Taylor Hawkins appears on the new Edgar Winter album, Brother Johnny, which is out today (April 15.)
The album serves as a tribute to Johnny Winter, Edgar’s brother who died in July 2014 at age 70. Hawkins sings on the track “Guess I’ll Go Away,” a cover of a song Johnny Winter originally released on his 1970 studio album Johnny Winter And.
Edgar Winter wrote about working with Hawkins in a tribute on his website after the Foo Fighters drummer’s sudden passing at age 50. Edgar wrote, in part, about the cover, “It stands out in my mind as the highest energy and hardest rocking song on the entire album. I have always considered it stylistically the most uncharacteristically advanced song Johnny ever wrote, almost a precursor of heavy metal.”
Edgar added, “I had only just met Taylor, and barely got to know him, but I was so impressed by his sincerity, positive energy, and pure enthusiasm. He had a unique spontaneous style different from anyone I’ve ever worked with before. I can be very opinionated—but as soon as heard what he was doing, I knew it was best to step back, stay out of the way, and let him do his thing. That session was an experience I will never forget.”
On top of that, Edgar said Hawkins refused to be compensated for his work saying, “When I tried to open a business discussion, he simply would not hear of it. He said—I don’t want ANYTHING for doing this, I just wanna get out there and Rock. And Rock HE DID! I don’t know if it was out of respect for Johnny, a desire to help me in what I was doing, compassion for the nature of the project, or his friendship with [the album’s producer] Ross [Hogarth.] Most probably all these things—but whatever it was, he gave it His ALL!”