Music makes my friend Shannon cry. I cried at the Boston Calling music festival on the Harvard Yard athletic field when Shane Hawkins, the late Taylor Hawkins' son, drummed "I'll Stick Around" with the Foo Fighters.
The whole concert was a holy dirge, a collective bouncing, a screaming exorcism, but when Shane lost himself in the drums he lured us into a hypnotic catharsis, the crescendo on a tribute filled set list, a raw intensity that reverberated through the at once silent and simultaneously exhaling mourners and revelers, a reminder that we are connected and alive while we chant in unison and alternately "I Don't Owe You Anything" and "I Never Want to Die!"
If visual art decorates our space, and music decorates our time, then Shane Hawkins painted the night with his palette of intensity, authenticity, and whiplash, a real teen badass.
The moment when Dave Grohl turns to Shane Hawkins and guides him from a near loss of control to a complete out of control drum solo is a master training in energy direction. Watch at 3:05 when he brings him down and then sets him loose and watch again at 8:15 to see the unbridled release.
This rock and roll festival was a purging of pity and fear, a reminder to live with urgency.
And I wonder
When I sing along with you
If everything could ever feel this real forever
If anything could ever be this good again
The only thing I'll ever ask of you
You gotta promise not to stop when I say when
She said...
