more.

With tickets priced between $60 and $150, fans and the bands who made the trip out to Texas are wondering where the money went? A MySpace page set up for the festival has since been removed (last login was May 7), but the last few messages left were from bands, raving mad about how everything went down. One person even chastised Pruett’s selection of vendors. “I’m going to send you a package of this sliding shit that has been falling from my ass for the past two days from the [food from the event]”, wrote one disgruntled patron.

Metal Martyr reports that, on Saturday morning, the bands who were set to perform from that point on discovered that Pruett had fled the scene. He didn’t pay any of the bands, and did not pay for the use of the campgrounds, where the poorly-promoted festival was staged, and that the rest of the festival has been cancelled, leaving dozens of bands stranded at the airport.

According to one report, Absu received a short text message from the promoter soon after it arrived, stating that the concert was cancelled and that nobody was coming to pick them up. Noisecreep tried contacting Pruett, and numbers for him listed under Global Athletic Positioning Firm were disconnected.

Two things my mom always taught me: “never agree to go to a place called Dripping Springs, Texas” and “never screw over a band called Impaler”. So really, lessons to be learned all around.