Brian Johnson On Awkward Justin Hawkins Mic Grab At Taylor Hawkins Tribute
By Katrina Nattress
December 22, 2022
The Taylor Hawkins tribute concert in London had a lot of memorable moments, but one the internet couldn't get over was when The Darkness singer Justin Hawkins seemingly grabbed the mic from Brian Johnson and started singing "Back In Black" during AC/DC's set.
Just days after the incident, Justin explained what happened after receiving backlash for "stealing the mic" in a lengthy social media post, and now Johnson is giving his account of the "awkward" interaction.
“We were getting ready to go on. Justin came up, and he was going, ‘Brian, I cannot believe I’m here.’ He said, ”Back In Black’ is my favorite of all songs in the world, and I’d love to be able to sing [it].’ And I said, ‘Come on and sing the second verse. Can you do that?’ And he went, ‘Oh, do you mean it?’" he recalled during a recent interview.
“He turned… Dave Grohl was there. He said, ‘Dave, Brian has just asked [me] to sing the second verse of ‘Back In Black’.’ And Dave Grohl said, ‘If Brian Johnson asks you to sing the second verse of ‘Back In Black’, you sing it.’ And he did. And then he got on. And I think he chickened out halfway through and I forgot the f**king words," Johnson continued. “But the worst thing was he got so excited, he came out and he forgot to bring a microphone with him. So that’s why it looked so awkward, trying to sing with one microphone. And he’s, like, six-foot-f**kin’-two or something.”
His account was similar to Justin's, who wrote:
10 minutes before the AC/DC segment of the tribute, Brian Johnson asked me to come up and sing the second verse of Back In Black. I initially refused, I’ve never sung it before and I didn’t want it to seem like I was gatecrashing. However, Brian really was insistent and Dave Grohl told me that ‘if Brian tells you to do something, you f**king do it.
I had Rufus pull up the lyrics on his phone and I gave it a go, but in all honestly I think Brian just wanted to create a memorable spontaneous moment and have a laugh so he could really push on and smash the rest of his set. The stage manager scrambled to prepare the microphone for me, but I didn’t know which one I was supposed to take and I ended up having to steal Brian’s, which looked a bit awkward," he continued. "Brian Johnson is an absolute legend and Dave was right, I couldn’t turn it down.