{"id":2237966,"date":"2026-01-16T19:45:17","date_gmt":"2026-01-16T19:45:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/?p=2237966"},"modified":"2026-01-16T19:45:17","modified_gmt":"2026-01-16T19:45:17","slug":"siouxsie-and-the-banshees-drummer-kenny-morris-dead-at-68","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/siouxsie-and-the-banshees-drummer-kenny-morris-dead-at-68\/","title":{"rendered":"Siouxsie and the Banshees drummer Kenny Morris dead at 68"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/wp-content%2Fuploads%2Fsites%2F2%2F2026%2F01%2Fposed-studio-group-portrait-l-119038364.jpg?quality%3D90%26strip%3Dall\" \/><\/p>\n<div>\n<p>Kenny Morris, the original drummer of the British punk band Siouxsie and the Banshees, has died. He was 68.<\/p>\n<p>John Robb, a music journalist and the late drummer\u2019s longtime friend, announced the news on Thursday. No cause of death has been revealed.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cKenny was a friend of ours, and it was always a pleasure to see and hang out with him when visiting Cork in Ireland, where he had been living,\u201d Robb wrote in a <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/louderthanwar.com\/kenny-morris-rip\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">touching tribute.<\/a> \u201cHe was sweet, articulate, artistic and fascinating company and his beautiful eccentricity was adorable.\u201d<\/p>\n<figure class=\"nyp-slideshow-modal-image wp-block-image aligncenter size-large\"><figcaption>Kenny Morris in 1979. <span class=\"credit\">Redferns<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>\u201cHe would turn up in a suit and a dress with open handcuffs on one hand and the next time in a totally different yet perfectly created bricolage of style, whilst still dressing in the artful confrontation of the 1976 punk era that he was such a key part of,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n<p>Robb acknowledged that Morris experienced his share of \u201cups and downs\u201d before moving to Ireland in 1993, and ended his heartfelt tribute with a sweet message to the late musician.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"single__inline-module aligncenter wp-block-nypost-editor-primary-tag\">\n<\/aside>\n<p>\u201cIt was great to know you, Kenny and we will miss your sweet eccentricity and long WhatsApp messages and your art and your gentle presence in a cruel world,\u201d he concluded.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"nyp-slideshow-modal-image wp-block-image aligncenter size-large\"><figcaption>Siouxsie and the Banshees members Steve Severin, Siouxsie Sioux, John McKay and Kenny Morris. <span class=\"credit\">Redferns<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Born in Essex, England, on Feb. 1, 1957, Morris studied fine art and filmmaking at\u00a0North East London Polytechnic before briefly joining early punk band The Flowers of Romance with Sid Vicious in late 1976.<\/p>\n<p>But it wasn\u2019t until 1977 that Morris joined Siouxsie and the Banshees as the group\u2019s original drummer. <\/p>\n<p>Siouxsie Sioux, now 68, and Steven Severin, now 70, had formed the rock band in London in 1976 shortly after opening for the Sex Pistols that September. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cI thought I definitely wanted to be in a rock\u2019n\u2019roll band when I grew up,\u201d Morris <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/tripeanddrisheen.substack.com\/p\/remembering-the-wail-of-the-banshee\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">said during an interview<\/a> in 2023.\u00a0\u201cEverything about the lifestyle, even at that age, appealed to me.\u201d<\/p>\n<figure class=\"nyp-slideshow-modal-image wp-block-image aligncenter size-large\"><figcaption>Kenny Morris joined Siouxsie and the Banshees in 1977. <span class=\"credit\">Redferns<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Morris also opened up about auditioning for Siouxsie and the Banshees and how he managed to land the drumming gig.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhen I turned up for the audition, there was some drum kit there, and I was fiddling around trying to figure out how to even set the thing up when Nils Stevenson, the Banshees manager, came up to me: \u2018You\u2019re supposed to be a f\u2013king drummer, aren\u2019t ya?&#8217;\u201d he recalled.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI took an instant dislike to him,\u201d he added. \u201cBut by the end of the audition, we had eight songs.\u201d<\/p>\n<figure class=\"nyp-slideshow-modal-image wp-block-image aligncenter size-large\"><figcaption>Siouxsie Sioux, Kenny Morris and Steve Severin in 1977. <span class=\"credit\">Redferns<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>After officially joining Siouxsie and the Banshees, Morris went on to play on their first two records: 1978\u2019s\u00a0\u201cThe Scream\u201d and 1979\u2019s\u00a0\u201cJoin Hands.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>However, Morris and the group\u2019s guitarist, John McKay, abruptly quit the band after an argument broke out during a record signing event in September 1979.<\/p>\n<p>The pair\u2019s sudden departure came in the middle of a major tour to promote \u201cJoin Hands,\u201d and Morris was ultimately replaced by the Slits\u2019 former drummer Budgie while McKay was replaced by the Cure\u2019s Robert Smith.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"nyp-slideshow-modal-image wp-block-image aligncenter size-large\"><figcaption>Kenny Morris and guitarist John McKay quit Siouxsie and the Banshees in 1979. <span class=\"credit\">Redferns<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Siouxsie and the Banshees <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/2007\/07\/18\/theyve-got-it-covered\/\">transitioned from post-punk to new wave<\/a> after Morris and McKay\u2019s exits, while Morris reportedly went on to pursue other drumming opportunities before enrolling in film school.<\/p>\n<p>Before his death, the late musician was said to have started drumming again for the Dublin-based post-punk goth band Shrine of the Vampyre. He also reportedly <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.mixcloud.com\/FrenchSpurs1\/retropopic-543-kenny-morris-talks-early-days-the-scream-join-hands-leaving-the-banshees\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">wrote a memoir<\/a> that is scheduled to be released later this year.<\/p>\n<p>The Post has reached out to Sioux\u2019s rep for comment.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><em> \u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n<p><em> \u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source celebrity.land \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Kenny Morris, the original drummer of the British punk band Siouxsie and the Banshees, has died. He was 68. John Robb, a music journalist and the late drummer\u2019s longtime friend, announced the news on Thursday. No cause of death has been revealed. \u201cKenny was a friend of ours, and it was always a pleasure to [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2237967,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25174],"tags":[22062,25601,433026,21741,21800,22149,306404],"class_list":["post-2237966","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-gossip","tag-celebrity-deaths","tag-deaths","tag-drumming","tag-entertainment","tag-music","tag-musicians","tag-punk-rock"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/Siouxsie-and-the-Banshees-drummer-Kenny-Morris-dead-at-68-scaled.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2237966","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2237966"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2237966\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2237968,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2237966\/revisions\/2237968"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2237967"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2237966"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2237966"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2237966"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}