{"id":1767199,"date":"2026-02-11T18:54:17","date_gmt":"2026-02-11T15:54:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=1767199"},"modified":"2026-02-11T18:54:17","modified_gmt":"2026-02-11T15:54:17","slug":"pogues-drummer-andrew-the-clobberer-ranken-dies-at-72","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=1767199","title":{"rendered":"Pogues Drummer\u00a0Andrew \u201cThe Clobberer\u201d Ranken Dies at 72"},"content":{"rendered":"

[analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/media.pitchfork.com\/photos\/698cc54d8d2fad0dcc8287e6\/16:9\/w_1280,c_limit\/pogues-andrew-ranken.jpg”]<\/p>\n

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News<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Pogues Drummer\u00a0Andrew \u201cThe Clobberer\u201d Ranken Dies at 72<\/h1>\n
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Ranken was a founding member of the Irish punk outfit<\/div>\n
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By <\/span>Jazz Monroe<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/div>\n

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The Pogues\u2019 Andrew Ranken, 2013 (Shirlaine Forrest\/WireImage)<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/header>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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Andrew Ranken, the drummer and occasional singer and songwriter of the Pogues, died Tuesday, February 10. The band announced the news on Instagram, describing the musician, known as the Clobberer, as a founding member and \u201cheartbeat of the Pogues.\u201d In her own post,\u00a0Victoria Mary Clarke, the wife of late bandleader Shane MacGowan, said Ranken had died after a \u201clong and brave battle with illness,\u201d though no cause of death was given. He was 72 years old.<\/p>\n

Native Londoner Ranken joined MacGowan, Peter \u201cSpider\u201d Stacy, and Jem Finer, in the band then known as Pogue Mahone, in 1983. He played on every record through the band\u2019s first phase of infamy, including the classic 1985 album Rum Sodomy & The Lash<\/em>, which he named as such because, he said, \u201cit seemed to sum up life in our band.\u201d Ranken remained in music after the Pogues\u2019 first breakup in 1996, joining the reunited members between 2001 and 2014 and playing in other projects such as the Mysterious Wheels and hKippers.<\/p>\n

In her tribute, Clarke commended Ranken for \u201cbraving all the beer-swilling, pogo-jumping, underground illegal drinking joints the fledgling band played and developing his own unique style of a warrior drumbeat. Without him the Pogues could never have developed their battle-ready rhythm and sound.\u201d<\/p>\n

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[analyse_source url=”http:\/\/pitchfork.com\/news\/pogues-drummer-andrew-the-clobberer-ranken-dies-at-72\/”]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/media.pitchfork.com\/photos\/698cc54d8d2fad0dcc8287e6\/16:9\/w_1280,c_limit\/pogues-andrew-ranken.jpg”] News Pogues Drummer\u00a0Andrew \u201cThe Clobberer\u201d Ranken Dies at 72 Ranken was a founding member of the Irish punk outfit By Jazz Monroe February 11, 2026 The Pogues\u2019 Andrew Ranken, 2013 (Shirlaine Forrest\/WireImage) Andrew Ranken, the drummer and occasional singer and songwriter of the Pogues, died Tuesday, February 10. The band announced the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[226,54],"class_list":["post-1767199","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","tag-crawlmanager","tag-pitchfork-com"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1767199","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1767199"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1767199\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1767199"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1767199"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1767199"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}