Pigboat's Mark Belanger announces he's being treated for cancer

Pigboat's singer/guitarist, Mark Belanger, has revealed that he's been undergoing treatment for lymphoma.  In a Facebook post from July 3rd, he went into detail about the diagnosis in April and the treatments that started in May. The success rate of this treatment is around 87 to 91% so as long as everything goes right, he should be back playing soon. As someone on the "inside" that has known about the diagnosis since it happened, I'm really happy that Mark made the decision to go public with it.

His statement explained:

"When this all started going down, I made a conscious decision to keep it off Facebook and the like. Not because I didn’t think people wouldn’t care, but quite the opposite. It was hard enough dealing with the uncertainty of what was going to happen, telling the people that I HAD to tell that I had cancer, leaving the best job I’ve ever had, and preparing myself for being out of work for several months. I figured that having my phone blowing up with messages would just be a constant reminder that things would never quite be the same again, especially in the early stages when what the process would be like is an anxious mystery. I was certain that I needed heavy intravenous drugs. I was less certain that I needed “10,000 pictures of cats walking on beaches saying inspirational words” as I tended to put it to people that I discussed this with."

With Mark's announcement, I'm also happy to reveal that members of the Portland music scene have been secretly planning benefit shows to help him with the big medical bills. Starting August 8th, there will be a series of 4 shows in Portland with some of the biggest names in the Maine music scene all playing to help Mark.

"RELENTLESS BELANGER"
a series of four local shows to help one of the music scene's best friends and biggest supporters

Thurs Aug 8 @ Genos
Eastern Spell
Gimme Goldar
Cryptic Overcast
Sylvia
Dead By Now

Fri Aug 9 @ Genos
Johnny Cremains
Hessian
Man-Witch
Covered in Bees

Sat Aug 10 @ Asylum
Rotors To Rust
Murcielago
Whitcomb
Tripe
& special guests

Sun Aug 11 @ Big Easy
Twisted Roots
Paranoid Social Club
6Gig

Tix to each show $8
Benefit T-Shirts $10

Sanctuary Tattoo Raffle $5 tix or 5/$20
Winners get $250/$150/$50 credit to Sanctuary Tattoo
Raffle tix on sale now at Sanctuary and at individual shows

All money raised goes to assist Mark during his battle with cancer, which he will win most successfully!