Some of the best drummers in the rock business have signed a bass drum skin to be auctioned in aid of an Isle of Wight-based charity.

The drum will go under the hammer in aid of the Roll Out The Barrel Trust at Bonhams in London on May 4.

Roll Out The Barrel helps villages in the Third World access clean water with their ingenious portable barrels. 

The drum skin has 63 drummer signatures including music legends such as Blondie's Clem Burke, The Kinks' Mick Avory, The Jam's Rick Buckler, The Who's Kenney Jones and Pink Floyd's Nick Mason.

In 2017, The Chords drummer Brett "Buddy" Ascott began collecting signatures from the drumming community for the drum skin. 
"I was a trustee of a charity called the Roll Out The Barrel Trust which exists to distribute 30 litre water barrels across the developing world," Brett told Phil Kennedy on BBC Radio Berkshire.

"They go to villages where they don't have a water supply and to save the women and children, because it's usually the women and children carrying buckets, often on their head, which results in neck injuries.

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"We give them these barrels that they can take to the well or water hole to fill and then they can roll it back to their village.

"So, they can take a lot more water in one journey which saves on the possibility of being attacked and spillage and contamination. So, it's a brilliant invention by our founder, Island Rotarian Adrian Brewer."

"Adrian kept asking me 'you know a lot of musicians. What can you do?'

And I said 'Well I don't know a lot of musicians but I do know quite a lot drummers'," adds Brett.

"Every year he hires the O2 for an afternoon or morning to have Rotarians walking over the top of the O2.

"And I just woke up one morning and I thought I need a unique angle on this. And I suddenly thought well If we put a snare drum at the top of the O2, then people can climb and sit there and play for a minute and they can tell everyone they've played the O2. And that is what happened.

"I think there was 40 of us that eventually went up. And we were led up by Rick Buckler of The Jam and everyone who climbed signed the drum skin. And that was great.

"The drum skin had been donated by Nick Mason of Pink Floyd.

"He's a director at Footes drum shop. And then it took on a life of its own, because we had a lot of space on the drum skin and I just started door-stepping famous drummers, turning up with this drum skin and asking them to sign it."

The online rock, pop and film auction takes place at Bonhams in London at noon on May 4.