Belle and Sebastian drummer left in US car park for four hours

The drummer for Scottish band Belle and Sebastian was left by the group at a supermarket car park in the US in his pyjamas.

NEW YORK, NY - JULY 29: Stuart Murdoch of Belle and Sebastian performs at the Panorama Music Festival. Picture: Nicholas Hunt/Getty Images

Richard Colburn had to wait for four hours in a “desolate sport” after being forgotten by his band mates at a Walmart in the town of Dickinson on Tuesday in North Dakota.

With Colburn still in the store the rest of the band, who are currently touring north America, made their way to a gig St Paul in Minneapolis having recently been performing in Missoula, Montana.

The late-night stop meant that when the band returned to their bus they went to bed meaning they were unaware that Colburn was still in the store. It wasn’t until they were across state lines, having travelled around 500 miles, that there was a realisation the band was one short.

After waiting for hours, Colburn opted to venture to a hotel and use his credit card to check in.

Singer Stuart Murdoch told The Current, a Minneapolis radio show: “I was coming out the Walmart and he was coming into the Walmart and he was waving very happily in a good mood and that was the last time that we saw him.

“He was probably thinking that someone was going to notice but the trouble is that everyone went to bed.

He added: “There used to be a system, but because we all have mobile phones these days, everybody’s got a little bit blasé.

“It used to be that you would leave a pass on the passenger seat for the last person and that’s how the driver knew.

“Richard didn’t have his phone with him.”

The band, who formed in 1996, then used social media to help get Colburn to the gig. Which he eventually he did.

Murdoch said: “We didn’t know how we were going to get him from that desolate spot to St Paul, so we tweeted and lots of kind people tweeted me back saying ‘I’m in Fargo, maybe I could get there, I’m in Bismark, maybe we could work something out’. I even had a friend who was driving down from Winnipeg on the way to the show here.

“So currently we have him in a car driving to Bismark and the only question is will they let him on the plane with no ID and in his pyjamas.”

The band have since posted to say that Colburn was now “safely back in the fold”.