title: Phil Collins

text: In July 1970, the rock band Genesis had signed with Charisma Records and recorded their second album "Trespass" (1970), but suffered a setback following the departures of drummer John Mayhew and guitarist Anthony Phillips. They decided to continue, and placed an advert in the "Melody Maker" for a drummer "sensitive to acoustic music" and a 12-string acoustic guitarist. Collins recognised Charisma owner Tony Stratton-Smith's name on it, and he and Caryl went for the auditions. The group, who had been a full-time working band for less than a year, consisted of school friends from Charterhouse School, a private boarding school: singer Peter Gabriel, keyboardist Tony Banks, and bassist/guitarist Mike Rutherford. Collins and Caryl arrived early, so Collins took a swim in the pool at Gabriel's parents' house and memorised the pieces the drummers before him were playing. He recalled: "They put on 'Trespass', and my initial impression was of a very soft and round music, not edgy, with vocal harmonies, and I came away thinking Crosby, Stills and Nash." On 8 August 1970, Collins became their fifth drummer. Genesis then took a two-week holiday, during which Collins earned money as an exterior decorator. Rutherford thought Caryl was not a good fit; in 1971, the band enlisted Steve Hackett.


title: Phil Collins

text: From 1970 to 1975, Collins played drums, percussion, and largely sang backing vocals on Genesis albums and concerts. His first album as a member, "Nursery Cryme", features the acoustic song "For Absent Friends" that has Collins singing lead vocal. He sang "More Fool Me" on their 1973 album "Selling England by the Pound". In 1974, during the recording of "The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway", Collins played drums on Brian Eno's second album "Taking Tiger Mountain (By Strategy)" after Eno had contributed electronic effects to two songs on the album.


title: Phil Collins

text: In August 1975, Gabriel's departure from the band was publicly announced. Genesis advertised for a replacement in "Melody Maker" and received around 400 replies. After a lengthy auditioning process, during which he sang backup vocals for applicants, Collins became the band's lead vocalist during the recording of their album "A Trick of the Tail". The album was a commercial and critical success, reaching number 3 in the UK charts and 31 in the US. "Rolling Stone" wrote that Genesis "has managed to turn the possible catastrophe of Gabriel's departure into their first broad-based American success." For the tour, Collins accepted former Yes and King Crimson drummer Bill Bruford to play drums while Collins sang. "Wind & Wuthering" was the last Genesis album recorded with Hackett before he left the group. In 1976, Collins brought in American drummer Chester Thompson, formerly of Frank Zappa and Weather Report who became a mainstay of Genesis' and Collins' backing bands until 2010. When Collins, Banks, and Rutherford decided to continue Genesis as a trio in 1977, they recorded "...And Then There Were Three...". This marked a shift from their progressive rock roots to a more radio-friendly, pop rock sound, and included the band's first UK Top 10 and US Top 40 single, "Follow You Follow Me". The level of commercial success that Genesis had reached by this time allowed Collins and his wife to move into Old Croft, a home in Shalford, Surrey, in the spring of 1978.


title: Phil Collins

text: Collins pursued various guest spots and solo projects from his time as Genesis's drummer. In 1973, he and Hackett were among the musicians that performed on the solo debut of ex-Yes guitarist Peter Banks. In 1975, Collins sang and played drums, vibraphone, and percussion on Hackett's first solo album, "Voyage of the Acolyte"; performed on Eno's albums "Another Green World", "Before and After Science", and "Music for Films"; and replaced drummer Phil Spinelli of the jazz fusion group Brand X before recording their first two albums, "Unorthodox Behaviour" and "Moroccan Roll". Collins played percussion on "Johnny the Fox" by Thin Lizzy, and sang on Anthony Phillips' debut solo album, "The Geese & the Ghost".


title: Phil Collins

text: After Genesis finished touring in December 1978, the group went on hiatus after Collins went to Vancouver, Canada to try and save his failing marriage. The attempt failed, leaving his wife to return to England with their children while living apart. Collins returned to Old Croft, their home in Shalford, Surrey, and their divorce was finalised in 1981. Banks and Rutherford were recording their first solo albums during this time, so Collins rejoined Brand X for their album "Product" and its accompanying tour, played on John Martyn's album "Grace and Danger", and started writing demos of his own at home. This was followed by Genesis resuming activity and recording and touring through 1980 with their album "Duke" (1980). The three members contributed two tracks each; Collins put forward "Please Don't Ask" and "Misunderstanding".


title: Phil Collins

text: In February 1981, Collins released his debut solo album "Face Value". He signed with Virgin Records and WEA for American distribution in order to distance himself from the Charisma label, and oversaw every step of its production; he wrote the liner notes himself and by hand. His divorce was the focus of its lyrical themes and song titles: "I had a wife, two children, two dogs, and the next day I didn't have anything. So a lot of these songs were written because I was going through these emotional changes." Collins produced the album in collaboration with Hugh Padgham, with whom he had worked on Peter Gabriel's self-titled 1980 album. "Face Value" reached number one on the UK Albums Chart. It was also an international success, reaching number one in six other countries and number seven in the US where it went on to sell 5 million copies. "In the Air Tonight", the album's lead single, became a hit and reached number two in the UK charts. The song is known for the gated reverb effect used on Collins's drums, a technique developed by Padgham when he worked as an engineer on Gabriel's song "Intruder", on which Collins played drums.


title: Phil Collins

text: Following an invitation by record producer Martin Lewis, Collins performed live as a solo artist at an Amnesty International benefit show The Secret Policeman's Other Ball at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane in London in September 1981, performing "In the Air Tonight" and "The Roof Is Leaking". Collins also worked again with John Martyn in this year, producing his album "Glorious Fool". In September 1981, Genesis released "Abacab". This was followed by its 1981 supporting tour and a two-month tour in 1982 promoting the Genesis live album "Three Sides Live". In early 1982, Collins produced and played on "Something's Going On", the third solo album by Anni-Frid Lyngstad of ABBA, and performed most of the drum parts on "Pictures at Eleven", the first solo album by Led Zeppelin singer Robert Plant. In October 1982, Collins took part in the one-off Genesis reunion concert Six of the Best held at the Milton Keynes Bowl in Buckinghamshire, which marked the return of Gabriel on lead vocals and Hackett on guitar.


title: Phil Collins

text: Collins's second solo album, "Hello, I Must Be Going!", was released in November 1982. His marital problems continued to provide inspiration for his songs, including "I Don't Care Anymore" and "Do You Know, Do You Care". The album reached number 2 in the UK and number 8 in the US, where it sold 3 million copies. Its second single, a cover of "You Can't Hurry Love" by the Supremes, became Collins's first UK number one single and went to number 10 in the US. Collins supported the album with the "Hello, I Must Be Going!" tour of Europe and North America from November 1982 to February 1983. Following the tour, Collins played drums on Plant's second solo album, "The Principle of Moments", and produced and played on two tracks for Adam Ant's album "Strip", "Puss 'n Boots" and the title track. In May 1983, Collins, Banks and Rutherford recorded a self-titled Genesis album; its tour ended with five shows in Birmingham, England in February 1984. The latter shows were filmed and released as "Genesis Live – The Mama Tour".


title: Phil Collins

text: Collins wrote and performed on "Against All Odds", the main theme for the romantic film of the same name, which demonstrated a more pop-oriented and commercially accessible sound than his previous work. Released in February 1984, it was the first single of his solo career to reach number one on the "Billboard" Hot 100 chart; it peaked at number two in the UK. Collins won a Grammy Award for Best Pop Vocal Performance, Male. The song also earned him an Academy Award nomination for Best Original Song, and he arranged his 1985 tour to accommodate the possibility of performing it at the awards ceremony. However, a note to Atlantic Records from show producer Larry Gelbart explaining a lack of invitation stated: "Thank you for your note regarding Phil Cooper [sic]. I'm afraid the spots have already been filled", and Collins watched actress and dancer Ann Reinking perform it. The "Los Angeles Times" said: "Reinking did an incredible job of totally destroying a beautiful song." Collins would introduce it at subsequent concerts by saying: "I'm sorry Miss Ann Reinking couldn't be here tonight; I guess I just have to sing my own song."


title: Phil Collins

text: In 1984, Collins contributed to the production on "Chinese Wall" by Earth, Wind & Fire vocalist Philip Bailey, which included a duet from the two, "Easy Lover". The song was number one in the UK for four weeks, and peaked at number 2 in the US. He also produced and played drums on several tracks on "Behind the Sun" by Eric Clapton. In November, Collins was part of the charity supergroup Band Aid in aid of Ethiopian famine relief and played drums on its single, "Do They Know It's Christmas?".


title: Phil Collins

text: Collins's third album, "No Jacket Required", was recorded in 1984 and marked a turning point in his output. He departed from lyrics about his personal life and wrote more upbeat and dance-orientated songs with strong hooks and melodies, such as "Sussudio", "One More Night", "Take Me Home". The album also guest backing vocals from Sting, Peter Gabriel, and Helen Terry. "No Jacket Required" was released in February 1985 and became a huge worldwide success, reaching number one in several countries. "Sussudio" and "One More Night" topped the US singles chart, and "Don't Lose My Number" and "Take Me Home" made the US top ten. The album remains Collins's most successful of his career, selling over 12 million copies in the US and 1.9 million in the UK.


title: Phil Collins

text: Although the album was criticised for being overly commercial, David Fricke of "Rolling Stone" wrote: "After years on the art-rock fringe, Collins has established himself firmly in the middle of the road. Perhaps he should consider testing himself and his new fans's expectations next time around." "Sussudio" attracted negative attention for sounding too similar to Prince's "1999", a charge that Collins did not deny, and its hook line has been named as the most widely disliked element of his career. "No Jacket Required" earned Collins the first two of his six Brit Awards, winning Best British Male and Best British Album. Collins scored three US number one songs in 1985, the most by any artist that year. "No Jacket Required" won three Grammy Awards including Album of the Year.


title: Phil Collins

text: The No Jacket Required World Tour saw Collins perform 85 shows between February and July 1985. On 13 July, Collins took part in the Live Aid concerts, a continuation of the fundraising effort started by Band Aid. Collins was the only performer to appear at the London concert at Wembley Stadium and the US concert at JFK Stadium in Philadelphia on the same day. After performing "Against All Odds", "In the Air Tonight", and playing alongside Sting, Collins flew to Philadelphia on a Concorde to perform his solo material, play drums for Clapton, and drum with Plant and Jimmy Page for a Led Zeppelin reunion. The latter performance was poorly received and later disowned by the band. Page later said that Collins had not learned his parts for the set. Collins responded that the band "weren't very good", that a "dribbling" Page had made him feel uncomfortable, and only continued with the set rather than leave the stage in order to avoid negative attention. In November 1985, the song "Separate Lives", a duet featuring Collins and Marilyn Martin for the musical drama film "White Nights", was released and became a US number one hit.


title: Phil Collins

text: By the end of 1985, the music press noted that Collins's astronomical success as a solo artist had made him more popular than Genesis. Before the release of "No Jacket Required", Collins insisted that he would not leave the band and that he felt "happier with what we're doing now, because I feel it's closer to me." In October 1985, he reunited with Banks and Rutherford to record Genesis's thirteenth album, "Invisible Touch". Released in 1986, it became the group's biggest selling album with 6 million copies sold in the US, and 1.2 million sold in the UK. Its title track was released as a single and reached No. 1 in the US, the only Genesis song to do so. The group received a Grammy Award (their only one) and a nomination for the MTV Video Music Award for Video of the Year in 1987 for "Land of Confusion", which features puppet caricatures from the British satirical program "Spitting Image". Several music critics drew comparisons between the album and Collins's solo work, but "Rolling Stone"'s J. D. Considine praised the album's commercial appeal, stating, "every tune is carefully pruned so that each flourish delivers not an instrumental epiphany but a solid hook". March 1986 saw the release of "No One Is to Blame", a hit single by Howard Jones which included Collins on drums, backing vocals, and co-production alongside Padgham. Collins was one of the drummers, backing vocalists, and producers on Eric Clapton's 1986 album "August".


title: Phil Collins

text: After touring with Genesis in 1987, Collins was aware that his music had gained too much exposure and took a year off from writing and recording. He took on his first acting role since the late 1960s, starring as Buster Edwards opposite Julie Walters (who played his wife, June) in the romantic comedy drama-crime film "Buster" which centred around the Great Train Robbery from 1963 in Ledburn, Buckinghamshire. Reviews for the film were mixed and controversy ensued over its subject matter; Prince Charles and Princess Diana declined an invitation to the première after it was accused of glorifying crime. Collins contributed four songs to the film's soundtrack; his ballad rendition of "A Groovy Kind of Love", originally by the Mindbenders, became his only single to reach No. 1 in the UK and the US. The film also spawned the US #1 single "Two Hearts", which he co-wrote with Lamont Dozier and won the pair a Golden Globe for Best Original Song and an Oscar nomination in the same category. Film critic Roger Ebert said Collins "played [the role of Buster] with surprising effectiveness". In 1988, Collins was the subject of an episode of the British TV series "This Is Your Life".


title: Phil Collins

text: In August 1989, Collins appeared as a special guest for The Who on their 1989 tour for two shows, performing "Fiddle About" as Uncle Ernie and "Tommy's Holiday Camp" from their rock opera "Tommy" (1969).


title: Phil Collins

text: From April to October 1989, Collins recorded his fourth album "...But Seriously" in England and Los Angeles, which saw him address social and political themes in his lyrics. The album was released in November 1989 to worldwide commercial success, spending No. 1 in the UK for fifteen weeks and in the US for three. It became the UK's best-selling album of 1990 and is among the best-selling albums in UK chart history. It is the second best-selling album in Germany. Its lead single "Another Day in Paradise" is an anti-homelessness song and features David Crosby singing backing vocals. Upon its release in October 1989, it went to No. 1 in the US to become the final number one single there of the 1980s. Despite its success, the song was also heavily criticised and became linked to allegations of hypocrisy made against Collins. Responding to criticism of the song, Collins stated: "When I drive down the street, I see the same things everyone else sees. It's a misconception that if you have a lot of money you're somehow out of touch with reality." In 1991, "Another Day in Paradise" won the Grammy Award for Record of the Year. Other songs from "...But Seriously" also reached the top-five in the US: "Something Happened on the Way to Heaven", "Do You Remember?", and "I Wish It Would Rain Down" featuring Eric Clapton on guitar.


title: Phil Collins

text: "...But Seriously" was supported with the Seriously, Live! World Tour which ran between February and October 1990 and covered 121 dates. The tour spawned the live album "Serious Hits... Live!", which sold 1.2 million copies in the UK and over 4 million in the US. In February 1990, Collins performed "Another Day in Paradise" at the 1990 Brit Awards which won British Single of the Year, and in September he performed "Sussudio" at the 1990 MTV Video Music Awards in Los Angeles. He also played drums on the 1989 Tears for Fears single, "Woman in Chains".


title: Phil Collins

text: In 1991, Collins reconvened with Banks and Rutherford to write and record a new Genesis album, "We Can't Dance". It became the band's fifth consecutive No. 1 album in the UK and reached No. 4 in the US, where it sold over 4 million copies. It features the singles "Jesus He Knows Me", "I Can't Dance", "No Son of Mine", and "Hold on My Heart". Collins performed on their 1992 tour. At the 1993 American Music Awards, Genesis won the award for Favorite Pop/Rock Band, Duo, or Group. Collins co-wrote, sang and played on the 1993 single "Hero" by David Crosby.


title: Phil Collins

text: Collins worked on his fifth studio album, "Both Sides", in 1992 and 1993. It marked a departure from his more polished and up-tempo songs on recent albums to material more experimental in nature, with Collins performing all the instruments and producing the record himself, because the songs written "were becoming so personal, so private, I didn't want anyone else's input". The decline of his second marriage was a focal point of the album. Released in November 1993, "Both Sides" reached No. 1 in eight countries, including the UK, and No. 13 in the US. It marked a drop in sales in the latter when compared to his previous records, only reaching a single platinum certification by the end of the year. Its two biggest singles were "Both Sides of the Story" and "Everyday". The Both Sides of the World Tour saw Collins perform 165 shows across four legs between April 1994 and May 1995. Collins turned down the chance to contribute to "Tower of Song", an album of covers of Leonard Cohen songs, due to his touring commitments. On 29 March 1996, Collins's decision to leave Genesis to concentrate on his solo career was publicly announced.


title: Phil Collins

text: In the months surrounding his departure from Genesis, Collins formed the Phil Collins Big Band, seating himself on the drums. He had wanted to undertake the project for some time and felt inspired from the "" project that drummer Neil Peart had put together. Having moved to Switzerland, an invitation to perform at the Montreux Jazz Festival led to the band to come together, which featured Quincy Jones as conductor and Tony Bennett on vocals. The group toured summer jazz festivals in July 1996 with a set of jazz renditions of Genesis and Collins' solo material. Their first date was at the Royal Albert Hall for a Prince's Trust concert with Queen Elizabeth II and Nelson Mandela in attendance. To learn his parts, Collins devised his own notation on sheets. The band then went on hiatus until a US and European tour in the summer of 1998, which spawned the live album "A Hot Night in Paris".


title: Phil Collins

text: In October 1996, Collins released his sixth solo album, "Dance into the Light". It reached No. 4 in the UK and No. 23 in the US. The album was received negatively by the music press and sold less than his previous albums. "Entertainment Weekly" reviewed by saying that "even Phil Collins must know that we all grew weary of Phil Collins". Singles from the album included "Dance into the Light", which reached No. 9 in the UK, and the Beatles-inspired "It's in Your Eyes". The album was certified Gold in the US. Collins toured the album throughout 1997 with his Trip into the Light World Tour, covering 82 dates. He performed "In the Air Tonight" and "Take Me Home" at the Music for Montserrat benefit concert in London alongside Paul McCartney, Elton John, Eric Clapton, Mark Knopfler, and Sting.


title: Phil Collins

text: In October 1998, Collins released his first compilation album "...Hits" which contains a new track, a cover of "True Colors" by Cyndi Lauper that was produced by Kenneth "Babyface" Edmonds. The album was a commercial success worldwide, reaching No. 1 in the UK charts and selling 3.4 million copies in the US by 2012.


title: Phil Collins

text: In the mid-1990s Collins was recruited to write and perform songs for its adventure film "Tarzan" (1999), integrated with a score by Mark Mancina. Collins also sang his songs in French, Italian, German, and Spanish for the dubbed versions of the film's soundtrack. His song "You'll Be in My Heart" was released in June 1999 and spent 19 weeks at No. 1 on the "Billboard" Adult Contemporary chart, the longest time ever up to that point. In 2000, the song won Collins an Academy Award and a Golden Globe Award, both for Best Original Song. He performed "Two Worlds" at that year's ceremony and the Disney-themed Super Bowl halftime show.


title: Phil Collins

text: In June 1999, Collins was awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. In 2000, he became partially deaf in one ear due to a viral infection. In June 2002, Collins accepted an invitation to drum for the house band at the Party at the Palace concert held on the grounds of Buckingham Palace, an event which celebrated Queen Elizabeth II's Golden Jubilee. In 2002, he received the Disney Legend award.


title: Phil Collins

text: On 11 November 2002, Collins released his seventh solo album, "Testify". Metacritic's roundup of album reviews found this record to be the worst-reviewed album at the time of its release, though it has since been surpassed by three more recent releases. The album's single "Can't Stop Loving You" (a Leo Sayer cover) was a number-one Adult Contemporary hit. "Testify" sold 140,000 copies in the US by year's end.


title: Phil Collins

text: Disney hired Collins to compose and perform on the soundtrack to its 2003 animated feature "Brother Bear", which included the song "Look Through My Eyes". In the same year he was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame. From June 2004 to November 2005, Collins performed his First Final Farewell Tour, a reference to the multiple farewell tours of other popular artists. In 2006, he worked with Disney on a musical production of Tarzan.


title: Phil Collins

text: Collins reunited with Banks and Rutherford and announced on 7 November 2006, nearly 40 years after the band first formed. The tour took place during summer 2007, and played in twelve countries across Europe, followed by a second leg in North America. During the tour Genesis performed at the Live Earth concert at Wembley Stadium, London. In 2007 they were honoured at the second annual VH1 Rock Honors, performing "Turn It On Again", "No Son of Mine" and "Los Endos" at the ceremony in Las Vegas. On 22 May 2008 Collins received his sixth Ivor Novello Award from the British Academy of Songwriters, Composers and Authors when he was presented the International Achievement Award at a ceremony held at the Grosvenor House Hotel, London.


title: Phil Collins

text: In October 2009, it was reported that Collins was to record a Motown covers album. He told a German newspaper, "I want the songs to sound exactly like the originals", and that the album would feature up to 30 songs. In January 2010, Chester Thompson said that the album had been completed and would be released some time soon. He also revealed that Collins managed to play the drums on the album despite a spinal operation. The resulting album, "Going Back", was released on 13 September 2010. It reached number one on the UK Albums Chart. In summer 2010, Collins played six concerts with the music from "Going Back". These included a special programme, "Phil Collins: One Night Only", aired on ITV1 on 18 September 2010. Collins also promoted "Going Back" with his first and only appearance on the BBC's music series "Later... with Jools Holland", broadcast on 17 September 2010.


title: Phil Collins

text: In March 2010, Collins was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of Genesis at a ceremony in New York City. As of January 2011, Collins has spent 1,730 weeks in the German music charts—766 weeks of them with Genesis albums and singles and 964 weeks with solo releases. On 4 March 2011, citing health problems and other concerns, Collins announced that he was taking time off from his career, prompting widespread reports of his retirement. On 7 March his UK representative told the press, "He is not, has no intention of, retiring." However, later that day, Collins posted a message to his fans on his own website, confirming his intention to retire to focus on his family life. In July 2012, Collins's greatest hits collection "...Hits" re-entered the US charts, reaching No. 6 on the "Billboard" 200.


title: Phil Collins

text: In November 2013, Collins told German media that he was considering a return to music and speculated that this could mean further live shows with Genesis, stating: "Everything is possible. We could tour in Australia and South America. We haven't been there yet." Speaking to reporters in Miami, Florida in December 2013 at an event promoting his charity work, Collins indicated that he was writing music once again and might tour again.


title: Phil Collins

text: On 24 January 2014, Collins announced in an interview with "Inside South Florida" that he was writing new compositions with fellow English singer Adele. Collins said he had no idea who Adele was when he learned she wanted to collaborate with him. He said "I wasn't actually too aware [of her]. I live in a cave." Collins agreed to join her in the studio after hearing her voice. He said, "[She] achieved an incredible amount. I really love her voice. I love some of this stuff she's done, too." However, in September 2014, Collins revealed that the collaboration had ended and he said it had been "a bit of a non-starter". In May 2014, Collins gave a live performance of "In the Air Tonight" and "Land of Confusion" with young student musicians at the Miami Country Day School in Miami, Florida. Collins was asked to perform there by his sons, who are students at the school. In August 2014, Collins was reported to have accepted an invitation to perform in December at a benefit concert in Miami in aid of his Little Dreams Foundation charity. He ultimately missed the concert due to illness.


title: Phil Collins

text: In May 2015, Collins signed a deal with Warner Music Group to have his solo albums remastered and reissued with previously unreleased material. In October of that year, he announced that he was no longer retired and had started plans to tour and make a new album. By mid-2016, all eight of his albums were reissued with the artwork updated to display Collins as his older self, the exception being "Going Back", which had a new cover. In 2019, the additional digital only releases "Other Sides" and "Remixed Sides" followed.


title: Phil Collins

text: In October 2016, Collins's autobiography "Not Dead Yet" was published. At a press conference held at the Royal Albert Hall in the same month, Collins announced his Not Dead Yet Tour which initially took form as a short European trek from June 2017. The tour included five nights at the Royal Albert Hall which sold out in fifteen seconds, prompting the announcement of Collins's headline spot at the 2017 BST Hyde Park festival which became his largest solo concert. His band included his son Nicolas on the drums. A review in "The Telegraph" stated: "Unlike the body, the voice is largely unravaged by time. It's still soulful, sometimes silky, occasionally bruised." In 2017, the tour was extended worldwide and ran until October 2019 for a total of 97 shows.


title: Phil Collins

text: In March 2020, Collins, Banks, and Rutherford announced they had reformed Genesis once more to undertake The Last Domino? Tour. This time the band were joined by Collins's son Nic on the drums, leaving his father to handle lead vocals. After the tour was rescheduled twice due to the COVID-19 pandemic, it began in September 2021 and finished in London on 26 March 2022. At the last show, at the O Arena in London, Collins said on stage: "It's the last show for Genesis".


title: Phil Collins

text: In his book on the "legends" who defined progressive rock drumming, American drummer Rich Lackowski wrote: "Phil Collins's grooves in early Genesis recordings paved the way for many talented drummers to come. His ability to make the drums bark with musicality and to communicate so convincingly in odd time signatures left many a drummer tossing on the headphones and playing along to Phil's lead." In 2014, readers of "Rhythm" voted Collins the fourth most influential progressive rock drummer for his work on the 1974 Genesis album "The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway". In 2015, MusicRadar named Collins one of the six pioneers of progressive rock drumming. In 2005, Planet Rock listeners voted Collins the fifth greatest rock drummer in history. Collins was ranked tenth in "The Greatest Drummers of All Time" list by "Gigwise" and number nine in a list of "The 20 greatest drummers of the last 25 years" by MusicRadar in 2010. In 1987, Collins looked back at his fast playing in Brand X and early Genesis: "I actually can't play like that anymore".


title: Phil Collins

text: Late Foo Fighters drummer Taylor Hawkins cited Collins as one of his drumming heroes. He said, "Collins is an incredible drummer. Anyone who wants to be good on the drums should check him out – the man is a master." In the April 2001 issue of "Modern Drummer", Dream Theater drummer Mike Portnoy named Collins in an interview when asked about drummers he was influenced by and had respect for. In another conversation in 2014, Portnoy lauded his "amazing progressive drumming" back in the early and mid-1970s. Rush drummer Neil Peart praised his "beautiful drumming" and "lovely sound" on the 1973 Genesis album "Selling England by the Pound", which he called "an enduring masterpiece of drumming". Marco Minnemann, drummer for artists including Joe Satriani and Steven Wilson, described Collins as "brilliant" for the way "he composes his parts, and the sounds he gets". He said, "Phil is almost like John Bonham to me. I hear his personality, his perspective." He singled out the drumming on "In the Air Tonight" as an example of "ten notes that everybody knows" and concluded "Phil is a insanely talented drummer."


title: Phil Collins

text: Other drummers who have cited him as an influence or expressed admiration for his drumming work are Brann Dailor of Mastodon, Nick D'Virgilio of Spock's Beard and Big Big Train, Jimmy Keegan of Spock's Beard, Matt Mingus of Dance Gavin Dance, John Merryman of Cephalic Carnage, Craig Blundell of Steven Wilson and Frost*, and Charlie Benante of Anthrax. According to Jason Bonham, his father "respected Phil Collins' drumming very much" and one of his favourite songs was Genesis' "Turn It On Again", which he used to love playing with him.


title: Phil Collins

text: "Modern Drummer" readers voted for Collins every year between 1987 and 1991 as Pop/Mainstream Rock drummer of the year. In 2000, he was voted as Big Band drummer of the year. In 2012, he was inducted into the Hall of Fame.


title: Phil Collins

text: Collins is a left-handed drummer, and uses Gretsch drums, Noble & Cooley solid snare drums, Remo heads, Sabian cymbals and he uses his signature Promark sticks. Past kits he used were made by Pearl and Premier.


title: Phil Collins

text: Other instruments associated with Collins's sound (particularly in his post-1978 Genesis and solo career) include the Roland TR-808, Roland TR-909, the Simmons SDS-V electronic drum set, and the LinnDrum drum machines. Collins also used a Roland CR-78, Sequential Circuits Prophet-5 synthesizer, Fender Rhodes electric piano, and a vocoder for his voice. Other Korg instruments include the Wavestation, the Karma and the Trinity.


title: Phil Collins

text: Collins had cameo appearances in Steven Spielberg's "Hook" (1991) and the AIDS docudrama "And the Band Played On" (1993). He starred in "Frauds", which competed for the Palme d'Or at the 1993 Cannes Film Festival. He supplied voices to two animated features: Amblin's "Balto" (1995) and Disney's "The Jungle Book 2" (2003). A long-discussed but never completed project was a film titled "The Three Bears"; originally meant to star Collins, Danny DeVito, and Bob Hoskins. He often mentioned the film, though an appropriate script never materialised. Collins's music is featured in the satirical black comedy film "American Psycho", with psychotic lead character Patrick Bateman (played by Christian Bale) portrayed as an obsessive fan who reads deep meaning into his work, especially with Genesis, while describing his solo music as "...more commercial and therefore more satisfying, in a narrower way." Bateman delivers a monologue praising Collins and Genesis during a sequence in which he engages the services of two prostitutes while playing "In Too Deep" and "Sussudio". Collins told "The New Musical Express": "I don't think him being a psychopath and liking my music is linked – my music was just omnipresent in that era."


title: Phil Collins

text: During the 1980s, Collins was among the celebrities caricatured on the satirical television puppet show "Spitting Image"—the show's creators were then commissioned by Genesis to create puppets of the entire band to appear in their 1986 music video "Land of Confusion". Collins twice hosted the Billboard Music Awards on television, which were produced and directed by his longtime music video and TV special collaborators, Paul Flattery and Jim Yukich of FYI (Flattery Yukich Inc). He also appeared in an episode of the series "Miami Vice", entitled "Phil the Shill", in which he plays a cheating con-man. In the 1980s he appeared in several comedy sketches with "The Two Ronnies" on BBC One.


title: Phil Collins

text: In 2001, Collins was one of several celebrities who were tricked into appearing in a controversial British comedy series, "Brass Eye", shown on public service broadcaster Channel 4. In the episode, Collins endorsed a hoax anti-paedophile campaign wearing a T-shirt with the words "Nonce Sense" and warned children against speaking to suspicious people. Collins was reported by the BBC to have consulted lawyers regarding the programme, which was originally pulled from broadcast but eventually rescheduled. Collins said he had taken part in the programme "in good faith for the public benefit", believing it to be "a public service programme that would be going around schools and colleges in a bid to stem child abduction and abuse". Collins also accused the makers of the programme of "some serious taste problems" and warned it would prevent celebrities from supporting "public spirited causes" in the future.


title: Phil Collins

text: In 2006, Collins played a fictional version of himself in the PSP and PS2 video game "". Set in 1984, he appears in three missions in which the main character, , must save him from Mafia-hired hitmen, who are trying to kill Collins because his manager refused to pay his $3 million debt to them. The final mission occurs during his concert, where the player must defend the scaffolding against saboteurs while Collins is performing "In the Air Tonight". After this, the player is given the opportunity to watch this performance of "In the Air Tonight" for the cost of 6,000 in-game dollars. "In the Air Tonight" is part of the official "Vice City Stories" soundtrack, and can be also heard on the in-game radio station Emotion 98.3. The song has also been featured in films such as "Aqua Teen Hunger Force Colon Movie Film For Theaters" (2007) and "The Hangover" (2009).


title: Phil Collins

text: "In the Air Tonight" featured in the 2007 "Gorilla" commercial for Cadbury's Dairy Milk chocolate. Many believed that Collins himself was the drummer. When asked about "Gorilla", Collins jokingly commented that "Not only is he a better drummer than me, he also has more hair. Can he sing too?" The advertisement—which won Gold at the British Television Advertising Awards in 2008—helped the song re-enter the New Zealand RIANZ Singles Chart at No. 3 in July 2008, the following week reaching No. 1, beating its original 1981 No. 6 peak. "In the Air Tonight" was also sampled in the song "I Can Feel It" on Sean Kingston's self-titled debut album.


title: Phil Collins

text: Collins was portrayed in the cartoon "South Park" in the episode "Timmy 2000" holding his Oscar throughout, referring to his 1999 win for "You'll Be in My Heart", which defeated "Blame Canada" from "". The show's creators admitted resenting losing to Collins, as they felt their other competitors were more worthy. The episode "Cartman's Silly Hate Crime 2000" involves a sled race down the landmark known as Phil Collins Hill, which has an impression of Collins' face in the side. The Phil Collins character returns once more and gets killed off in the episode "200". Collins appears briefly in the Finnish animated sitcom "Pasila" in the episode "Phil Collins Hangover". The music of this episode is a pastiche of Collins's "Another Day in Paradise". Collins was mentioned in the "Psych" episode "" as resembling Shawn Spencer's father, Henry, portrayed by actor Corbin Bernsen.


title: Phil Collins

text: According to a 2000 BBC biography of Collins, "critics sneer at him" and "bad publicity also caused problems", which "damaged his public profile". Rock historian Martin C. Strong wrote that Collins "truly polarised opinion from the start, his ubiquitous smugness and increasingly sterile pop making him a favourite target for critics". According to "Guardian" writer Paul Lester, Collins would "regularly" call music journalists to take issue with negative reviews. Over time, he came to be personally disliked; in 2009, journalist Mark Lawson told how Collins's media profile had shifted from "pop's Mr. Nice guy, patron saint of ordinary blokes", to someone accused of "blandness, tax exile and ending a marriage by sending a fax". Collins has rejected accusations of tax avoidance, and despite confirming that some of the divorce-related correspondence between him and second wife, Jill Tavelman, was by fax (a message from Collins regarding access to their daughter was reproduced for the front cover of "The Sun" in 1993), he states that he did not terminate the marriage in that fashion. Nevertheless, the British media has often repeated the fax claim. Collins has been the victim of scathing remarks in regard to his alleged right-wing political leanings. Caroline Sullivan, a music critic of "The Guardian", referred to his cumulative negative publicity in her 2007 article "I wish I'd never heard of Phil Collins", writing that it was difficult for her to hear his work "without being riven by distaste for the man himself".


title: Phil Collins

text: Several critics have commented on Collins's omnipresence, especially in the 1980s and early 1990s. Journalist Frank DiGiacomo wrote a 1999 piece for "New York Observer" titled "The Collins Menace"; he said, "Even when I sought to escape the sounds [of Collins] in my head by turning on the TV, there would be Mr. Collins ... mugging for the cameras—intent on showing the world just how hard he would work to sell millions of records to millions of stupid people." In his 2010 article "Love Don't Come Easy: Artists we Love to Hate", "The Irish Times" critic Kevin Courtney expressed similar sentiments. Naming Collins as one of the ten most disliked pop stars in the world, he wrote: performed at Live Aid, playing first at Wembley, then flying over to Philadelphia via Concorde, just to make sure no one in the U.S. got off lightly. By the early 1990s, Phil phatigue had really set in." Tim Chester of the "New Musical Express" alluded to the backlash against Collins in an article titled, "Is It Time We All Stopped Hating Phil Collins?" Chester said of the unrelenting derision he has suffered, "a lot of it he brings on himself." He also said that Collins was "responsible for some of the cheesiest music ever committed to acetate". Erik Hedegaard of "Rolling Stone" mentioned that Phil Collins hate sites had "flourished" online, and acknowledged that he had been called "the sellout who took Peter Gabriel's Genesis, that paragon of prog-rock, and turned it into a lame-o pop act and went on to make all those supercheesy hits that really did define the 1980s".


title: Phil Collins

text: According to author Dylan Jones in his 2013 publication on 1980s popular music, many of Collins's peers "despised" him. Some fellow artists have made negative comments about Collins publicly. In 1990, former Pink Floyd frontman Roger Waters criticised Collins's "ubiquitous nature", including his involvement in the Who's 1989 reunion tour. David Bowie dismissed some of his own 1980s output as his "Phil Collins years/albums". In addition to the song's negative press from music journalists, singer-songwriter and political activist Billy Bragg criticised Collins for writing "Another Day in Paradise", stating: "Phil Collins might write a song about the homeless, but if he doesn't have the action to go with it he's just exploiting that for a subject." Oasis songwriter Noel Gallagher criticised Collins on multiple occasions, including the comment: "Just because you sell lots of records, it doesn't mean to say you're any good. Look at Phil Collins." Collins said he has "at times, been very down" about Noel Gallagher's comments. Gallagher's brother, Oasis singer Liam, also recalled the "boring" Collins's chart dominance in the 1980s and stated that, by the 1990s, it was "time for some real lads to get up there and take charge". Appearing on the BBC television series "Room 101" in 2005, in which guests discuss their most hated things and people, Collins nominated the Gallaghers to be sent into the eponymous room. He described them as "horrible" and stated: "They're rude and not as talented as they think they are. I won't mince words here, but they've had a go at me personally."


title: Phil Collins

text: Collins acknowledged in 2010 that he had been "omnipresent". He said of his character: "The persona on stage came out of insecurity ... it seems embarrassing now. I recently started transferring all my VHS tapes onto DVD to create an archive, and everything I was watching, I thought, 'God, I'm annoying.' I appeared to be very cocky, and really I wasn't." Collins concedes his status as a figure of contempt for many people and has said that he believes this is a consequence of his music being overplayed. In 2011 he said: "The fact that people got so sick of me wasn't really my fault. ... It's hardly surprising that people grew to hate me. I'm sorry that it was all so successful. I honestly didn't mean it to happen like that!" He described criticism of his physical appearance over the years as "a cheap shot", but has acknowledged the "very vocal element" of Genesis fans who believe that the group sold out under his tenure as lead singer. Collins denied that his retirement in 2011 was due to negative attention and said that his statements had been taken out of context. He said: "I have ended up sounding like a tormented weirdo who thinks he was at the Alamo in another life, who feels very sorry for himself, and is retiring hurt because of the bad press over the years. None of this is true."


title: Phil Collins

text: Paul Lester of "The Guardian" wrote in 2013 that Collins is one of several pop acts that "used to be a joke" but are "now being hailed as gods". Collins has become an important figure in US urban music, influencing artists such as Kanye West, Alicia Keys and Beyoncé. His songs have been sampled by various hip-hop and contemporary R&B acts, and performers including Lil' Kim, Kelis and Wu-Tang Clan co-founder Ol' Dirty Bastard covered his work on the 2001 tribute album "Urban Renewal". In 2004, DCFC and Postal Service musician Ben Gibbard described Collins as a "great vocalist". Collins has been championed by his contemporary, the heavy metal singer Ozzy Osbourne, David Crosby called him "a dear friend" who has helped him "enormously", Queen guitarist Brian May called him "a great guy and an amazing drummer", and Robert Plant paid tribute to him as "the most spirited and positive and really encouraging force" when commencing his own solo career after the break-up of Led Zeppelin. Collins has been championed by modern artists in diverse genres, including indie rock groups the 1975, Generationals, Neon Indian, Yeasayer, St. Lucia and Sleigh Bells, electronica artist Lorde, and soul singer Diane Birch, who said in 2014, "Collins walks a really fine line between being really cheesy and being really sophisticated. He can seem appalling, but at the same time, he has awesome production values and there's a particular richness to the sound. It's very proficient in the instrumentation and savvy about melodies."


title: Phil Collins

text: Genesis bandmate Mike Rutherford has praised Collins's personality, saying that "he always had a bloke-next-door, happy-go-lucky demeanour about him: let's have a drink in the pub, crack a joke, smoke a cigarette or a joint". In 2014, Ex-Genesis frontman Peter Gabriel, whom they both cross-collaborated with on some of their solo albums in the 1980s, referred to Collins as the "workaholics' workaholic". He has been characterised by favourable critics as a "rock god", and an artist who has remained "down to earth". In "The New Rolling Stone Album Guide", published in 2004, J. D. Considine wrote: "For a time, Phil Collins was nearly inescapable on the radio, and enormously popular with the listening public — something that made him an obvious target for critics. Despite his "lumpen"-pop appeal, however, Collins is an incisive songwriter and resourceful musician." Tim Chester of the "New Musical Express" described Collins as "the go-to guy for ironic appreciation and guilty pleasures" and stated he was responsible for "some moments of true genius (often accompanied, it must be said, by some real stinkers)". Creation Records founder Alan McGee wrote in 2009 that there was a "non-ironic revival of Phil Collins" happening. According to McGee: "The kids don't care about 'indie cred' anymore. To them, a great pop song is just that: a great pop song. In this time of revivals, nothing is a sacred cow anymore, and that can only be a good thing for music." Commenting on Collins's popularity with hip-hop acts, he argued: "It's not surprising. Collins is a world-class drummer whose songs immediately lend themselves to being sampled."


title: Phil Collins

text: In 2010, Gary Mills of "The Quietus" made an impassioned defence of Collins: "There can't be many figures in the world of pop who have inspired quite the same kind of hatred-bordering-on-civil-unrest as Collins, and there can't be too many who have shifted anything like the 150 million plus units that he's got through as a solo artist either ... The disgrace of a career bogged entirely in the determined dross of "No Jacket Required" however is simply not justified, regardless of how Collins gained either his fortune, or his public image." David Sheppard wrote for the BBC in 2010: "Granted, Collins has sometimes been guilty of painting the bull's-eye on his own forehead (that self-aggrandising Live Aid Concorde business, the cringe-worthy lyrics to 'Another Day in Paradise', "Buster", etc.), but nonetheless, the sometime Genesis frontman's canon is so substantial and his hits so profuse that it feels myopic to dismiss him merely as a haughty purveyor of tortured, romantic ballads for the middle income world."


title: Phil Collins

text: "Rolling Stone" journalist Erik Hedegaard expressed disapproval of the widespread criticism which Collins has received, suggesting that he has been "unfairly and inexplicably vilified". Martin C. Strong stated in 2011 that "the enigmatic and amiable Phil Collins has had his fair share of mockers and critics over the years, although one thing is sure, and that is his dexterity and undeniable talent". In a piece the following year, titled "10 Much-Mocked Artists It's Time We Forgave", "New Musical Express" critic Anna Conrad said Collins had been portrayed as a "villain", and wrote: "Was the bile really justified? ... come on, admit it. You've air drummed to 'In the Air Tonight', and loved it." "The Guardian" journalist Dave Simpson wrote a complimentary article in 2013; while acknowledging "few pop figures have become as successful and yet reviled as Phil Collins", he argued "it's about time we recognised Collins's vast influence as one of the godfathers of popular culture".


title: Phil Collins

text: Collins has divorced three times. From 1975 to 1980, he was married to Canadian-born Andrea Bertorelli. They met as 11-year-old students in a London drama class and reconnected in 1974 when Genesis performed in Vancouver. They married in England when both were 24, after which Collins legally adopted Bertorelli's daughter Joely (b. 1972), who became an actress and film producer. They also had a son, Simon Collins (b. 1976), who is the former vocalist and drummer of the progressive rock band Sound of Contact. In 2016, Bertorelli took legal action against Collins pertaining to his account of their relationship in his autobiography.


title: Phil Collins

text: In 1984, Collins married American-born Jill Tavelman. They have one daughter, Lily Collins (b. 1989), who became an actress. The marriage encountered problems that culminated in Collins twice having an affair with Lavinia Lang, a former drama school classmate, while touring with Genesis in 1992. The two were previously engaged, but the relationship ended before they married. In 1994, Collins openly stated that he had fallen out of love with Tavelman and had filed for divorce, which finalised in 1996. As part of the settlement, Collins paid £17 million to Tavelman.


title: Phil Collins

text: In 1999, Collins married Orianne Cevey, a Swiss national who worked as his translator at the start of his 1994 tour when she was 22. They have two sons, Nicholas and Matthew. They lived in the former house of Jackie Stewart in Begnins, Switzerland. In 2006 they divorced. Collins paid £25 million to Cevey, which became the largest settlement in a British celebrity divorce. Collins continued to live in Féchy, Switzerland, while he also maintained homes in New York City and Dersingham, Norfolk.


title: Phil Collins

text: From 2007 to 2016, Collins was in a relationship with American news anchor Dana Tyler. In 2008, Cevey and her two sons moved to Miami, Florida. Collins recalled: "I went through a few bits of darkness; drinking too much. I killed my hours watching TV and drinking, and it almost killed me." He said in 2015 that he had been teetotal for three years. In January 2016, after moving to Miami Beach, Florida in the previous year to be closer to his two youngest sons, Collins reunited with Cevey and they lived together in Miami. In October 2020, Collins filed an eviction notice against Cevey after she secretly married another man in August. Collins sold his Miami home in 2021, for $39 million.


title: Phil Collins

text: Collins' brother Clive was a cartoonist. Phil appeared at his brother's investiture ceremony at Buckingham Palace in 2012 when he was awarded an MBE for services to art, with Phil stating, "I shared a bedroom with him when we were boys and he was always drawing. He used to do Christmas cards and birthday cards for the family."


title: Phil Collins

text: In 2012, Collins was estimated to be the second wealthiest drummer in the world, surpassed only by Ringo Starr. Collins was estimated to have a fortune of £120 million in the "Sunday Times Rich List" of 2018, making him one of the 25 wealthiest people in the British music industry.


title: Phil Collins

text: On 29 March 2000, Collins launched a case against two former musicians from his band to recoup £500,000 in royalties that were overpaid. Louis Satterfield, 62, and Rahmlee Davis, 51, claimed their contract entitled them to 0.5 per cent of the royalties from "Serious Hits... Live!", a live album recorded during Collins's Seriously, Live! World Tour in 1990. Their claim was they were an integral part of the whole album, but Collins responded the two should only receive royalties from the five tracks in which they were involved. On 19 April 2000, the High Court in London ruled that the two musicians would receive no more royalty money from Phil Collins. The amount that Collins was seeking was halved, and Satterfield and Davis (who originally brought the suit forward in California) would not have to repay any of it. The judge agreed with Collins's argument that Satterfield and Davis should have been paid for only the five tracks on which they performed, including the hit "Sussudio".


title: Phil Collins

text: In 2000, Collins developed sudden hearing loss in his left ear following a recording session in Los Angeles. He consulted three doctors, who told him that there was nothing they could do and that the chance of a full recovery was slim. Two years later, he had recovered most of his hearing. Collins later found that it was caused by a viral infection, and that it resolved after treatment.


title: Phil Collins

text: In April 2009, Collins had surgery on his upper neck, which was to correct an issue that occurred while drumming on the 2007 Genesis tour. Following the operation, he lost feeling in his fingers and could only grip drum sticks if they were taped to his hands. In 2010, Collins alluded to feelings of depression and low self-worth in recent years and said he had contemplated suicide, but he resisted for the sake of his children. In 2014, Collins said that he was still unable to play the drums and that it was not arthritis, but an undiagnosed nerve problem. In 2015, he underwent a spine operation. In 2016, he said he was still unable to drum with his left hand. His doctor advised him that if he wanted to play the drums again, he would need to practice as long as he took it step by step.


title: Phil Collins

text: In his 2016 autobiography, Collins acknowledged that he had struggled with an alcohol problem following his retirement and third divorce. He also stated that he had been sober for three years.


title: Phil Collins

text: In January 2017, Collins said he was a type 2 diabetic and had received treatment with a hyperbaric chamber after he developed a diabetic abscess on his foot that became infected. In June 2017, Collins cancelled two shows after he slipped in his hotel room during the night and hit his head on a chair as he fell, resulting in stitches for a severe gash close to his eye. The fall was caused by his foot drop, developed as a result of his back operation.


title: Phil Collins

text: In 2017, Collins began to use a cane to assist with walking, and performed on stage while sitting in a chair.


title: Phil Collins

text: Collins has received several honorary degrees in recognition of his work in music and his personal interests. In 1987, he received an honorary doctorate of fine arts at Fairleigh Dickinson University. In 1991, he received an honorary doctorate of music at the Berklee College of Music. On 12 May 2012, he received an honorary doctorate of history at the McMurry University in Abilene, Texas, for his research and collection of Texas Revolution artefacts and documents (see other interests section).


title: Phil Collins

text: Collins has often been mentioned erroneously in the British media as being a supporter of the Conservative Party and a critic of the Labour Party. This derives from the famous article in "The Sun", printed on the day of the 1992 UK general election, titled "If Kinnock wins today will the last person to leave Britain please turn out the lights", which stated that Collins was among several celebrities who were planning to leave Britain in the event of a Labour victory.


title: Phil Collins

text: Collins is often reported in the British press to have left the UK and moved to Switzerland in protest at the Labour Party's victory in the 1997 general election. Shortly before the 2005 election (when Collins was living in Switzerland), Labour supporter Noel Gallagher was quoted: "Vote Labour. If you don't and the Tories get in, Phil Collins is threatening to come back and live here. And let's face it, none of us want that." However, Collins has since stated that although he did once claim many years earlier that he might leave Britain if most of his income was taken in tax, which was Labour Party policy at that time for top earners, he has never been a Conservative Party supporter and he left Britain for Switzerland in 1994 purely because he started a relationship with a woman who lived there. He said of Gallagher: "I don't care if he likes my music or not. I do care if he starts telling people I'm a wanker because of my politics. It's an opinion based on an old, misunderstood quote."


title: Phil Collins

text: Despite his statement that he did not leave Britain for tax purposes, Collins was one of several wealthy figures living in tax havens who were singled out for criticism in a 2008 report by the charity Christian Aid. "The Independent" included Collins as one of their "ten celebrity tax exiles", erroneously repeating that he had left the country when Labour won the 1997 general election and that he threatened to return if the Conservatives won in 2005. Referring to the 1997 general election in his article "Famous men and their misunderstood politics" for MSN, Hugh Wilson stated: "Labour won it in a landslide, which just goes to show the influence pop stars really wield". He also wrote that Collins's reported comments and subsequent move to Switzerland led to "accusations of hypocrisy" since he had "bemoaned the plight of the homeless in the song 'Another Day in Paradise'", making him "an easy target when future elections came round". The Paul Heaton and Jacqui Abbott song "When I Get Back to Blighty", from their 2014 album "What Have We Become?", made reference to Collins as "a prisoner to his tax returns".


title: Phil Collins

text: Asked about his politics by Mark Lawson in an interview for the BBC, broadcast in 2009, Collins said: "My father was Conservative but it wasn't quite the same, I don't think, when he was alive. Politics never loomed large in our family anyway. I think the politics of the country were very different then." In a 2016 interview in "The Guardian", Collins stated that talking about politics to "The Sun" was one of his biggest regrets. When asked whether he had ever voted Conservative, he said: "I didn't vote, actually. And that's not something I'm proud of. I was just so busy that I rarely was here."


title: Phil Collins

text: Collins is a member of the Canadian charity Artists Against Racism and has worked with them on campaigns including radio PSAs. In October 2020, Collins issued a cease and desist order to Donald Trump and his campaign for playing "In the Air Tonight" at a rally.


title: Phil Collins

text: Collins has a long-standing interest in the Alamo. He has collected hundreds of artefacts related to the famous 1836 battle in San Antonio, Texas, narrated a light and sound show about the Alamo, and has spoken at related events. His passion for the Battle of the Alamo has also led him to write the book "The Alamo and Beyond: A Collector's Journey", published in 2012. A short film was released in 2013 called "Phil Collins and the Wild Frontier" which captures Collins on a book tour in June 2012. On 26 June 2014, a press conference was held from the Alamo, where Collins spoke, announcing that he was donating his entire collection to the Alamo via the State of Texas. On 11 March 2015, in honour of his donation, Collins was named an honorary Texan by the state legislature.


title: Phil Collins

text: Like Rod Stewart, Eric Clapton, and Neil Young, Collins is a model railway enthusiast. He also has an interest in King & Country toy soldiers. He is an honourary president of Richmond Yacht Club, of which his parents used to be members.


title: Phil Collins

text: Collins has performed at the "Secret Policeman's Ball", a benefit show co-founded by Monty Python member John Cleese on behalf of Amnesty International. He made his first appearance at the 1981 show held in London's Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, and he subsequently became an activist. Collins was appointed a Lieutenant of the Royal Victorian Order (LVO) in the 1994 Birthday Honours, in recognition of his work on behalf of The Prince's Trust, a leading UK youth charity founded by Charles, Prince of Wales which provides training, personal development, business start up support, mentoring, and advice. Since appearing at the first Prince's Trust's rock concert in 1982 which included a performance as part of singer Kate Bush's backing band, Collins has played at the event numerous times since, most recently at the Royal Albert Hall in 2010.


title: Phil Collins

text: On 9 April 1989, Collins topped the bill at a benefit concert for the veteran English comic actor Terry-Thomas. Held at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, the event raised over £75,000 for Terry-Thomas and Parkinson's UK.


title: Phil Collins

text: Collins has stated he is a supporter of animal rights and People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA). In 2005 he donated autographed drum sticks in support of PETA's campaign against Kentucky Fried Chicken.


title: Phil Collins

text: In February 2000, Collins and Cevey launched the Little Dreams Foundation, a non-profit organisation that aims to "...realise the dreams of children in the fields of sports and art" by providing future prodigies aged 4 to 16 years with financial, material, and mentoring support with the help of experts in various fields. Collins took the action after receiving letters from children asking him how they could break into the music industry. Mentors to the students who have benefited from his foundation include Tina Turner and Natalie Cole. In 2013 he visited Miami Beach, Florida, to promote the expansion of his foundation.


title: Phil Collins

text: Collins supports the South African charity "Topsy Foundation", which provides relief services to some of South Africa's most under-resourced rural communities through a multi-faceted approach to the consequences of HIV/AIDS and extreme poverty. He donates all the royalties earned from his music sales in South Africa to the organisation.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: Elizabeth Angela Marguerite Bowes-Lyon (4 August 1900 – 30 March 2002) was Queen of the United Kingdom and the Dominions of the British Commonwealth from 11 December 1936 to 6 February 1952 as the wife of King George VI. She was the last Empress of India from her husband's accession 1936 until the British Raj was dissolved in August 1947. After her husband died, she was known as Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother, to avoid confusion with her daughter, Queen Elizabeth II.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: Born into a family of British nobility, Elizabeth came to prominence in 1923 when she married the Duke of York, the second son of King George V and Queen Mary. The couple and their daughters Elizabeth and Margaret embodied traditional ideas of family and public service. The Duchess undertook a variety of public engagements and became known for her consistently cheerful countenance.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: In 1936, Elizabeth's husband unexpectedly became king when his older brother, Edward VIII, abdicated in order to marry the American divorcée Wallis Simpson. Elizabeth then became queen consort. She accompanied her husband on diplomatic tours to France and North America before the start of the Second World War. During the war, her seemingly indomitable spirit provided moral support to the British public. After the war, her husband's health deteriorated, and she was widowed at the age of 51. Her elder daughter, aged 25, became the new queen.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: After the death of Queen Mary in 1953, Elizabeth was viewed as the matriarch of the British royal family. In her later years, she was a consistently popular member of the family, even at times when other royals were suffering from low levels of public approval. She continued an active public life until just a few months before her death at the age of 101, seven weeks after the death of her younger daughter, Princess Margaret.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: Elizabeth Angela Marguerite Bowes-Lyon was the youngest daughter and the ninth of ten children of Claude Bowes-Lyon, Lord Glamis (later the 14th Earl of Strathmore and Kinghorne in the Peerage of Scotland), and his wife, Cecilia Cavendish-Bentinck. Her mother was descended from British Prime Minister William Cavendish-Bentinck, 3rd Duke of Portland, and Governor-General of India Richard Wellesley, 1st Marquess Wellesley, who was the elder brother of another prime minister, Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: The location of Elizabeth's birth remains uncertain, but reputedly she was born either in her parents' Westminster home at Belgrave Mansions, Grosvenor Gardens, or in a horse-drawn ambulance on the way to a hospital. Other possible locations include Forbes House in Ham, London, the home of her maternal grandmother, Louisa Scott. Her birth was registered at Hitchin, Hertfordshire, near the Strathmores' English country house, St Paul's Walden Bury, which was also given as her birthplace in the census the following year. She was christened there on 23 September 1900, in the local parish church, All Saints.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: Elizabeth spent much of her childhood at St Paul's Walden and at Glamis Castle, the Earl's ancestral home in Scotland. She was educated at home by a governess until the age of eight, and was fond of field sports, ponies and dogs. When she started school in London, she astonished her teachers by precociously beginning an essay with two Greek words from Xenophon's "Anabasis". Her best subjects were literature and scripture. After returning to private education under a German Jewish governess, Käthe Kübler, she passed the Oxford Local Examination with distinction at age thirteen.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: On Elizabeth's fourteenth birthday, Britain declared war on Germany. Four of her brothers served in the army. Her elder brother, Fergus, an officer in the Black Watch Regiment, was killed in action at the Battle of Loos in 1915. Another brother, Michael, was reported missing in action on 28 April 1917. Three weeks later, the family discovered he had been captured after being wounded. He remained in a prisoner of war camp for the rest of the war. Glamis was turned into a convalescent home for wounded soldiers, which Elizabeth helped to run. She was particularly instrumental in organising the rescue of the castle's contents during a serious fire on 16 September 1916. One of the soldiers she treated wrote in her autograph book that she was to be "Hung, drawn, & quartered ... Hung in diamonds, drawn in a coach and four, and quartered in the best house in the land." On 5 November 1916, she was confirmed at St John's Scottish Episcopal Church in Forfar.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: Prince Albert, Duke of York—"Bertie" to the family—was the second son of King George V. He initially proposed to Elizabeth in 1921, but she turned him down, being "afraid never, never again to be free to think, speak and act as I feel I really ought to". When he declared he would marry no other, his mother, Queen Mary, visited Glamis to see for herself the girl who had stolen her son's heart. She became convinced that Elizabeth was "the one girl who could make Bertie happy", but nevertheless refused to interfere. At the same time, Elizabeth was courted by James Stuart, Albert's equerry, until he left the Prince's service for a better-paid job in the American oil business.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: In February 1922, Elizabeth was a bridesmaid at the wedding of Albert's sister, Princess Mary, to Viscount Lascelles. The following month, Albert proposed again, but she refused him once more. Eventually in January 1923, Elizabeth agreed to marry Albert, despite her misgivings about royal life. Albert's freedom in choosing Elizabeth, not a member of a royal family, though the daughter of a peer, was considered a gesture in favour of political modernisation; previously, princes were expected to marry princesses from other royal families. They selected a platinum engagement ring featuring a Kashmir sapphire with two diamonds adorning its sides.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: They married on 26 April 1923, at Westminster Abbey. Unexpectedly, Elizabeth laid her bouquet at the Tomb of the Unknown Warrior on her way into the abbey, in memory of her brother Fergus. Elizabeth became styled "Her Royal Highness The Duchess of York". Following a wedding breakfast at Buckingham Palace prepared by chef Gabriel Tschumi, the new Duchess and her husband honeymooned at Polesden Lacey, a manor house in Surrey owned by the wealthy socialite and friend Margaret Greville. They then went to Scotland, where she caught "unromantic" whooping cough.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: After a successful royal visit to Northern Ireland in July 1924, the Labour government agreed that Albert and Elizabeth could tour East Africa from December 1924 to April 1925. The Labour government was defeated by the Conservatives in a general election in November (which Elizabeth described as "marvellous" to her mother) and the Governor-General of Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, Sir Lee Stack, was assassinated three weeks later. Despite this, the tour went ahead, and they visited Aden, Kenya, Uganda, and Sudan, but Egypt was avoided because of political tensions.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: Albert had a stammer, which affected his ability to deliver speeches, and after October 1925, Elizabeth assisted in helping him through the therapy devised by Lionel Logue, an episode portrayed in the 2010 film "The King's Speech". In 1926, the couple had their first child, Princess Elizabeth—"Lilibet" to the family—who would later become Queen Elizabeth II. Albert and Elizabeth, without their child, travelled to Australia to open Parliament House in Canberra in 1927. She was, in her own words, "very miserable at leaving the baby". Their journey by sea took them via Jamaica, the Panama Canal and the Pacific; Elizabeth fretted constantly over her baby back in Britain, but their journey was a public relations success. She charmed the public in Fiji when, as she was shaking hands with a long line of official guests, a stray dog walked in on the ceremony; she shook its paw as well. In New Zealand she fell ill with a cold and missed some engagements, but enjoyed the local fishing in the Bay of Islands accompanied by Australian sports fisherman Harry Andreas. On the return journey, via Mauritius, the Suez Canal, Malta and Gibraltar, their transport, , caught fire and they prepared to abandon ship before the fire was brought under control.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: Her second daughter, Princess Margaret, was born at Glamis Castle in 1930. The close family lived at 145 Piccadilly.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: On 20 January 1936, George V died and his eldest son, Edward, Prince of Wales, became King Edward VIII. Just months into Edward's reign, his decision to marry the American divorcée Wallis Simpson caused a constitutional crisis that resulted in his abdication. Elizabeth's husband Albert, reluctantly became King in his brother's place on 11 December 1936 under the regnal name of George VI. George VI and Elizabeth were crowned King and Queen of Great Britain, Ireland and the British Dominions, and Emperor and Empress of India in Westminster Abbey on 12 May 1937, the date previously scheduled for Edward VIII. Elizabeth's crown was made of platinum and was set with the Koh-i-Noor diamond.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: Edward and Simpson married and became the Duke and Duchess of Windsor, but while Edward was a Royal Highness, George VI withheld the style from the Duchess, a decision that Elizabeth supported. Elizabeth was later quoted as referring to the Duchess as "that woman", and the Duchess referred to Elizabeth as "Cookie", because of her supposed resemblance to a fat Scots cook. Claims that Elizabeth remained embittered towards the Duchess were denied by her close friends; the Duke of Grafton wrote that she "never said anything nasty about the Duchess of Windsor, except to say she really hadn't got a clue what she was dealing with".


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: In summer 1938, a state visit to France by the King and Queen was postponed for three weeks because of the death of the Queen's mother, Lady Strathmore. In two weeks, Norman Hartnell created an all-white trousseau for the Queen, who could not wear colours as she was still in mourning. The visit was designed to bolster Anglo-French solidarity in the face of aggression from Nazi Germany. The French press praised the demeanour and charm of the royal couple during the delayed but successful visit, augmented by Hartnell's wardrobe.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: Nevertheless, Nazi aggression continued, and the government prepared for war. After the Munich Agreement of 1938 appeared to forestall the advent of armed conflict, the British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain was invited onto the balcony of Buckingham Palace with the King and Queen to receive acclamation from a crowd of well-wishers. While broadly popular among the general public, Chamberlain's policy towards Hitler was the subject of some opposition in the House of Commons, which led historian John Grigg to describe the King's behaviour in associating himself so prominently with a politician as "the most unconstitutional act by a British sovereign in the present century". However, historians argue that the King only ever followed ministerial advice and acted as he was constitutionally bound to do.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: In May and June 1939, Elizabeth and her husband toured Canada from coast to coast and back, the first time a reigning monarch had toured Canada. They also visited the United States, spending time with President Roosevelt at the White House and his Hudson Valley estate. U.S. First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt said that Elizabeth was "perfect as a Queen, gracious, informed, saying the right thing & kind but a little self-consciously regal". The tour was designed to bolster trans-Atlantic support in the event of war, and to affirm Canada's status as an independent kingdom sharing with Britain the same person as monarch.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: According to an often-told story, during one of the earliest of the royal couple's repeated encounters with the crowds, a Boer War veteran asked Elizabeth, "Are you Scots or are you English?" She replied, "I am a Canadian!" Their reception by the Canadian and U.S. public was extremely enthusiastic, and largely dissipated any residual feeling that George and Elizabeth were a lesser substitute for Edward. Elizabeth told Canadian Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King, "that tour made us", and she returned to Canada frequently both on official tours and privately.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: During the Second World War, the King and Queen became symbols of the fight against fascism. Shortly after the declaration of war, "The Queen's Book of the Red Cross" was conceived. Fifty authors and artists contributed to the book, which was fronted by Cecil Beaton's portrait of the Queen and was sold in aid of the Red Cross. Elizabeth publicly refused to leave London or send the children to Canada, even during the Blitz, when she was advised by the Cabinet to do so. She declared, "The children won't go without me. I won't leave the King. And the King will never leave."


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: Elizabeth visited troops, hospitals, factories, and parts of Britain that were targeted by the German Luftwaffe, in particular the East End near London's docks. Her visits initially provoked hostility; rubbish was thrown at her and the crowds jeered, in part because she wore expensive clothes that served to alienate her from people suffering the deprivations of war. She explained that if the public came to see her they would wear their best clothes, so she should reciprocate in kind; Norman Hartnell dressed her in gentle colours and avoided black to represent "the rainbow of hope". When Buckingham Palace itself took several hits during the height of the bombing, Elizabeth said, "I'm glad we've been bombed. It makes me feel I can look the East End in the face."


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: Though the King and Queen spent the working day at Buckingham Palace, partly for security and family reasons they stayed at night at Windsor Castle about west of central London with the Princesses Elizabeth and Margaret. The Palace had lost much of its staff to the army, and most of the rooms were shut. The windows were shattered by bomb blasts, and had to be boarded up. During the "Phoney War" the Queen was given revolver training because of fears of imminent invasion.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: Adolf Hitler is said to have called her "the most dangerous woman in Europe" because he viewed her popularity as a threat to German interests. However, before the war both she and her husband, like most of Parliament and the British public, had supported appeasement and Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain, believing after the experience of the First World War that war had to be avoided at all costs. After the resignation of Chamberlain, the King asked Winston Churchill to form a government. Although the King was initially suspicious of Churchill's character and motives, in due course both the King and Queen came to respect and admire him.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: In the 1945 British general election, Churchill's Conservative Party was soundly defeated by the Labour Party of Clement Attlee. Elizabeth's political views were rarely disclosed, but a letter she wrote in 1947 described Attlee's "high hopes of a socialist heaven on earth" as fading and presumably describes those who voted for him as "poor people, so many half-educated and bemused. I do love them." Woodrow Wyatt thought her "much more pro-Conservative" than other members of the royal family, but she later told him, "I like the dear old Labour Party." She also told the Duchess of Grafton, "I love communists."


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: During the 1947 royal tour of South Africa, Elizabeth's serene public behaviour was broken, exceptionally, when she rose from the royal car to strike an admirer with her umbrella because she had mistaken his enthusiasm for hostility. The 1948 royal tour of Australia and New Zealand was postponed because of the King's declining health. In March 1949, he had a successful operation to improve the circulation in his right leg. In summer 1951, Elizabeth and her daughters fulfilled the King's public engagements in his place. In September, he was diagnosed with lung cancer. After a lung resection, he appeared to recover, but the delayed trip to Australia and New Zealand was altered so that Princess Elizabeth and her husband, the Duke of Edinburgh, went in the King and Queen's place, in January 1952. George VI died in his sleep on 6 February 1952 while Princess Elizabeth and the Duke of Edinburgh were in Kenya on a Commonwealth tour, and with George's death his daughter immediately became Queen Elizabeth II.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: Shortly after George VI's death, Elizabeth began to be styled as "Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother" because the normal style for the widow of a king, "Queen Elizabeth", would have been too similar to the style of her elder daughter, who had become Queen Elizabeth II. Popularly, she became the "Queen Mother" or the "Queen Mum". She was devastated by her husband's death and retired to Scotland. However, after a meeting with the prime minister, Winston Churchill, she broke her retirement and resumed her public duties. Eventually she became just as busy as queen mother as she had been as queen consort. In July 1953, she undertook her first overseas visit since the funeral when she visited the Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland with Princess Margaret. She laid the foundation stone of the University College of Rhodesia and Nyasaland—the current University of Zimbabwe. Upon her return to the region in 1957, Elizabeth was inaugurated as the college's president, and attended other events that were deliberately designed to be multi-racial. During her daughter's extensive tour of the Commonwealth over 1953–54, Elizabeth acted as a counsellor of state and looked after her grandchildren, Charles and Anne. In February 1959, she visited Kenya and Uganda.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: Elizabeth oversaw the restoration of the remote Castle of Mey, on the north coast of Scotland, which she used to "get away from everything" for three weeks in August and ten days in October each year. She developed her interest in horse racing, particularly steeplechasing, which had been inspired by the amateur jockey Lord Mildmay in 1949. She owned the winners of approximately 500 races. Her distinctive colours of blue with buff stripes were carried by horses such as Special Cargo, the winner of the 1984 Whitbread Gold Cup, and Devon Loch, which spectacularly halted just short of the winning post at the 1956 Grand National and whose jockey Dick Francis later had a successful career as the writer of racing-themed detective stories. Peter Cazalet was her trainer for over 20 years. Although (contrary to rumour) she never placed bets, she did have the racing commentaries piped direct to her London residence, Clarence House, so she could follow the races. As an art collector, she purchased works by Claude Monet, Augustus John and Peter Carl Fabergé, among others.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: In February 1964, Elizabeth had an emergency appendectomy, which led to the postponement of a planned tour of Australia, New Zealand, and Fiji until 1966. She recuperated during a Caribbean cruise aboard the royal yacht, "Britannia". In December 1966, she underwent an operation to remove a tumour, after she was diagnosed with colon cancer. Contrary to rumours which subsequently spread, she did not have a colostomy. She was diagnosed with breast cancer in 1984 and a lump was removed from her breast. Her bouts with cancer were never made public during her lifetime.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: During her widowhood she continued to travel extensively, including on over forty official visits overseas. In 1975, Elizabeth visited Iran at the invitation of Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. The British ambassador and his wife, Anthony and Sheila Parsons, noted how the Iranians were bemused by her habit of speaking to everyone regardless of status or importance, and hoped the Shah's entourage would learn from the visit to pay more attention to ordinary people. Between 1976 and 1984, she made annual summer visits to France, which were among 22 private trips to continental Europe between 1963 and 1992.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: In 1982, Elizabeth was rushed to hospital when a fish bone became stuck in her throat, and had an operation to remove it. Being a keen angler, she calmly joked afterwards, "The salmon have got their own back." Similar incidents occurred at Balmoral in August 1986, when she was hospitalised at Aberdeen Royal Infirmary overnight but no operation was needed, and in May 1993, when she was admitted to the Infirmary for surgery under general anaesthetic.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: In 1987, Elizabeth was criticised when it emerged that two of her nieces, Katherine and Nerissa Bowes-Lyon, had both been committed to the Royal Earlswood Asylum for Mental Defectives, a psychiatric hospital in Redhill, Surrey in 1941, because they had severe learning disabilities. However, "Burke's Peerage" had listed the sisters as dead, apparently because their mother, Fenella (Elizabeth's sister-in-law), "was 'extremely vague' when it came to filling in forms and might not have completed the paperwork for the family entry correctly". When Nerissa died in 1986, her grave was originally marked with a plastic tag and a serial number. Elizabeth said that the news of their institutionalisation came as a surprise to her.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: In her later years, Elizabeth became known for her longevity. Her 90th birthday—4 August 1990—was celebrated by a parade on 27 June that involved many of the 300 organisations of which she was a patron. In 1995, she attended events commemorating the end of the war fifty years before, and had two operations: one to remove a cataract in her left eye, and one to replace her right hip. In 1998, her left hip was replaced after it was broken when she slipped and fell during a visit to Sandringham stables.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: Elizabeth's 100th birthday was celebrated in a number of ways: a parade that celebrated the highlights of her life included contributions from Sir Norman Wisdom and Sir John Mills; her image appeared on a special commemorative £20 note issued by the Royal Bank of Scotland; and she attended a lunch at the Guildhall, London, at which George Carey, the Archbishop of Canterbury, accidentally attempted to drink her glass of wine. Her quick admonition of "That's mine!" caused widespread amusement. In November 2000, she broke her collarbone in a fall that kept her recuperating at home over Christmas and the New Year.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: On 1 August 2001, Elizabeth had a blood transfusion for anaemia after suffering from mild heat exhaustion, though she was well enough to make her traditional appearance outside Clarence House three days later to celebrate her 101st birthday. Her final public engagements included planting a cross at the Field of Remembrance on 8 November 2001; a reception at the Guildhall, London, for the reformation of the 600 Squadron, Royal Auxiliary Air Force on 15 November; and attending the re-commissioning of on 22 November.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: In December 2001, aged 101, Elizabeth fractured her pelvis in a fall. Even so, she insisted on standing for the national anthem during the memorial service for her husband on 6 February the following year. Just three days later, her second daughter Princess Margaret died. On 13 February 2002, Elizabeth fell and cut her arm in her sitting room at Sandringham House; an ambulance and doctor were called, and the wound was dressed. She was still determined to attend Margaret's funeral at St George's Chapel, Windsor Castle, two days later on the Friday of that week, even though the Queen and the rest of the royal family were concerned about the journey the Queen Mother would face to get from Norfolk to Windsor; she was also rumoured to be hardly eating. Nevertheless, she flew to Windsor by helicopter, and so that no photographs of her in a wheelchair (which she hated being seen in) could be taken—she insisted that she be shielded from the press—she travelled to the service in a people carrier with blacked-out windows, which had been previously used by Margaret.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: On 5 March 2002, Elizabeth was present at the luncheon of the annual lawn party of the Eton Beagles, and watched the Cheltenham Races on television; however, her health began to deteriorate precipitously during her last weeks, after retreating to Royal Lodge for the final time.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: On 30 March 2002, at 15:15 GMT, Elizabeth died at the Royal Lodge, Windsor, at the age of 101, with her surviving daughter Queen Elizabeth II by her side. She had been suffering from a chest cold since Christmas 2001. At 101 years and 238 days old she was the first member of the British royal family to live past the age of 100. She was the longest-living member of the British royal family at the time of her death. Her surviving sister-in-law, Princess Alice, Duchess of Gloucester, exceeded that, dying at the age of 102 on 29 October 2004. She was one of the longest-lived members of any royal family.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: Elizabeth grew camellias in every one of her gardens, and before her flag-draped coffin was taken from Windsor to lie in state at Westminster Hall, an arrangement of camellias from her own gardens was placed on top. An estimated 200,000 people over three days filed past as she lay in state in Westminster Hall at the Palace of Westminster. Members of the household cavalry and other branches of the armed forces stood guard at the four corners of the catafalque. At one point, her four grandsons Prince Charles, Prince Andrew, Prince Edward and Viscount Linley mounted the guard as a mark of respect—an honour similar to the Vigil of the Princes at the lying in state of King George V.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: On the day of her funeral, 9 April, the Governor General of Canada issued a proclamation asking Canadians to honour Elizabeth's memory that day. In Australia, the Governor-General read the lesson at a memorial service held in St Andrew's Cathedral, Sydney.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: In London, more than a million people filled the area outside Westminster Abbey and along the route from central London to Elizabeth's final resting place in the King George VI Memorial Chapel beside her husband and younger daughter in St George's Chapel, Windsor Castle. At her request, after her funeral the wreath that had lain atop her coffin was placed on the Tomb of the Unknown Warrior, in a gesture that echoed her wedding-day tribute 79 years before.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: Known for her personal and public charm, Elizabeth was one of the most popular members of the royal family, and helped to stabilise the popularity of the monarchy as a whole.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: Elizabeth's critics included Kitty Kelley, who falsely alleged that she did not abide by the rationing regulations during the Second World War. This, however, was contradicted by the official records, and Eleanor Roosevelt during her wartime stay at Buckingham Palace reported expressly on the rationed food served in the Palace and the limited bathwater that was permitted. Claims that Elizabeth used racist slurs to refer to black people were strongly denied by Major Colin Burgess, the husband of Elizabeth Burgess, a mixed-race secretary who accused members of Prince Charles's Household of racial abuse. Elizabeth made no public comments on race, but according to Robert Rhodes James in private she "abhorred racial discrimination" and decried apartheid as "dreadful". Woodrow Wyatt records in his diary that when he expressed the view that non-white countries have nothing in common with "us", she told him, "I am very keen on the Commonwealth. They're all like us." However, she did distrust Germans; she told Woodrow Wyatt, "Never trust them, never trust them." While she may have held such views, it has been argued that they were normal for British people of her generation and upbringing, who had experienced two vicious wars with Germany.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: In his official biography, William Shawcross portrays Elizabeth as a person whose indomitable optimism, zest for life, good manners, mischievous sense of humour, and interest in people and subjects of all kinds contributed to her exceptional popularity and to her longevity. Sir Hugh Casson said Elizabeth was like "a wave breaking on a rock, because although she is sweet and pretty and charming, she also has a basic streak of toughness and tenacity. ... when a wave breaks on a rock, it showers and sparkles with a brilliant play of foam and droplets in the sun, yet beneath is really hard, tough rock, fused, in her case, from strong principles, physical courage and a sense of duty." Sir Peter Ustinov described her during a student demonstration at the University of Dundee in 1968:


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: Elizabeth was well known for her dry witticisms. On hearing that Edwina Mountbatten was buried at sea, she said: "Dear Edwina, she always liked to make a splash." Accompanied by the gay writer Sir Noël Coward at a gala, she mounted a staircase lined with Guards. Noticing Coward's eyes flicker momentarily across the soldiers, she murmured to him: "I wouldn't if I were you, Noël; they count them before they put them out."


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: After being advised by a Conservative Minister in the 1970s not to employ homosexuals, Elizabeth observed that without them, "we'd have to go self-service". On the fate of a gift of a nebuchadnezzar of champagne (20 bottles' worth) even if her family did not come for the holidays, she said, "I'll polish it off myself." Emine Saner of "The Guardian" suggests that with a gin and Dubonnet at noon, red wine with lunch, a port and martini at 6 pm and two glasses of champagne at dinner, "a conservative estimate puts the number of alcohol units she drank at 70 a week". Her lifestyle amused journalists, particularly when it was revealed she had a multi-million pound overdraft with Coutts Bank.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: Her habits were parodied by the satirical 1980s television programme "Spitting Image". This was the first satirical depiction on television; the makers initially demurred from featuring her, fearing that it would be considered off-limits by most of the viewing public. In the end, she was portrayed as a perpetually tipsy Beryl Reid soundalike. She was portrayed by Juliet Aubrey in "Bertie and Elizabeth", Sylvia Syms in "The Queen", Natalie Dormer in "W.E.", Olivia Colman in "Hyde Park on Hudson", Victoria Hamilton (Seasons 1 and 2), Marion Bailey (Seasons 3 and 4) and Marcia Warren (Season 5) in "The Crown" and in "The King's Speech" by Helena Bonham Carter, who was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress and won a BAFTA Award for Best Actress in a Supporting Role for her portrayal.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: The Cunard White Star Line's was named after her. She launched the ship on 27 September 1938 in Clydebank, Scotland. Supposedly, the liner started to slide into the water before Elizabeth could officially launch her, and acting sharply, she managed to smash a bottle of Australian red over the liner's bow just before it slid out of reach. In 1954, Elizabeth sailed to New York on her namesake.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: A statue of Elizabeth by sculptor Philip Jackson was unveiled in front of the George VI Memorial, off The Mall, London, on 24 February 2009, creating the King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Memorial.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: In March 2011, her eclectic musical taste was revealed when details of her small record collection kept at the Castle of Mey were made public. Her records included ska, local folk, Scottish reels and the musicals "Oklahoma!" and "The King and I", and artists such as yodeller Montana Slim, Tony Hancock, The Goons and Noël Coward.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: Eight years before her death, she had reportedly placed two-thirds of her money (an estimated £19 million) into trusts, for the benefit of her great-grandchildren. In her lifetime, she received £643,000 a year from the Civil List, and spent an estimated £1–2 million annually to run her household. By the end of the 1990s, her overdraft was said to be around £4 million. She left the bulk of her estate, estimated to be worth between £50 and £70 million, including paintings, Fabergé eggs, jewellery, and horses, to her surviving daughter, Queen Elizabeth II. Under an agreement reached in 1993, property passing from monarch to monarch is exempt from inheritance tax, as is property passing from the consort of a former monarch to the current monarch, so a tax liability estimated at £28 million (40 percent of the value of the estate) was not incurred. The most important pieces of art were transferred to the Royal Collection by Elizabeth II. Following her death, the Queen successfully applied to the High Court so that details of her mother's will would be kept secret. This brought criticism from the Labour Party politicians and segments of the public, and the Queen eventually released the outlines of her mother's will.


title: Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother

text: Elizabeth's coat of arms was the royal coat of arms of the United Kingdom (in either the English or the Scottish version) impaled with the canting arms of her father, the Earl of Strathmore; the latter being: 1st and 4th quarters, Argent, a lion rampant Azure, armed and langued Gules, within a double tressure flory-counter-flory of the second (Lyon); 2nd and 3rd quarters, Ermine, three bows stringed paleways proper (Bowes). The shield is surmounted by the imperial crown, and supported by the crowned lion of England and a lion rampant per fess Or and Gules.


title: Vanessa Hudgens

text: Vanessa Anne Hudgens (; born December 14, 1988) is an American actress and singer. After making her feature film debut in "Thirteen" (2003), Hudgens rose to fame portraying Gabriella Montez in the "High School Musical" film series (2006–2008), which brought her significant mainstream media success. The success of the first film led Hudgens to acquire a recording contract with Hollywood Records, with whom she released two studio albums, "V" (2006) and "Identified" (2008).