71-year-old legendary music man, Phil Collins, had gave some worrying health updates. As he was a member of Genesis, and then he made a name as a solo artist, he is one of the legendary names of the music industry.
Unfortunately, he is having some health problems, that as he stated, he can barely hold a drumstick.
Collins was born in 1951, in London, England. He first played a drum, at the age of 3, and at five, he was playing the drum kit that his uncle had made for him.
“The old cliché is, ‘Well, at least it will keep him quiet’,” he had stated.
As he had played with his toy drums, he was able to play it in the boating club of his parents.
“When I started playing seriously, the English beat thing was just happening, the Shadows and bands like that. It was the very early ’60s,”
“I remember buying Please Please Me. I used to put the record player on very loud and set up my drums so I was facing the mirror, that way you don’t look at what you’re doing.”
“Then when I was fourteen I went to a teacher to learn to read drum music. I figured when this rock-and-roll thing finished I would have to make a living playing in a dance band or in an orchestra pit. So I learned to read drum music, but I found that my capacity for reading was not anywhere near as good as actually playing by instinct.” Collins continued.
He was 13 years old, when he was called for a performance in a London production of “Oliver!”. When his parents had learnt that, they had took him to Barbara Speake Stage School in London.
When it was 1970, he saw a paper from the legendary band, Genesis, that they were looking for a drummer that can also be ablo to do backup vocals. As he got auditioned, he got the part.
In 1975, the lead singer of Genesis, Peter Gabriel had left the band, and it was time for Collins to shine.
“I felt exposed. I’d lived all my life behind the security blanket of a drum kit, and suddenly there was nothing except a microphone stand,”
“And the band sounds different from out front. You hear a different kind of balance out front, and it isn’t comfortable. And I didn’t want the job, frankly.”
“I wanted to stay the drummer. We had people down every Monday [auditioning], five or six people, and I would teach them what they had to do. We were writing A Trick Of The Tail and I would teach them some old songs – Firth Of Fifth or whatever – and I ended up sounding better than anyone else,”
“And this [Genesis] was kind of a family. ‘Do we want this person in our family? Will he fit in with the way we do things?’ Anyway, we didn’t find anybody and ended up with me.”
In 1981, he decided to create his solo work, which included his legendary song, In The Air Tonight.
“Well, Genesis got to the point where we’d all write together and then someone would go off and write the lyrics and kind of write the melody that would go over this thing that we’d written. And sometimes, there was a lack of air. It was all very claustrophobic,” Collins said.
“And I kind of always yearned for the space of an R&B record, you know? So one of the things that I said to myself when I started learning how to record at home was whatever doodles I was writing, I would sing. And then anything else I did would have to work around the vocal.”
“So, something like “In The Air Tonight” is a good example where you have an atmosphere and a vocal, and if I’d have given that to Genesis, it would have gotten a lot busier. Any of the songs I’ve done have ended up being busy from a production point of view.”
“Certainly some are a little bit busier than others — I mean “Sussudio,” you know, it’s got all those horn parts.”
Phil Collins had added, “Having been with Genesis for 25 years, I felt it time to change direction in my musical life,”
“For me now it will be music for movies, some jazz projects and of course my solo career. I wish the guys in Genesis all the very best in their future. We remain the best of friends.”
He had three marriages. “People ask me, “Aren’t you embarrassed? You’re putting your private life out for all the world to see.’ It’s like I oughtn’t to let people see that I was hurt, that I cry, that I do unmanly things,”
“But I’m not embarrassed by it.”
On 2015, Genesis had announced their reunion. But when the COVID had shaked the UK, as it did to everywhere on the world, they had postponed their tour.
Collins had stated that his son, Nicholas was going to be at the drums. “Nic is a great drummer, but he is capable of sounding like early Phil. For Mike and I, that was always quite exciting,” had stated by Tony Banks.
“It means you can play some of the songs that you haven’t played with Phil as the drummer for a long time.”
Collins had stated, “I’d love to but you know, I mean, I can barely hold a stick with this hand. So there are certain physical things that get in the way,”
“We’re all men of our age, and I think to some extent, I think it probably is putting it to bed,”
“I think yeah, I think just generally for me, I don’t know if I want to go out on the road anymore.”
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