Taylor Hawkins was “Mr. Fanboy’ whenever he was around his idols
Foo Fighters drummer Taylor Hawkins made sure to show his idols how much he loved them. They inspired him to pursue a career music, so he often paid homage to them. He was so passionate about his heroes and was fortunate enough to form close friendships with all of them, including The Police’s Stewart Copeland, Queen’s Roger Taylor and Brian May, as well as the members of Rush. Hawkins was “Mr. fan boy.”
Taylor Hawkins was “Mr. Fanboy’ to all his idols
When Hawkins started drumming as a kid, he looked up to Stewart Copeland of The Police and Roger Taylor of Queen. In 2019, Hawkins told the BBC how he first heard The Police.
“My brother gave me a copy of ‘Zenyatta Mondatta,'” Hawkins said. “It was 1982. He says, ‘If you want to be good, you have to play it like this guy.’ My first two big inspirations – probably the two guys who shaped a lot of what I do when I play drums in a rock band – are Roger Taylor and Stewart Copeland.”
Hawkins and Copeland became close friends in the early 2000s. They often hung out and jammed together. After Hawkins’ death on March 25, Copeland told Rolling Stone: “He was always Mister Fanboy, but that was part of his shtick.
“‘Okay, ok, Taylor, calm down!’ One of his social tricks was that whenever we were together he would select a police t-shirt from his extensive collection. When he hung out with Neil, he wore his Rush t-shirt. He was 50 years old and going to eight.
“He was a fan of everyone, a real enthusiast. Even though he was a star, he was very interested in all the other people, how they got there and what they do. He knew everything – all the different things anyone could do. Each Flammadiddle and Rattamacue as played by its heroes.”
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Hawkins surprised his idols
The Foo Fighters drummer also adored Queen. After seeing the band perform for the first time as a child, he was so amazed that he couldn’t sleep that night. However, his love for the band surprised guitarist Brain May.
May reflected on the drummer’s love for Queen during an interview on My Planet Rocks. He said he was shocked Hawkins was such a big fan because he was cooler than Queen.
“The funny thing was that he turned out to be the biggest Queen fan in the world,” May said. “That always came as a shock to me because he seemed way cooler than us.”
May loves that Hawkins helped spread Queen’s music to a younger generation. “I think Taylor Hawkins single-handedly made Queen cool for a new generation. He knew everything about us…everything!
“It was at that point that he and (Foo Fighters guitarist) Pat Smear presented us with an award at a ceremony – I can’t even remember what it was now – but at that point it became clear very early on that they knew everything. They knew more about us than we did! It was always a great thing.”
May asked Hawkins to provide drums for the track “Cyborg,” which he got to play. Hawkins had just joined the Foo Fighters. For him, it was a moment when things came full circle. Roger Taylor later gave Hawkins the snare drum he used during the Freddie Mercury AIDs Awareness concert. It was one of Hawkins’ proudest possessions.
“Several times in London, me and Taylor would walk to Freddie’s in the middle of the night [Mercury’s] house and just sat in front of the gate,” said Chad “Yeti” Ward, Hawkins’ drum technician from 2005 to 2019. “That was his hero.”
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The Foo Fighters drummer made a fan very happy a few days before his death
Hawkins managed to befriend almost all of his idols, including Jane’s Addiction frontman Perry Farrell.
“What I loved about him was that he wasn’t afraid to say he was a fan,” said Perry Farrell. “There are a lot of men who are afraid to say that because they might be jealous of each other’s talent. You don’t want to give him any light.
“Taylor didn’t have that problem at all. If he thought you were great, he would talk about it. It was a very endearing, childish quality he had.”
Hawkins made sure his own fans knew he loved them as much as his idols. Three days before his death, Hawkins made a fan very happy. On March 22, the Foo Fighters canceled their concert in Asunción, the capital of Paraguay, due to bad weather.
Hawkins was in his hotel lobby when he heard drumming from the crowd of fans outside. When he did some research, he found nine-year-old Emma Sofía Peralta, who played her heart out on Foo Fighters’ “The Pretender” and “Everlong.”
“That day was going to be the worst day of my life,” Peralta told Rolling Stone, referring to the canceled concert via Zoom (with the help of her father Julius, translating), “and suddenly it became the best day of my life. ”
Just as The Police and Queen gave Hawkins hope as a child, Hawkins gave hope to Peralta. Hawkins paid it further.
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