Chris Slade, the Welsh drummer best-known for his stints with AC/DC, has announced his retirement.
Slade was brought into the band after previous incumbent of the drummer’s stool Simon Wright left in 1989. He played on The Razor’s Edge album and the accompanying world tour, but left in 1994 when Malcolm Young intimated they wanted to bring Phil Rudd back into the band.
The decision to retire at the age of 79 comes after he suffered a stroke seven years ago. Announcing the news on social media, Slade wrote: ”Hello, everybody. It’s with a heavy heart that I’m announcing my retirement from drumming.”
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“I’m near enough 80 years old. I’ve been drumming professionally since I was 16 with Tom Jones. I’ve had a good innings. And thank you all for coming to the shows.
“So, what happened was that I had a stroke, as you probably know, about seven years ago. A small stroke, but it’s got worse. And I’m afraid that has screwed me up. I’m really jealous of people like The Stones or Paul McCartney who are going well into their 80s, and I wanted to do that. But it looks like I can’t. So, as I say, with a heavy heart, it’s bye for now.”
As he mentioned in his statement, Slade’s career goes back to the mid -60s and a stint behind the kit for Tom Jones. He later joined Manfred Mann’s Earth Band and his CV has a long list of diverse names on it – he’s played with Frankie Miller, Asia, Uriah Heep, Gary Numan, David Gilmour and Jimmy Page’s post-Zeppelin outfit, The Firm.
Slade rejoined AC/DC in 2015. You might recall that this was when Phil Rudd was in all sorts of legal trouble – his house in New Zealand had been raided and he was accused of possessing amphetamine, cannabis and – more seriously – hiring a hitman and attempting to kill two people.
Those charges were later dropped, but with Rudd unable to take part in the band’s Rock Or Bust world tour, Slade stepped into the breach. He stayed until 2020 when he was announced that he had left once more before the release of that year’s Power Up album.
