Rolls-Royce has driven a Phantom into a pool because Keith Moon did it once

The Rolls-Royce Phantom is 100 years old in 2025, and to celebrate, Rolls-Royce has driven one straight into a swimming pool. Because The Who drummer Keith Moon famously did just that in the 1970s.

Well, at least that’s what the legend will tell you. Regardless of whether or not it happened, Rolls-Royce considers it a special enough story to recreate for Phantom’s big 100th anniversary.

So it took an old extended Phantom prototype destined for the big scrapheap in the sky, and sent it straight into Tinside Lido in Plymouth. The famous Art Deco building sits next to the English Channel, and is itself linked to another music legend: it featured in a picture taken of a band called ‘The Beatles’ – yup, us neither – back in 1967.

“Over the last 100 years, music artists have used Phantom to project their identity and challenge convention,” said Rolls-Royce boss Chris Brownridge. “Their motor cars often became icons in their own right, with a lasting place in the history of modern music.”

Indeed, it’s reeled off a list of musicians with connections to the Phantom. Elvis bought a Phantom V in 1963. Lennon too, famously repainting his in yellow. Liberace bought a 1961 V and covered it in “tiny mirror pieces”, with the car later appearing in the biopic Behind the Candelabra.

Sir Elton John – heard of him? – bought a Phantom V and Phantom VI, the former resplendent in pink and white which he later gifted to his percussionist, the latter bought on the spot on the way to a concert in 1973.

And of course, Snoop Dogg’s Drop It Like It’s Hot video featured a Phantom VII in the backdrop. One of many appearances of the big boi Rolls in hip-hop videos.

“This enduring connection reminds us that Rolls-Royce and the extraordinary people who are part of the marque’s story are united by one ambition: to make their presence felt,” Brownridge added.