‘Tragic and untimely loss’: Foo Fighters drummer Taylor Hawkins dead at 50

Hawkins added, “I’m not here to preach about not doing drugs, because I loved doing drugs, but I just got out of control for a while and it almost got me.” In a 2018 conversation with Beats 1, he said, “There’s no happy ending with hard drugs,” but declined to explain how he stayed sober: “I don’t really discuss how I live my life in that regard. I have my system that works for me.” No cause of death has been revealed. After Foo Fighters founder and frontman Dave Grohl, Hawkins was probably the most prominent member of the group, appearing alongside Grohl in interviews and playing prominent roles in the band’s videos. Taylor Hawkins and Foo Fighters frontman Dave Grohl. Credit:Getty

He also starred in Foo Fighters’ recently released horror-comedy film Studio 666, in which a demonic force in a house the band is staying in seizes Grohl and makes him murderous. In the film, Hawkins and other members of the band, Pat Smear, Rami Jaffee, Chris Shiflett, Nate Mendel, are killed off one by one. The film allowed the group – for decades one of rock music’s most durable acts – to have fun while acting out a long-running joke. Loading The film’s premise came out of their work on their 10th studio album at a home in Los Angeles’ San Fernando Valley. Hawkins was the Foo Fighters’ drummer for 25 of the band’s 28 years, taking over from original drummer William Goldsmith in 1997.

Born Oliver Taylor Hawkins in Fort Worth, Texas, in 1972, Hawkins was raised in Laguna Beach, California. He played in the small Southern California band Sylvia before landing his first major gig as a drummer for Canadian singer Sass Jordan. He then spent the mid-1990s as the touring drummer for Alanis Morissette before Grohl asked him to join the Foo Fighters. It’s the second time Grohl has experienced the death of a close bandmate. Grohl was the drummer for Nirvana when Kurt Cobain died in 1994. Hawkins is survived by his wife, Alison, and their three children Oliver, Annabella and Everleigh.

The Foo Fighters are currently on a massive world tour, with shows booked until the end of 2022, including five stadium shows in Australia in November and December. On March 4, the band played a special one-off gig at Kardinia Park in Geelong - the first stadium show by an international band or artist since the COVID pandemic paused tours to Australia. Tickets sold out within hours of going on sale. The gig was driven by Grohl himself, who hatched a plan that took only “three weeks from phone call to encore” according to Frontier Touring’s chief operating officer Dion Brant. “It was Dave Grohl’s idea that Foo Fighters should come down and be that first big international to bring rock back to Australia,” said Brant. The band released their 10th studio album, Medicine at Midnight, in 2021. Tributes for Hawkins

Celebrities and musicians from around the world have taken to social media to pay tribute to Hawkins.

Hawkins ‘learned from the best’ Hawkins told The Age and Sydney Morning Herald in early 2021, around the time the band’s new album was released, that he’d “learned from the best” by listening to Queen’s drummer Roger Taylor and Stewart Copeland from the Police. His first album with the Foo Fighters was 1999’s There Is Nothing Left To Lose.

“It felt like I was somehow able to fit in on the drums for the Foo Fighters, and it’s a tough position to fill because Dave [Grohl] is one of the best drummers of all time,” he said. Loading “I had to find my zone, so to speak ... and I can’t believe I’ve made eight albums. When we were making Nothing Left To Lose, I wasn’t sure I was ever going to be able to make a record with the Foo Fighters. Playing live is such a different thing and I’d never really been in a real studio before, so it was definitely a trial by fire experience ... and Dave really held my hand through that record and helped me get through it.” He said the recent period of lockdown in America when tours were cancelled, had been a time for reflection. “I had time to chill and reflect and just be a family person and that’s been nice ... if there’s anything to take away from all this, it’s been time to self reflect and reflect on the good fortune we’ve had and smell the roses a little bit.”

He said Foo Fighters played a show in West Hollywood’s Troubadour during the lockdown, to help raise money for roadies and small venues. “The joy of that, really was just having Dave sitting in front of me, telling stories to the road crew and it was a bunch of guys, having a laugh, getting to the core of what we do as a band, which is play live and that felt good to do that, it really did.” Despite the band’s worldwide hits, including Learn To Fly, Times Like These and All My Life, he said one of his favourite Foo Fighters songs was Aurora, from his first album. “I made one of my favourite recordings I’ve ever made on that record, which is Aurora, it’s one of my favourite songs I’ve ever recorded with the Foo Fighters, I love it so much, a beautiful song.