Let There Be Drums! (Greenwich Entertainment), a forthcoming documentary directed by Justin Kreutzmann (son of Grateful Dead drummer Bill Kreutzmann), features what is alleged to be the last filmed interview with late Foo Fighters drummer Taylor Hawkins. In a trailer released yesterday, Hawkins reveals that the “second I sat on the drums, it was like a bolt of lightning went through my body and I’ll never forget that day.”
The documentary features a who’s who of legendary beat makers. In addition to the elder Kreutzmann and fellow Grateful Dead percussionist Mickey Hart, participants include Chad Smith (Red Hot Chili Peppers), Ringo Starr, Stewart Copeland (The Police), Stephen Perkins (Jane’s Addiction), Matt Sorum (ex-Guns N’ Roses), Adrian Young (No Doubt), Green Day’s Tré Cool and Primus’ Jay Lane. Let There Be Drums! will be released on Oct. 28.
The documentary aims to be an “examination into the essential role drumming plays in great bands and how music passes from generation to generation,” using a combined 70 years of examples.
In addition to interviews, the producers gathered a collection of rare footage, including Keith Moon in outtakes from the 1979 The Who documentary The Kids Are Alright, as well as late Led Zeppelin drummer John Bonham on the roles of fatherhood amid being a musician (his son Jason famously sat in for him with the surviving members of the band at a 2007 London reunion show). There are also snapshots of the talents before they made it big, like Starr posing with his drum kit as a teenager and No Doubt’s Young doing a basement show years before “Just a Girl.”
