LOS ANGELES - Taylor Hawkins, best friend of Foo Fighters drummer and frontman Dave Grohl for 25 years, has died during a South American tour with the rock band. He was 50 years old.
There were no immediate details on how Mr Hawkins died, although the band said in a statement Friday that his death was a "tragic and untimely loss".
The Foo Fighters were to play at a festival in Bogota, Colombia on Friday night. Mr Hawkins' final concert was on Sunday at another event in San Isidro, Argentina.
"Their musical spirit and infectious laughter will live on with all of us forever," said a message on the band's official Twitter account that was also emailed to reporters. "Our hearts go out to his wife, children and family."
Police vehicles, an ambulance and fans gathered outside the hotel in northern Bogota where Mr Hawkins was believed to be staying.
“It was a band I grew up with. It leaves me blank,” Juan Sebastian Anchique, 23, told the Associated Press as he mourned Hawkins outside the hotel.
Colombian officials have not commented on Mr Hawking's death. The US Embassy in Bogota offered its condolences in a tweet.
After Mr. Grohl, Mr. Hawkins was the most recognizable member of the group, appearing with the lead singer in interviews and in memorable videos of the band and their recent horror-comedy film, "Studio 666", as the lead, usually comic. played a role.
Mr Hawkins was Alanis Morissette's touring drummer when he joined Foo Fighters in 1997. He played on the band's biggest albums including "One by One" and "On Your Honor", and on hit singles including "My Hero" and "Best of You". ,
In Mr Grohl's 2021 book "The Storyteller", he called Mr Hawking his "brother to another mother, my best friend, a man I would take a pill for."
"On the first meeting, our bond was instant, and we grew closer every day, with every song, every note," wrote Mr. Grohl. "We are meant to be whole, and I am grateful that we found each other in this lifetime."
This is the second time Mr Grohl has experienced the death of a close bandmate. Mr. Grohl was the drummer for Nirvana at the time of Kurt Cobain's death in 1994.
Tributes poured in on social media for Mr Hawkins on Friday night.
"God bless you Taylor Hawkins," Rage Against the Machine guitarist Tom Morello said on Twitter alongside a photo of himself, Hawkins, and Jane's Addiction singer Perry Farrell. "I loved your spirit and your unstoppable rock power."
Billie Eilish's brother, co-writer and producer Finness tweeted, "What an incredible talent that didn't even need to be so kind and generous and cool, but all those things too." "The world was lucky enough to have gifts for the times it did."
Born Oliver Taylor Hawkins in 1972 in Fort Worth, Texas, Mr Hawkins was raised in Laguna Beach, California. He played in the small Southern California band Sylvia before landing his first major gig as a drummer for Canadian singer Sass Jordan.
Mr Hawkins told The Associated Press in 2019 that his early drumming influences included Stewart Copeland of The Police, Roger Taylor of Queen, and Phil Collins, who he said was "one of my favorite drummers. You know, People forget that he was a great drummer as well as a good 80s sweater-wearing guy, poor thing.
When he spent two years drumming for Ms. Morissette in the mid-1990s, he was primarily inspired by Stephen Perkins' playing of Jane's Addiction.
"My drums were set up like his, the whole thing," Mr Hawkins told the AP. "I was kind of an imitator at the time too. Establishing my own kind of style took a while and took a while. I didn't look like him at all, I seemed like myself, but he was a big, huge influence." Was. "
He and Mr Grohl met backstage at a show when Mr Hawkins was still with Ms Morissette. Mr. Grohl's band would start soon after the departure of then-drummer William Goldsmith. Mr. Grohl called Mr. Hawkins, a big Foo Fighters fan, and immediately accepted.
Mr. Grohl wrote in his book, "I am not afraid to say that our chance meeting was love at first sight, igniting a musical 'twin flame' that still burns to this day." "Together, we have become an unstoppable pair, on and off the stage, in pursuit of any and all adventures we can find."
Mr Hawkins first appeared with the band in the 1997 video for Foo Fighters' most popular song, "Everlong", although he was yet to join the group until the song was recorded. However, he would go on to play epic versions of it hundreds of times as the climax of Foo Fighters' concerts.
In another highlight of the group's live shows, Mr. Grohl will be behind the drums and Mr. Hawkins will hold the mic to sing a cover of Queen's "Somebody to Love".
"The best part of being the lead singer of Foo Fighters for just one song is that I really have the greatest rock 'n' roll drummer on planet Earth," Hawkins said before the song on March 18. Concert in Chile.
Mr Grohl can be heard telling them to shut up.
Mr Hawkins also co-starred in Foo Fighters' recently released horror-comedy film, "Studio 666", in which a demonic force in a house where the band is living captures Mr. Grohl and kills him. makes. Mr Hawkins and the other band members are killed one by one. The basis for their work on their 10th studio album came from in a house in Los Angeles.
He also drummed and sang for the side-project trio Taylor Hawkins and the Kotel Riders. He released an album "Get the Money" in 2006.