Grohl David - Foo Fighters: learning to fly

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For Anna Valentine, whose idea this book was

Without whom none of this would have been possible: Robert Kirby, Malcolm Edwards, Linda Wall, Maureen Rice, Vanessa Lampert, Harry Paterson, Emma Smith, Amy Elliot, Mark Foster, Mark Handsley, Susan Howe, Margot Weale, Jessica Purdue, Rebecca Gray, Richard King, Krystyna Kujawinska, Isadora Attab, Marianne Ihlen, Anna Hayward; Sarah and Martin Sando, Sandie Alcock, and not forgetting Ian Clark, Steve Morant, and all at the SNC. Extra special thanks: Dave Everley and Joe Daly the X Team.

Reading Festival, 26 August 2012. Sunday night. The one theyve all been waiting for. Nearly 90,000 people, all ready to let themselves go, all ready to explode with pride on behalf of the most prideful band in rock, all ready already.

Knowing this, feeling the occasion more keenly than the most fish-eyed fan, Dave Grohl makes his move. His timing has always been excellent. This time, though, he knows he has excelled himself, for this is a special night: 20 years exactly since he first headlined Reading with Nirvana, before the shit hit the fan and the world went all wrong.

But now it is all right again. Now everything is just cool, brother. Its 20 years later, a new generation, another century, and Dave is feeling so good he decides to stop the show and tell the crowd, his people, all nearly 90,000 of them, a little story. It goes like this

Strumming his guitar, stroking it like the hair on a babys head, gently, playfully, sensually, absent-mindedly, the rest of the band shutdown, hidden in the shadows, listening as intently as the crowd, Dave just wants to share, to connect, to be like Bruce Springsteen but without the self-righteous bullshit, guitar twinkling.

so I grew up in Virginia, right outside of Washington, DC. I played in a punk rock band. We played in little clubs and squats and we toured and we fuckin starved and it was really, really fun. One day this friend of mine says, Hey, you ever heard of that band Nirvana?

The crowd, Daves crowd, some of whom have never owned a Nirvana record, but are smart enough to play along, give this an enormous roar of approval. Nirvana, golden name, golden band, golden age, now gone, lost in the single blast of a 20-gauge shotgun and the simple delirium of an OD-strength hit from a syringe, Kurts loaded body shaking interminably then stopping. Abruptly. Bloodily. Stupidly.

Im like, Yeah, Ive heard of Nirvana. He said, Well, theyre looking for a drummer and they think youre pretty good. I said, Really? Yeah. So I flew up to Seattle

His guitar twinkling, drifting, like orphan stars high above. Black tee. Black jeans. Black-and-white sneakers. Black beard and white, spotlit face.

and they already had a drummer. This guy named Danny. He was a fucking great drummer. Danny was in a band called Mudhoney

Some modest yells of recognition. No one out there can actually name two good Mudhoney songs, let alone who the drummer was on the first Nirvana album, but heres a clue: it was neither Danny nor Dave. Yeah, and so?

and theyd been over here and toured and played a bunch. So the first day I ever hung out with Krist and Kurt and all those guys, we were having a little barbecue and I said to Danny, I said, Whats the biggest audience youve ever played to? And he said, Uh 35,000 people. I said, Where the fuck did Mudhoney play to 35,000 people? He said, Oh, this place called the Reading Festival

Now comes the real sweet spot as the nearly 90,000 people at this Reading have a rippling, whole-body crowdgasm.

About a year later, we had recorded the record Nevermind and we had come over here to play some festivals The last of these words are drowned out as the crowd erupts into another fetishistic thunderclap. They cant believe what theyre hearing, what theyre witnessing. Dave Grohl never mentions Nevermind. Never talks about Nirvana. Not at a Foo Fighters show! Except, he is! He just fucking is!

Dave continues to spin his yarn, about the first time he and Nirvana played Reading, even further back, how he had never been so fucking scared in my entire life at the prospect of playing to so many people. How it was beyond my wildest fucking dreams, and the 2012 Reading crowd continues to lap it up, baying and hooting and hanging on every gooey, sentimental syllable.

Then a little misstep: Over the years Ive seen the stage get taller and taller and Ive seen the barrier get farther and farther away. Its leading up to something but the crowd doesnt give him time to finish. They start to booooooo.

But Dave Grohl didnt get where he is today without knowing how to recover from mistakes, to find the instant rejoinder that gets the conversation back on track, the evasive action that guarantees to right the ship, that gets the show back on the road.

Without even flinching, he just rolls it out, like a punch line, like he always knew what he was doing all along. But, from right here, it looks the same as it has for twenty-two years.

The booing stops and the crowd melts as one. They knew they could rely on Dave. That he would never let them down, never stop making sense or call on them to get their eyes blackened.

But still its not enough. He goes on, talking about his mother, who is there at the side of the stage, as she often is these days, as she sometimes was even in Nirvana days, and whose birthday it is in a few days time, getting the crowd to sing her Happy Birthday, which of course they are more than happy to do, the giant video screens flashing on her at the side of the stage smiling, enchanted, bursting with pride for her most prideful son.

Its like one of those scenes from a Disney movie, where the handsome young hero, having fought his way up from nothing, against all odds, despite the haters, the bullies and the badmouthing, finally triumphs and gets to make his valedictory speech in front of an adoring crowd of whooping, cheering Hollywood extras.

Its exactly like that, except well this is real. Right?

This festival he chokes out the words, his guitar becoming insistent is not just a festival to me. Pause, drama, pause, dingle-dangle-doo on the guitar, piercing stare into the crowd. Tonight is like the most important gig of my life. The tide of approval rolls in across the festival grounds, the mental visuals all in sweeping long shot, the dream panorama almost complete now

So this one small breath is for all of you! No blam into the song though, no band follow-up. Its called Times Like These

Dave, the master of delayed gratification, merely upping the stakes by singing the song alone, just him and the crowd and his almost 90,000 very best friends, on the occasion of the most important gig of his life.

Its times like these you learn to live again, he croons, sounding a little like Tom Petty, whom he nearly joined after Kurt died, but was too smart to. Its times like these you learn to give and give again

And there you have it: the reason why it isnt just the people at the Reading Festival that love Dave Grohl and his Foo Fighters; its the millions around the world who have bought his CDs and DVDs, his concert and festival tickets; the generations that bought into his story, his dream, his self-fulfilling prophecies. Daves a giver. He may not have the savant glamour of Kurt Cobain, but Kurt was a taker. Kurt dwelled in darkness, on the wrong side of the moon. Dave is a sun worshipper, a lover not a loner, a bringer of light.