This morning, reports surfaced that Charlie Watts had quit the Rolling Stones, with the Australian Web site Undercover quoting a “source within the Stones inner-circle” as saying “Charlie Watts has quit the band. He will never record or tour with the band again.” Undercover went on to say that to them, the news wasn’t a surprise, and that the band already had a backup drummer ready to go. Well, guess who the news did surprise? The Stones’ publicist, who issued this denial a few hours after the Undercover story went viral:

“Contrary to a fabricated story that ran this morning on a small music web site in Australia, drummer Charlie Watts has not left The Rolling Stones.”

Ooh, a traffic burn in conjunction with a denial? That’s gotta hurt. (Although it’s not like a Web site’s size always results in it being on the ball factually, you know? Cough cough.)


ROLLING STONES’ CHARLIE WATTS HAS NOT QUIT: OFFICIAL! [Uncut]
EXCLUSIVE: Charlie Watts Quits The Rolling Stones [Undercover]