The Foo Fighters song Taylor Hawkins compared to The Who
It took a while for Taylor Hawkins to claim the drum stool permanently in the Foo Fighters. Being the drummer for a band led by Dave Grohl was never going to be easy, and for at least a decade after the untimely demise of Nirvana, Grohl had continued to play drums for his own band off and on. He famously played all the instruments on the 1995 self-titled debut, and his pushiness to continue playing on 1997’s The Colour and the Shape eventually led to the band’s original drummer, Sunny Day Real Estate stickman William Goldsmith, to leave the group.
When Hawkins arrived to replace Goldsmith, he and Grohl split the drumming duties almost evenly on 1999’s There Is Nothing Left to Lose. “I was just green, and I was having a really hard time learning how to play in the studio because it’s just such a different thing,” Hawkins admitted during his drumming masterclass with Steve Lamacq in 2019. “The first album I played on, I played half the drums on and Dave played the other half.”
Tensions between the band members began to surface during the recording of 2002’s One By One. Hawkins had survived a drug overdose early in the recording process, but the connection between him and Grohl was still fragile when Grohl was called over to Queens of the Stone Age to record Songs for the Deaf at the same time. The tensions boiled over during rehearsals for the 2002 Coachella Music and Arts Festival, during which the band almost split. However, after a solid performance, the Foo Fighters returned to the studio and re-recorded One By One over two months.
One By One became the first Foo Fighters studio album not to feature Grohl playing drums on any tracks. By 2005’s In Your Honor, Hawkins was the only one playing drums, with the exception of his own self-written track ‘Cold Day in the Sun’, on which he and Grohl swapped positions, with Grohl playing drums and Hawkins singing and playing guitar. Hawkins’ approach had evolved by that point as he was feeling more comfortable in the studio environment.
“The big difference for me on this record was that I had drum tech, Gersh, working with me in the studio,” Hawkins told Rhythm Magazine in 2005. “Gersh is a drummer too and has been doing sessions in Los Angeles for 10 years. He understands how to tune drums and make them sound good. It’s a real art and meant that all I had to worry about was playing. I’m the first to admit that I am more comfortable on stage than I am in the studio, but I felt like I had a great support system around me this time. I’m sure I will become more comfortable with each record that we do, but when I’m in the tracking room and all eyes are on me, I’m just desperate to get it right! Drums are tough because they are the first thing to be recorded and they are the foundation of the song.”
The concept behind In Your Honor was that it would be half hard rock and half acoustic music. The album’s first track, ‘In Your Honor’, would kick off the rock side of the LP, and Hawkins channelled the thunderous style of Keith Moon and The Who on the song. “This is the coolest drum sound on the record, and the drum rolls are very Who-esque,” Hawkins revealed in the same interview. “As well as being a great introduction to the rock record, it is almost like a mission statement.”
Check out ‘In Your Honor’ down below.
