More like The Rolling Bones.
Charlie Watts, 80, the drummer for the greatest rock band in history, will miss this year’s 13-city U.S. tour by The Rolling Stones after having emergency surgery.
What surgery Watts underwent was not disclosed, but it was a “completely successful” medical procedure, according to reports.
“For once my timing has been a little off,” the legendary drummer and a Stones’ founding members said, according to the Daily Mail. “I am working hard to get fully fit but I have today accepted on the advice of the experts that this will take a while,” said Watts, who also underwent treatment for throat cancer in 2004.
Watts was psyched to get back on the road, disheartened by delays prompted by the COVID-19 pandemic. And like a true entertainer, he said the show must go on.
“’I am working hard to get fully fit but I have today accepted on the advice of the experts that this will take a while,” he said. “After all the fans’ suffering caused by COVID I really do not want the many RS fans who have been holding tickets for this Tour to be disappointed by another postponement or cancellation.”
“I have therefore asked my great friend Steve Jordan to stand in for me,” Watts said of the drummer who joined in on Stones’ guitarist Keith Richards’ side project, the X-Pensive Winos.
“With rehearsals starting in a couple of weeks it’s very disappointing to say the least, but it’s also fair to say no one saw this coming,” a spokesman said, according to the New York Post.
Jordan told Variety that it was “an absolute honor and a privilege to be Charlie’s understudy.”
“No one will be happier than me to give up my seat on the drum-riser as soon as Charlie tells me he is good to go,” he said.
The Stones have been performing since the 1960s. But now all of them are in their 70s, with Watts turning 80 in June.
Stones’ frontman Mick Jagger, 78, underwent heart valve replacement surgery in 2019, prompting the band to cancel its planned tour. But in no time he once again had moves like, well, Mick Jagger.
— Mick Jagger (@MickJagger) May 15, 2019
On Watts, Jagger said: The band “really look forward to welcoming Charlie back as soon as he is fully recovered.”
Meanwhile, the band’s 74-year-old guitarist, Ronnie Wood, also suffered health problems, battling cancer for a second time. Wood told The Sun he was diagnosed with rare and aggressive small-cell cancer last year. “I’ve had cancer two different ways now,” he said. “I came through with the all-clear.”
Jagger is ready to rock. “I’m so excited to get back on the stage again and want to thank everyone for their patience he said. “See you soon!” The Stones tour is set to begin Sept. 26.