Foo Fighters’ Dave Grohl cracks jokes, introduces rare song at NY show
Foo Fighters lead singer Dave Grohl cracks a joke and introduces a rare song from the band during an intimate performance at Irving Plaza in New York.
WASHINGTON – Dave Grohl has no off switch.
But put the Foo Fighters’ ecstatically manic frontman in front of more than 40,000 fans across the Potomac River from his hometown and Grohl is like a race car with the gas pedal locked down.
At the Aug. 17 stop at Nationals Park in Washington, D.C. on the band’s Take Cover stadium excursion, Grohl and his equally vigorous bandmates stampeded through a three-hour history tour of the Foos’ brawny catalog.
But as the head Foo, Grohl was the tireless centerpiece, albeit one who sounded like he might burst a vocal cord at any moment given the ferocity of his singing. But he’s always been a bounce back kind of guy, and his voice retains the same type of elasticity. There may be a little more gray in Grohl’s goatee, but don’t equate that with waning stamina.
Before the last notes of show-opener “All My Life” were played, Grohl was drenched in sweat, his long hair flying, his legs sprinting down the lengthy catwalk.
After a 32-year existence, the band has such a reservoir of rockers both melodic and headbanging that they can reel off “The Pretender,” “Times Like These,” “My Hero” and “Learn to Fly” within in the first seven offerings and still have more than 20 songs left to uncork (though this date did not feature anything from their current album, “Your Favorite Toy”).
Dave Grohl embraced playing a hometown show
Guitarists Chris Shiflett and Pat Smear, keyboardist Rami Jaffee, bassist Nate Mendel and new drummer Ilan Rubin – a bulldozer behind the kit – kept pace with the relentless energy of the show, which unfolded under a canopy of frenzied lights and three video screens offering close-ups of the musicians sweltering in the humid air.
Aside from a 2015 20th anniversary gig at (ready-to-be-razed) RFK Stadium, the Foos have mostly hit arenas and intimate specialty shows in the area. Grohl made mention of the enormity of this stadium production and was clearly jazzed to be near his northern Virginia roots. He grew up in the suburb of Springfield and talked about writing “Stacked Actors” in the nearby haven of Old Town in Alexandria, while also dedicating the pretty “These Days” to his friends and family in attendance.
Following an aggressive “No Son of Mine,” featuring a snippet of Motörhead’s “Ace of Spades” and powered by the velocity of Rubin’s drumming, the band finally took a breath an hour into the show.
Foo Fighters are equally riveting in the quiet moments
Gathered at a B-stage set up at the end of the catwalk, the Foos spotlighted the melodies lurking within the heavy riffs and banshee screams.
“Let’s shift gears,” Grohl said, tucking his sopping hair behind his ears. “I’m 57-years-old. I’m gonna play an acoustic song.”
The four-song set was highlighted by Grohl doing a shot of Jägermeister with a woman whose daughter caught his attention with a sign (“After all these years I’ve never done a shot with a mom in the front row before,” Grohl quipped), but also some riveting material.
“Marigold,” written when Grohl first moved to Seattle and lived with Kurt Cobain, was the B-side to Nirvana’s “Heart-Shaped Box” in 1993 and offered striking grunge-era guitar.
While the poppy bounce of “Big Me” is always welcome, it was Grohl’s solo performance of “Under You” that resonated the deepest. Written after the 2022 death of drummer and friend Taylor Hawkins, the song felt like a moment of catharsis for Grohl, the emotion in his voice audible and his guitar playing an exorcism of emotional pain.
The Foos returned to their crunch-rock with the 2017 deep cut “La Dee Da” (“For the OG’s!” Grohl yelled) paired with the even heavier “Run” from the same “Concrete and Gold” album.
Foo Fighters are still going full throttle
Throughout this North American leg of the tour, which began the first week of August and will pause for a few weeks before returning Sept. 12 for another spate of shows, the Foos have delivered unique band introductions. Given the rock bona fides of the musicians, the rule is simple – each player had to perform a song from a band they were in before Foo Fighters.
The format was an amusing detour as the crowd heard from Shiflett (No Use for a Name), Jaffee (The Wallflowers), Mendel (Sunny Day Real Estate), Smear (The Germs) and Rubin (The New Regime).
The setup was an ideal segue into the final slice of the show that included the bruising “Monkey Wrench” and, as usual in the Foos recent sets, a more obvious tribute to Hawkins with the lovely “Aurora.”
After three decades, the Foos are firmly in legacy territory, and among the veterans still packing stadiums. But what differentiates them from some of their peers is the unyielding pace of their live shows, all of it delivered with the grinning joy of playing rock ‘n’ roll.
The switch is most definitely still on.