Foo Fighters drummer Taylor Hawkins tragically passed away in late March during a tour stop in in Bogota, Colombia. An official cause of death has not been released, but Colombia’s attorney general’s office said a preliminary toxicology report by medical examiners found evidence of 10 types of substances in Hawkins including opioids, benzodiazepines, marijuana and antidepressants.
In a new Rolling Stone article, friends and peers of Hawkins claim that the drummer was hesitant to return to the road prior to his passing, and that he wasn’t sure if he could remain a full-time member of the band if Foo Fighters kept up their busy touring schedule. “[Taylor] had a heart-to-heart with Dave [Grohl, Foo Fighters frontman] and, yeah, he told me that he ‘couldn’t f*cking do it anymore’ — those were his words,” said Pearl Jam and Soundgarden drummer Matt Cameron. “So I guess they did come to some understanding, but it just seems like the touring schedule got even crazier after that.” A Foo Fighters rep denied that Hawkins said this: “No, there was never a ‘heart-to-heart’ — or any sort of meeting on this topic — with Dave and [Silva Artist Management].”
Singer Sass Jordan said Hawkins was “tired of the whole game.” Another friend who wished to remain anonymous said: “The fact that he finally spoke to Dave and really told him that he couldn’t do this and that he wouldn’t do it anymore, that was freeing for him. That took f*cking balls. That did take a year of working up the guts to do.” The Foo Fighters rep again denied the claim: “He never ‘informed Dave and [management]’ of anything at all like that.”
Red Hot Chili Peppers drummer Chad Smith said that Hawkins passed out on board a plane in Chicago last December. “He just said he was exhausted and collapsed, and they had to pump him full of IVs and stuff,” Smith said. “He was dehydrated and all kinds of stuff.” Smith also added that Hawkins said: “I can’t do it like this anymore.”
Cameron said that Hawkins felt pressure to keep up the pace given the amount of employees within the Foo Fighters organization. “[A band like that] is a big machine [with] a lot of people on the payroll,” Cameron said. “So you’ve got to really be cognizant of the business side of something when it’s that big and that has inherent pressure, just like any business.” Hawkins’s family members and bandmates declined to comment according to Rolling Stone.
