Live Report: Taylor Hawkins Tribute Concert

An astonishing page in rock history...

An unforgettable night for the history books as friends, family and rock icons pay tribute to the late Taylor Hawkins at Wembley Stadium.

There may be no better way to celebrate the life of the late-Foo Fighters drummer Taylor Hawkins than performances from his friends, family and rock idols at a sold-out Wembley Stadium all in support for charities Music Support and Recording Academy Musicares.

Emotions were high throughout the night as the concert marked the first time Foo Fighters have performed since Hawkins’ tragic death last March which led to the band canceling the entirety of their scheduled 2022 tour.

The members of Foo Fighters came on to pay an emotional tribute to Taylor Hawkins, led by Dave Grohl. 

Grohl said: “For those of you who knew him personally, you know that no one else could make you smile, or laugh, or dance, or sing like he could.” 

“And for those of you who admired him from afar, I’m sure you’ve all felt the same thing so, tonight, we’ve gathered with family and his closest friends, his musical heroes and greatest inspirations to bring you a gigantic fucking night for a gigantic fucking person.”

CREDIT: Scarlet Page

The ‘gigantic fucking night’ got underway with none other than Liam Gallagher, setting the standards high from the off. 

The Oasis frontman opened up with the fitting ‘Rock and Roll Star’ and ‘Live Forever’, a song that Liam dedicated to Hawkins a day after his passing at the Royal Albert Hall back in March.

Following Gallagher was Dave Chapelle, who performed ‘Creep’ by Radiohead with Foo Fighters at MSG last year. Yes, that really happened.

He gave an emotional tribute to his friend saying: “Taylor Hawkins is a legend of a man, he’s a legend of a musician and he’s a legend of a father.”

The concert lasted an incredible six hours and the majority of it honoured and celebrated the music that Taylor loved, performed by the people he loved and looked up to. There was everything from a David Bowie section with Nile Rodgers and Queens of the Stone Age’s Josh Homme to a Jeff Buckley section with Violet Grohl and even a special section of The Police with drummer Stewart Copeland.

The rock legends kept coming from Led Zeppelin’s John Paul Jones performing in his band Them Crooked Vultures to The Eagles’ Joe Walsh with his supergroups The James Gang’s first performance in 15 years and the surviving members of Rush with Dave Grohl filling in for the late Neil Peart. 

One of the early highlights of the show was the one-off performance from arguably one of the great supergroups formed in rock history. Brian Johnson of AC/DC on vocals, Lars Ulrich of Metallica on drums with the Foo Fighters to perform a duo of AC/DC songs ‘Back in Black’ and ‘Let There Be Rock.’

This encapsulated the beauty of this event, all of these legendary musicians coming together to deliver unforgettable moments all in tribute to Hawkins. 

Just before Queen took to the stage, Justin Hawkins led the iconic Freddie Mercury ‘Ay-Oh’ that the frontman performed at Live Aid through footage of a live performance.  Queen were the first band that Taylor saw live and he fell in love with the band, especially Roger Taylor on drums.

One of the most iconic stadium anthems of all time, ‘We Will Rock You’, opened Queen’s set and got the energy pumping throughout the crowd before drummer Roger Taylor’s ‘I’m In Love With My Car.’ 

Following an outright fun performance of ‘Somebody To Love’, with surprise guest Sam Ryder, the rest of the band went off stage and Brian May sat down for a solo performance of ‘Love Of My Life’, a song that Freddie Mercury famously performed at Wembley in 1986.

There was hardly a dry eye in the stadium as phone torches lit up Wembley with a photo of Hawkins showing in the background. 

CREDIT: Oliver Halfin

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Foo Fighters then took to the stage for a set that kicked off with ‘Times Like These.’ Grohl held back the tears as halfway through the song he took a moment to compose himself before continuing.

Just like Taylor would have wanted, emotions turned into high-octane energy with hits like ‘All My Life’, ‘The Pretender’, ‘Learn To Fly’ and ‘Best Of You.’

The surprise of the evening came as Dave Grohl introduced Chrissie Hynde back onto the stage with one of her friends… that friend only happened to be Sir Paul McCartney.

The Beatles legend performed the classic track ‘Oh, Darling!’ for the first time ever as he dueted with The Pretender’s lead singer. 

McCartney then launched into arguably the first heavy metal song, The Beatles’ ‘Helter Skelter’, alongside Foo Fighters.

Foo Fighters set had a ‘revolving door’ of all-star drummers including Blink-182’s Travis Barker, Nandi Bushell, Rufus Taylor and Omar Hakim but the highlight had to be the emotional performance of ‘My Hero’ with Taylor Hawkin’s youngest son Shane Hawkins on the drums.

Feeding off the insane energy in the crowd, It was as if Taylor was reborn as his son delivered a powerful performance on the drums in what must have been an incredibly emotional and difficult moment for him. 

At the end of the show all the performers took to the stage and the magnitude of what the 90,000 inside Wembley had just witnessed was laid bare, one of the most iconic nights in rock history. 

It is a testament to the character of the late-drummer that all these rock icons and fans turned out to pay tribute to one of the modern greats.

Words: Adam Davidson
Photography: Scarlet Page / Oliver Halfin

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