Taylor Hawkins always wanted to be one legendary drummer: “I wanted to play stadiums when I was ten years old”
It’s one of the most recent tragedies to befall a rock and roll giant, and the loss of Taylor Hawkins still feels incredibly sore to many of the band’s fans.
The drumming duo of Hawkins and Dave Grohl acted as the group’s ultimate double act, changing instruments and positions as easily as they exchanged jokes and barbs in interviews. Operating as the two pillars of the rock legends, the duo seemed to understand each other better than most.
There are a lot of cruel jokes about drummers that float around musical circles. Wrongly thought of as the simplest members of any band, usually relying on rhythm and feel more than musical notes on a page, Hawkins and Grohl mark themselves out as different from the rest. These two not only pound their drumkits like devils but sing like angels.
It’s not entirely uncommon for a drummer to sing, too. Helping out with backing vocals has been a job for many percussionists, from Matt Helders of Arctic Monkeys to Ringo Starr of The Beatles. However, taking on lead vocal duties is not something that happens very often, with The Monkees Micky Dolenz and Eagles’ legend Don Henley being the two prime examples.
Grohl now firmly sits at the head of the Foo Fighters table, taking on lead vocals with a guitar in his hand. However, Hawkins would usually contribute sitting behind his kit, a position he wanted to emulate from the very moment he laid eyes on one noted percussionist: Roger Taylor.
Speaking to Sammy Hagar, Hawkins noted: “One of my heroes when I was a kid was Roger Taylor from Queen, and I always thought it was cool because he always sang a song on the record. He had the highest voice kind of in the band, and he just, you know, behind a big drum set, I said, ‘Uh, he’s cool. I want to be like him'”.
It’s a sentiment he shared throughout his tragically short career: “I wanted to be Roger Taylor, I wanted to be in Queen, I wanted to play stadiums when I was ten years old”. The feeling was mutual and, after his passing, Taylor likened Hawkins to a “younger brother”, and felt that his presence in the Queen drummer’s life made an imprint on him.
Hawkins admired Taylor, feeling that the drummer gifted Queen their sound. “Roger gave Queen their heavy feel and big sound,” he said. “His playing was laid back, loose and – I use this term loosely – punk rock because he did have that sort of rough edge to his drumming, too. And he always put on a real show – he was a very theatrical drummer.”
“[Roger Taylor] swings like no one else, and that’s impossible to emulate,” Hawkins continued. “You know it’s him when you hear the hi-hat open up every time he hits the snare. I can play every fill he’s ever done, but I could never get his feel. I’ve tried and it’s impossible!”.
Playing huge stadium shows became par for the course for the drummer and while he would only sing lead vocals on a few Foo Fighters songs, such as ‘Sunday Rain’ he would deliver a rich and velvety vocal that likely made him a hero to a whole host of fledgling drummers.
Roger Taylor’s secret to good drumming
For Taylor, it’s about knowing your place within the track, telling Express, “As drummers, we drive the band, and I think the most important thing we can all do is play for the song. It’s not about showing off on your instrument. It’s about being aware of the whole song – not just the drum part.”
It’s easy to see how Taylor puts his mouth where his money is whenever Queen hit the studio, too. There are definitely moments where he gets to showboat, like the massive fill in ‘Fat Bottomed Girls’, but some of the most celebrated songs in Queen’s canon include him hanging back and getting into the groove, including ‘We Will Rock You’, where his only job is to just stomp and clap.
Being able to be that kind of drummer almost means learning one thing no one wants to do: knowing when to shut the hell up.
