Agree, and unfortunately, these type stories are common. I've experienced it several times myself, or seen or heard of it happening to others I know, and of course, you can find TONS of stories like this at TGP.
We had a band all put together my freshman year at collage. (I've told the story before about the other guitar player and his Mesa Mark II). Well, he was a much better singer than guitar player. He wasn't bad, but was a really good singer who could not only sing, but had stage presence, worked a crowd etc. So after just a couple practices, he decided we'd be better with just me playing guitar and him just singing. The drummer and bass player were good, tight and had been playing together for a while so things came together very quickly after I joined. They had actually been practicing as a 3 piece for months, but singer wasn't keeping up on guitar, and wasn't as good at singing while trying to play guitar. So after I joined things went very fast. We had 10 songs down after two practices. Basically, everyone showed up knowing their parts and it was almost too easy...
So we book a gig. A good sized one with over 1000 people expected to attend for our first gig. An hour before the gig, we were completely set up, tuned up, guitars on stands on stage and out mingling, waiting for the show... but no singer. 30 minutes before, still no singer. 15 before, no singer. Showtime... no singer. We were getting more embarrassed by the minute. 30 minutes after the show was supposed to start, we decided to play a couple instrumentals... that we had never played together before, but songs we all knew and just figured we could jam on. It actually went well. But we were so disappointed (and concerned) at what was happening that we weren't really showing out. Then we got the idea to get someone else to sing a couple songs that we knew. That didn't go well after a few hours of partying (college crowd).
In the end, we played for 35 minutes or so and that was it. The singer was THE artsy one in the band. He was big into (and VERY GOOD at) the college theater group. He was USED to preforming in front of people, and he was talented. We didn't see him all weekend. We were afraid he'd been in a wreck or something... Apparently he got so nervous about the gig that he went home from school for the weekend! Without telling anyone. I hardly knew any of the other three guys before our few weeks together, but we got close fast and like I said, the other 3 were already friends and had played together (all upper classman). When he returned on Monday, the drummer and bass player found out what he did and immediately disbanded. They asked me to stay with them, so I did, but 3 weeks later we hadn't found a (good) singer yet and basketball started so I was out. I would have stayed if we had something going, but trying to start again with daily basketball practice and games every weekend didn't work. Auditioning singers was... a joke. As was mentioned in another thread here today, it's really hard to believe how many people "think" they can sing well, who really can't sing well at all. But really I was just discouraged because we had a really good thing going and one guy flaked out and poof, it was gone. I learned in just a few weeks just how fickle the band scene can be. I actually thought we really had something going, and it didn't last a month!
And some of you already know my band story from 15 years or so ago. That one was pretty funny as well.