Olympics Organizers Ask The Who's Keith Moon to Perform

File this one under "faux pas."

With Led Zeppelin and the remaining Beatles out of the question for the 2012 London Olympics, the organizers of the event approached another rock legend about playing the closing ceremony: Keith Moon, legendary drummer for the Who.

Or rather, the legendary and very dead drummer for the Who.

Moon was requested to take part in the Symphony of Rock, a celebration of British pop culture, which was scheduled to take place on August 12 during the closing ceremony of this year's Summer Olympics.

"I emailed back saying Keith now resides in Golders Green crematorium," the band's longtime manager Bill Curbishley told The Times, "having lived up to the Who's anthemic line 'I hope I die before I get old'."

He would add: "If they have a round table, some glasses and candles, we might contact him."

Moon died in 1978 at the age of 32.

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Josh Hart

Josh Hart is a former web producer and staff writer for Guitar World and Guitar Aficionado magazines (2010–2012). He has since pursued writing fiction under various pseudonyms while exploring the technical underpinnings of journalism, now serving as a senior software engineer for The Seattle Times.