UFO Cancels Final Tour as Founder-Singer Suffers Heart Attack
by Best Classic Bands Staff
UFO (L-R): Rob De Luca, Vinnie Moore, Phil Mogg, Neil Carter, Andy Parker
UFO has announced that their singer and founder Phil Mogg suffered a heart attack last week. The group has thus canceled the October dates of their farewell tour. The band shared the news today (Sept. 2, 2022) on their Facebook page noting that Mogg had an operation to place stents into two arteries. The performer, who turned 74 on April 15, wrote that, in consultation with his doctor, he must put off “resuming work, touring, playing, etc.” His rehab program will begin in six weeks and is expected to last for another six weeks. “I certainly didn’t want to bow out in this fashion,” he wrote. The band indicated that it was unclear whether the dates will be made up in 2023.
UFO announced their final tour on Sept. 3, 2021, featuring a series of exclusive concerts in summer 2022, with some unique events, including a dress rehearsal, limited to just 80 tickets. The plans allowed the British rock legends “to bid farewell to its fans in style.”
The band described the performances “as the grand finale of an unprecedented success story, which began in 1969 and has spanned more than five decades.”
UFO were to play the very last concert of their long career on Oct. 29, 2022, in Athens, Greece, where the band performed its first show featuring current guitarist Vinnie Moore in February 2004. See the full original itinerary below.
Mogg had anticipated the farewell with mixed feelings. “After so many years with countless highlights, fantastic experiences and lots of beautiful memories – as well as some difficult moments, naturally – it’ll be a worthy finale to say goodbye to your fans in person. I know that there are bound to be some very emotional moments on both sides.”
UFO lost two of the band’s prominent alumni in 2020. Founding bassist Pete Way died Aug. 14 from injuries he sustained in an auto accident. His death was preceded two months earlier by longtime guitarist Paul Chapman, on June 9.
Watch UFO perform at their last concert on July 16, 2022
UFO Final Tour – 2022
Jun 20 – Hannover, Germany – Beatbox (indoors)
Jun 21 – Hannover, Germany – Beatbox (outdoors)
Jun 23 – Clisson , France – Hellfest (Part 2)
Jul 01 – Barcelona, Spain – Rockfest
Jul 03 – Munich, Germany – Backstage
Jul 05 – Memmingen, Germany – Kaminwerk
Jul 07 – Bremen, Germany – Modernes
Jul 08 – Berlin, Germany – Hole 44
Jul 09 – Torgau, Germany – Kulturbastion Open Air
Jul 11 – Tübingen, Germany – Sudhaus
Jul 12 – Bochum, Germany – Zeche
Jul 13 – Cologne, Germany – Kantine
Jul 15 – Frankfurt, Germany – Batschkapp
Jul 16 – Enderndorf, Germany – Lieder am See Festival
Oct 15 – Sint-Niklaas, Belgium – De Casino
Oct 16 – Tilburg, Holland – 013
Oct 17 – Braunschweig, Germany – Westand
Oct 18 – Hamburg, Germany – Fabrik
Oct 20 – Prague, Czech Republic – Palac Akropolis
Oct 21 – Dresden, Germany – Tante Ju
Oct 22 – Erfurt, Germany – HsD
Oct 24 – Augsburg, Germany – Spectrum
Oct 25 – Speyer, Germany – Halle 101
Oct 26 – Nuremberg, Germany – Hirsch
Oct 28 – Thessaloniki, Greece – Principal Club
Oct 29 – Athens, Greece – Fuzz Club
2 Comments so far
Jump into a conversationPete Way did not die from an auto accident. He died in hospital after complications from taking a fall down the staircase of his home.
NOOOOOOO!!!!! Not Phil!!! Get well soon, sir!! We love you and wish the best for you now and always!! Thank you from the depths of my soul for PHILling my life and heart with some of the greatest rock music ever created since I was eleven years old in 1974!! Thank you, too, for how cool you were to me in 1995 when you fulPHILled one of my greatest dreams by reuniting with Mad Mikey, playing Toad’s Place in New Haven, CT and being so gracious when I had the stick to knock on your bus door. You and Pete were so awesome to me, my brothers, sister, girlfriend and dozen or so friends who accompanied me and for signing my Strangers LP I had since I was 15. It’s a memory I’ll cherish forever! Thank you, also, for sending me a pre-release burned cd-r of Covenant. That really knocked me out!! If there was a Mt. Rushmore of Rock, your head would be carved into it. You are loved and revered more than you may know!! Godspeed, you immortal legend!! Gotta go listen to Love to Love and have a good cry. With everything I am, Chris Yancik, Thomaston, CT