While it’s unclear what exactly sparked the rumors, the outlet points to an interview Collins gave Mojo magazine in February, in which he said he’s “been sick, I mean very sick…” The drummer’s health has been declining since Genesis’ The Last Domino? Tour in 2022, which was billed as the band’s final performance together. Collins suffers from dislocated vertebrae and nerve damage, some of which “stemmed from all those years playing drums and bad posture,” his son, Nic Collins, explained in a documentary by Drumeo in 2022. The conditions force him to use a cane and have prevented him from playing drums for the past few years. “I keep thinking I should go downstairs to the studio and see what happens but I’m not hungry for it anymore,” Collins also shared in the Mojo interview.
Collins also spoke of his ailments in the Drumeo documentary. “If I can’t do what I did as well as I did it, I’d rather relax and not do anything,” he said. “If I wake up one day and I can hold a pair of drumsticks, then I’ll have a crack of it. But I just feel like I’ve used up my air miles.”
“It’s still kind of sinking in a bit,” he added. “I’ve spent all my life playing drums. To be suddenly not be able to do that is a shock.”
