Pearl Jam pay tribute to Taylor Hawkins with Cold Day In The Sun cover

"It's never easy when you lose someone, and as you get old you'll notice it starts happening more and more," said Eddie Vedder introduced Pearl Jam's tribute to late Foo Fighter's drummer Taylor Hawkins on stage at the LA Forum on Saturday night (7 May). "He was someone who truly, truly loved living life," the frontman continued. But it was apt that it wasn't Vedder that took the vocals on the band's cover of the Foo Fighters' Cold Day In The Sun, but drummer and Hawkins' close friend Matt Cameron.

The original song from the Foo's 2005 double album In Your Honour was Hawkins' debut on lead vocals for the band, and soon became a fan favourite. Cameron played a Telecaster as he took his place stage front. 

Vedder joined touring member Josh Klinghoffer on backing vocals at the back, with special guest and Red Hot Chili Pepper Chad Smith (who also plays drums in Vedder's solo band) joining them on tambourine. 

Taking Cameron's place on the drum stool was none other than current St Vincent band member Mark Guiliana, who played on David Bowie's final album Blackstar as well as Cameron's last solo album. 

Taylor Hawkins: farewell to a modern rock drumming hero

Rob Laing
Guitars Editor, MusicRadar

I'm the Guitars Editor for MusicRadar, handling news, reviews, features, tuition, advice for the strings side of the site and everything in between. Before MusicRadar I worked on guitar magazines for 15 years, including Editor of Total Guitar in the UK. When I'm not rejigging pedalboards I'm usually thinking about rejigging pedalboards.