A few days ago at a show in Los Angeles, Pearl Jam covered the Foo Fighters in a tribute to Taylor Hawkin’s passing. They picked a relative deep cut too: “Cold Day in the Sun” is a classic-rock feeling song from the Foo Fighters album In Your Honor. In the original, which he wrote, drummer Hawkins took the lead by singing and playing, while Dave Grohl manned the drums.
In this cover, Matt Cameron leads with guitar and vocals. In addition to the full band, Chad Smith (from the Red Hot Chili Peppers) also joins in, adding in a bit of tambourine. The brightness of the lead guitar almost gives this cover a southern flair, while Cameron keeps his vocal timbre eerily similar to Hawkin’s own tone. The richness of the song really begins to shine in the chorus, when new vocal harmonies are added in. However, the drumbeat and instrumentation have been kept nearly identical to the original.
Before the cover was played, Eddie Vedder said, “It’s never easy when you lose someone. As you get older, you’ll notice it starts happening more and more. It’s just where you are on the timeline and where your friends are on the timeline. But sometimes, like this, it’s so unexpected. It also makes it harder because he was someone who truly, truly loved living life on this planet. I guess the one thing we can be consoled by is the fact that he never wasted a moment, and he did live his life to the fullest. We just want more of it.”
To listen to more great Foo Fighter covers, click here.
