“This is the hometown shit, so you’ve got to make it loud,“ Dave Grohl declared as he took the stage in the early moments of the Taylor Hawkins Tribute Concert in Los Angeles. The audience, unsurprisingly, obliged.
The Foo Fighters frontman was addressing a packed crowd Tuesday night at the Forum, as more than 17,000 people came out to celebrate the departed drummer. “What we really wanted to do was to pay tribute to Taylor in a way that you could sort of spend some time in his musical mind,” Grohl continued, before laughing and adding, “which can be a pretty terrifying place, actually.”
“What we’ve done is we’ve brought an even fuckin’ crazier cast of characters for you to tonight, to play music that Taylor loved, by the people that Taylor loved, and the people that loved Taylor,” Grohl explained, before concluding his intro with one further announcement: “It’s gonna be a long fuckin’ night!”
So began an amazing evening of music, with a cavalcade of stars taking the stage to honor Hawkins. Across six hours, rock legends, pop stars, comedians and up-and-coming acts all joined forces in celebration of the drummer’s life and career.
The night was electric. Even in Los Angeles – a town so saturated in celebrity culture that audiences infamously appear desensitized to marquee events – there was a tangible sense that what everyone was witnessing was a once-in-a-lifetime collection of talent.
From Joan Jett to Queen, Rush to Pink, James Gang to Nancy Wilson, and many more, we’ve collected some of the evening’s most powerful images in the gallery below.
Taylor Hawkins Los Angeles Tribute Show Photos
Rock’s biggest stars pay tribute to the fallen Foo Fighters drummer.