Apart from throwing in some thinly veiled references to Pink Floyd, the Solo Agency chief was reacting to a November 7 BBC News item saying Collins is “open” to a reunion with Gabriel.

“I’m open for it. I’m happy to sit behind the drums and let Peter be the singer,” Collins told the BBC. Collins expressed the same views in an Israeli broadcast and print media interview earlier in the day, but Giddings said that – as far as he’s aware – there are “no plans as we speak.”

“I’d be proud and very pleased to be involved, but this is something that’s been discussed so many times over the years. In fact, it feels like we’ve discussed it a million times,” Giddings explained.

The BBC story also quoted Collins as saying, “If it doesn’t happen, it would just be because there are too many things in the way.”

Most of Collins’ own 2006 diary could well be taken up with work on his score for Disney’s “Tarzan,” which is being rewritten for a Broadway musical.

However, the reunion story took on a little more substance when Collins echoed Giddings’ comments on the general goodwill between the band’s former members.

“Just because we don’t play in the same band any more doesn’t mean we don’t see each other and enjoy each other’s company,” Collins told The Independent. He went on to say he’d play in a band with Gabriel “in a second” if he was asked.

Last month, some U.S. music mags quoted former Genesis guitarist Steve Hackett as saying, “A reunion, I think, is on the cards at some point.” In addition, Gabriel recently told an American talk show that he’d be meeting with the other members to discuss whether a joint project could take place in the near future.

Genesis formed in the late 1960s and were internationally successful for more than 30 years, despite a series of lineup changes, before the group called it a day in 1998.

Collins, who took over vocal duties when Gabriel left in 1975, is currently nearing the end of the second leg of his solo First Final Farewell Tour, which has included dates across Western Europe as well as Istanbul, Beirut and Tel Aviv.

Collins’ tour is set to continue through Dubai, Dusseldorf, Dublin, Belfast and Glasgow before wrapping with two shows at Prague’s Sazka Arena (23-24), which were shifted from October 24-25 because Collins had the flu.