Kerrang! 2005
In the past three years Foo Fighters have survived bust-ups, doomed political crusades and the temporary defection of their singer, songwriter and founder. Now they're coming back with not one album, but two...
"WE'VE ALWAYS wound up recording everyone
of our albums at least twice because we fuck it up
the first time usually because we're not ready to go
into the studio," confesses Grohl. "The second
album was recorded twice; the third album we
recorded three or four versions of every song before
we settled on the final ones and the last album was
recorded twice. So we basically thought we'd make
the new record here..."
  ".. And save a million dollars!" laughs Hawkins.
  "But of course," adds Shiflett, "you'll never know
if it isn't the first version.. because it's our studio, so
we can just pretend."
Not that Foo Fighters aren't prepared for their
fifth - as yet untitled - album. Where previous
records have been written in the three or four
months between tours, this latest opus has
been a year in the writing and will, when it's
finished, be a double CD, one rock, the other
acoustic. There is even talk of doing separate rock
and acoustic shows.
  "One of the things we're trying to do with this
album," says Grohl, "is keep things simplified
and keep some sort of spontaneity. It's not rocket
science, but there's a lot of songs on this album
that could be over orchestrated. We've got 19
songs to finish before Christmas before we start
on the acoustic record and I almost look forward
to the acoustic record as the next Foo Fighters
record because the rock stuff is something we've
done before"
  Given the unusual nature of their record deal (Foo
Fighters record for their own label and licence the
recordings to other labels) Grohl insists that he feels
no weight of expectation.
  "For me, the biggest pressure is to make the
shows better and have better songs so people will
have a better time," he insists.
  But do they aim for a specific 'Foo Fighters
sound'?
  "Well, we have a lot of different sounds, which I
think has been the foundation of all of our records,"
counters Grohl "But then you start wondering,
'What is Foo Fighters? Is it just one thing or should it
be any kind of music made by any member of the
band?'. And I kind of lean towards that. I used to get
caught up with worrying that something shouldn't
go on the record because it doesn't sound like anything we've ever done before, but that kind of runs
you into a rut and you end up getting trapped in one
particular sound for the rest of your life.
  "The idea of doing a double album sounds
pretentious, but one of the ideas behind doing that
was to cut out that middle ground We have songs
that are loud and obnoxious, and we have songs that
are beautiful acoustic ballads and trying to fit those
two things on the same album is tricky. I thought I'd
make it easier on everybody so we can go further in
each direction without it sounding strange"
AS YET, still, there is no finished music. A chart on
the wall with a column for each track shows only the
drum parts completed But since the first version
probably isn't the one you'll hear on the record it
would be pointless to offer an opinion yet anyway
Perhaps unsurprisingly, Dave gets the final say on
which version comes out.
  "It's all Dave," says Taylor "They're Dave's songs
so really he has to have the final say. I can't have the
final say on a song that I didn't write, but we all work
on the song together and help arrange it."
  "I don't think there's ever been a time, at least as
long as I've been in the band, that there was ever a
strong feeling against using whatever final version
came about," adds Chris.
  "It's usually pretty obvious," agrees Dave. "I
mean, if you were to listen to the original version of
our last record we wouldn't be sitting here talking
about a new album right now When I go back and
listen to that original version it just sounds wrong.
I'm sure there's a lot of bands who go into the studio
and magic happens right off the bat, but I think with
the new music that we're doing here we've proven
to ourselves that we're at our best when we've really
worked and prepared something to its full potential. I
can hear the album in my head now; I can imagine
the album, whereas that doesn't happen with any
record we've made before until it's almost finished.
  Like I said, it's impossible to comment on the new
record without hearing any of it, but you can't help
wondering if Grohl has been influenced by
outside Foo Fighters, most notably with his
side-project Probot and his work on Killing Joke's
self-titled album: Foo Fighters seemed to suddenly
get a lot heavier, particularly on tracks like 'All My Life',
after Grohl had played drums for QOTSA.
  "I think with the last record the one thing that
influenced me from being with Queens Of The Stone
Age was just my love of sheer volume," allows Dave.
"So that came up on the last record a bit more than
it may have had I not done that. With this album,
with us having toured for a year and a half with a
set-list that were screamers every night, it made me
realise that that's what I love to do and sometimes
that's what we're best at. This album's a collection of
music that we wanna play every night and we tried
to do that with the last record, but it only happened
with five or six songs."
SPEAKING OF Queens, there were very strong
rumours that Foo Fighters were over and that Dave
would be joining QOTSA on a permanent basis
Anyone lucky enough to witness Grohl playing for
them, as I did at the one-off Troubadour show, could
see that he was in his element. It was his first time
behind a drum kit since Nirvana and he was enjoying
every moment of it. Maybe a little too much... How
worried were the rest of Foo Fighters at that point?
  "There was a moment of like, 'Oh well, that's
over'," admits Hawkins. "We'd done that first version
of the last record and it didn't work, so we were like,
'Do we have another good Foo Fighters record in us?'
"But the moment for me, when I knew it was
gonna be okay, was Coachella festival - Dave got up
onstage and was just the best front man in the world.
He has to play drums because that's what he is first
and foremost in a way, but as soon as we played that
gig I knew Dave had to do this, too."
  Shiflett: "Yeah, at the rehearsals for Coachella we
had a big argument blowout.."
  Hawkins "Well, me and Dave did!"
  Shiflett: "Yeah, but we got to sit and listen!"
  Grohl: (To Kerrang!) "Have you seen 'Some Kind
Of Monster'?"
  Shiflett: "I think the only person who didn't think
it was gonna be the end was Dave!"
There is a brief expectant pause, the merest glimmer as all eyes turn to Grohl.
  "Welllll.." says Grohl, and then it all comes out
like some weird confession Grohl speaks slowly, but
barely pauses for breath.
  "There was a moment when I thought 'Well, that
was fun and we've had a good run at the thing' I've
always thought that bands shouldn't last forever,
there's always an expiration date. So, yeah, for a
minute I thought we should call it quits and end it on
a high note But there's a lot more to being in a band
than just being in a band. It's such a big part of your
life and at that time the band was our life and it had
been my life for eight or nine years. I know it's a
clichéd analogy, but it's like a marriage, an unspoken
foundation, and it's something you know you
rely on Even if you're not there doing it every day
just knowing it's there in the back of your mind sort
of props you up and keeps you going.
"When I was out with QOTSA I felt like I was
losing some of that and it didn't feel right; I didn't
feel solid or balanced," Grohl continues. "To met the
band is more than just making records. The studio
represents what I love about the band because we
can hide away and shut ourselves off from the outside world. Even if we don't go out on tour for a year
and we don't see each other every day, I really feel
like some of my closest friends are the guys in the
band. I don't go looking for new friends or new family because I have them here. Playing with Queens
was great and I've known those guys for a long time,
but if there's any band that you can dip your toes
into and then run away it's QOTSA."
  Clearly the rest of the band are hearing this for the
first time.
  "It's always funny when we do an interview
because these are the times when we get to actually
hear what people felt about things," says Hawkins
finally. "I mean, we talk but you don't say, 'So, how
did you feel when Dave went off to do Queens?'. It's
almost like therapy!"
He pauses Smiles.
  "Do you wanna be our life coach?"
BUT IF one thing is abundantly clear it's that Foo
Fighters are in no need of therapy or a life coach.
Sure, Dave is the most talkative of the four and
there's a natural tendency to aim questions at him,
but you always get the feeling he's putting across
the collective viewpoint rather than just his own. For
instance, when Dave talks about supporting the John
Kerry campaign in the recent disastrous US elections,
he is very obviously speaking for the band as a
whole.
  "I went out on the John Kerry campaign and tried
to help them out because I really believed in getting
Bush out of office." says Grohl. "And it was really
inspirational because you'd see tens of thousands of
people gathered together with the common idea and
will to make things better. We did a lot of stuff with
the campaign, just travelling around through Middle
America and seeing people who really needed to be
rescued."
  In what way?
  "There's hundreds of ways," says Grohl. "From
trying to get their kids home from war, to
figuring out some sort of healthcare system,
to trying to get married But rather than
focus on the specifics it's just that simple
need or passion to make change and make things
better I'm not a political person, but I was moved by
a lot of what's happened in the last year and a lot of
the lyrics on the new record have to do with passion
and courage and fighting the good fight, standing up
for things you believe in. But in a roundabout way
It's not a political record It has more to do with
human reaction to what happened before and after
the election. It's more personal politics"
  Naturally, Foo Fighters weren't exactly chuffed on
November 3rd when they discovered that Bush had
just been given another four years in office.
  "We were all pretty upset," says Grohl, frowning.
"That was a bad day. One of the things I thought
was that if Bush gets re-elected the first thing we'll
do is riot, smash shit up and make a big statement
and that our songs would be angry Rage Against The
Machine ballads.
  "But then I thought that if there's anything people
would want to listen to then it would be songs with
some sort of message of hope or positivity. Pissed off
as I am, you have to deal with what you've got"
  "It's gotta get a lot worse before people realise
that they've got to put aside their religious beliefs or
whatever for a better life," reckons Shiflett. "When
your children can't breathe and you can't eat the fish
out of America's lakes and you don't have a job, then
maybe you'll realise how bad these people are!"
  But do they think music can change anything?
  "Some of my fledgling political ideas came from
music," says Mendel quietly - it's the first and only
time he speaks during the interview "I learned a lot
of my philosophies from punk rock when I was growing up or I felt a solidarity with them because there
was a sense of community there I learned a shitload
from Crass."
  "Maybe it's not music changing something,"
shrugs Hawkins, "but younger people are far more
tolerant. If you look at the breakdown in this last
election, the youth of America were the only ones
that voted in favour of Kerry by a pretty wide margin.
So as those people grow up, in 20 or 30 years it will
be a very different culture we live in."
FOO FIGHTERS seem to exude this kind of optimism and confidence. Perhaps it's because Hawkins
has recently got engaged and Shiflett has had a baby
(well, his partner has...), but everything about them
seems to be forward looking right now In March
2002 a Kerrang! cover story quoted Dave Grohl saying he was happier than he had been for as long as
he could remember. And now?
  "I'm happier now than I was then!" he beams.
"Because with every record we've ever made I
always imagined that it would be our last album! I
always thought that would have been enough
Having done the whole Nirvana thing, gone out and
done Foo Fighters records and played with people
like Queens and done all the things that I've done, I
thought it would be enough and I could then begin a
normal life."
How did you figure that one?
"I don't know!" he laughs - one of those, 'What
was I thinking?' laughs again.
"I thought one of these days this is just gonna
stop and everything will be fine and I can look back
on everything I've done and be really happy I wouldn't stop making music, but I'd stop playing the game
and stay at home!
  "I've always imagined that," Grohl says, slipping
back into that weirdly intimate confessional mode he
has" And I've almost even wanted it like, 'When is
this just gonna fucking end?' I mean, when you go
to a festival and the headliners are 22 years old and
they come up to you and go, 'You were my first concert!' it's a weird feeling! One of the reasons I felt like
that was because the band was my whole life and I
was trying to have a life outside, but in the last couple of years we started to figure out how to make
the band a part of your life rather than your entire
life.
  "I think that's what can make it last, so now I can
imagine making albums for a long time to come."
Something tells me Studio 606 is going to need a
bigger corridor...
Words: Mörat   Pics: Lisa Johnson