{"id":293195,"date":"2026-02-11T23:44:08","date_gmt":"2026-02-11T23:44:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/293195\/"},"modified":"2026-02-11T23:44:08","modified_gmt":"2026-02-11T23:44:08","slug":"the-pogues-drummer-andrew-ranken-dies-aged-72-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/293195\/","title":{"rendered":"The Pogues drummer Andrew Ranken dies aged 72 \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/the-pogues\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/the-pogues\/\">The Pogues<\/a> drummer Andrew Ranken has died aged 72. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">In a statement shared on social media, the band paid tribute to Ranken, describing him as \u201cdrummer, founding member, and heartbeat of The Pogues\u201d and \u201cforever a true friend and brother\u201d. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The message, which was signed off by fellow Pogues founding members Spider Stacy, Jem Finer and James Fearnley, thanked the drummer for his friendship, wit, generosity of spirit, \u201cand of course for the music\u201d. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/culture\/music\/2023\/12\/23\/siobhan-macgowan-my-mind-is-full-still-with-the-magical-mayhem-of-my-brother-shanes-life\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/culture\/music\/2023\/12\/23\/siobhan-macgowan-my-mind-is-full-still-with-the-magical-mayhem-of-my-brother-shanes-life\/\">Siobh\u00e1n MacGowan<\/a>, sister of the late frontman <a href=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/shane-macgowan\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/shane-macgowan\/\">S<\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/shane-macgowan\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/tags\/shane-macgowan\/\">hane MacGowan<\/a>, also paid tribute to Ranken, saying: \u201cAndrew was such an important part of the story. A band brother and unbelievably talented and unique drummer.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Commenting under The Pogues\u2019 online tribute, Victoria Mary Clarke, wife of Shane MacGowan, said that Ranken \u201cwas a beautiful human\u201d, \u201ca total gentleman\u201d, and \u201can absolutely legendary drummer\u201d.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">\u201cNo doubt that he will be warmly welcomed by Shane, but he will be very much missed here on Earth,\u201d Clarke said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Ranken was born on Ladbroke Grove, London, in 1953. He began playing drums at the age of 14 and became part of the London music scene through various bands such as Lola Cobra; The Stickers; and The Operation.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">He joined The Pogues\u2019 line-up in 1983, after being approached by MacGowan and Finer about a band they were putting together. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">Ranken played on every Pogues album and is credited with coming up with the title of their 1985 album <a href=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/culture\/music\/2023\/12\/01\/the-pogues-a-waste-of-time-were-it-not-for-shane-macgowans-songs\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.irishtimes.com\/culture\/music\/2023\/12\/01\/the-pogues-a-waste-of-time-were-it-not-for-shane-macgowans-songs\/\">Rum Sodomy &amp; the Lash<\/a>. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">He later said that the album\u2019s title \u201cseemed to sum up life in our band.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The Pogues reunited last year without Ranken and MacGowan, for a 40th anniversary tour of the album. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">More recently, Ranken fronted The Mysterious Wheels, which released a charity single Take me down to St Joe\u2019s in support of St Joseph\u2019s Hospice in Hackney in 2023. <\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph paywall \">The cause of Ranken\u2019s death is unknown. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Pogues drummer Andrew Ranken has died aged 72. In a statement shared on social media, the band&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":293196,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[93,61,60,6283,86953,140050],"class_list":{"0":"post-293195","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-entertainment","8":"tag-entertainment","9":"tag-ie","10":"tag-ireland","11":"tag-shane-macgowan","12":"tag-the-pogues","13":"tag-victoria-mary-clarke"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/293195","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=293195"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/293195\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/293196"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=293195"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=293195"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=293195"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}