"Looking forward to tearing it up with The Who again." Zak Starkey and Roger Daltrey confirm drummer's return
Zak Starkey is The Who's drummer again as band kick off rehearsals
Zak Starkey is back with The Who after last year's in-again-out-again saga which saw him fired, re-hired and fired again.
The drummer confirmed he was working with Roger Daltrey and Pete Townshend again in a social media post, not long after Daltrey told an audience in Las Vegas the same thing.
Daltrey was performing a solo show at the Encore Theater in Vegas on Wednesday night when he revealed The Who had been rehearsing with Starkey and that it "sounded great", according to the Las Vegas Journal-Review.
In a post on Threads the next day, Starkey wrote: "Nice one Rog. Looking forward to tearing it up with The Who again.
"The rehearsal was great. I don’t think we’ve ever rehearsed as tough as that. Usually we drink tea and talk about what time we’re going home!"
Starkey had been part of The Who since 1996 when he was fired by the band in April of 2025, before being reinstated just a few days later. But the following month, he was out once again just weeks after the band had announced a North American farewell tour which wrapped up in September.
The first sacking was thought to be sparked by an incident during the band's performance at a Teenage Cancer Trust benefit show at London's Royal Albert Hall.
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Zak said the band were playing The Song is Over when, Daltrey came in a bar too early and took it out on the drummer.
It appears the relationship has now been mended and that The Who will perform live again soon.
Their 2025 American dates were billed as The Song Is Over farewell tour, but Daltrey and Townshend admitted they likely weren't ready to retire the band.
Stef wrote close to 5,000 stories during his time as assistant online news editor and later as online news editor between 2014-2016. An accomplished reporter and journalist, Stef has written extensively for a number of UK newspapers and also played bass with UK rock favourites Logan. His favourite bands are Pixies and Clap Your Hands Say Yeah. Stef left the world of rock'n'roll news behind when he moved to his beloved Canada in 2016, but he started on his next 5000 stories in 2022.
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