The History of Rock Music » Dave Grohl

The Foo Fighters Release “Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace”

admin — Wed, 26 Sep 2007 02:33:21 +0000

To hear excerpts, just click the Amazon MP3 widget above

Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace is the sixth studio album by The Foo Fighters, released on September 25, 2007. The Foo Fighters previous release, 2005’s In Your Honor, was generally poorly received and seen as too self-indulgent. To my mind The Foo Fighters had been releasing steadily less satisfactory albums for about ten years, so this simply continued the trend. Luckily this time around The Foo Fighters have regained some focus and Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace is a far more satisfying collection of songs.

Opening with “The Pretender”, their best opening salvo since “Monkey Wrench,” The Foo Fighters get this album off on a bombastic footing. “The Pretender” is the kind of number we have come to expect from The Foo Fighters, but Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace is almost certainly their most experimental album to date. There is a distinct classic rock influence on the album, but his is cleverly used to make it easier for the listener to get into the more challenging material. This means Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace appeals to the existing fans, but opens The Foo Fighters up to new ones too.

Tracks like “Stranger Things Have Happened,” “Statues” and “Home,” sound unlike anything The Foo Fighters have done before showing a subtle side not previously explored. Even in it’s more mellow moments, it exudes a tension not heard on a Foo Fighters album before. These tracks do take a few listens, but creep up on you, showing some hitherto hidden depth to The Foo Fighters.

To my mind the best example of this is when Dave Grohl teams up with jazz guitarist Kaki King for the finger plucking instrumental “The Ballad Of The Beaconsfield Miners” This was based on a story from the collapsed Beaconsfield Mine, where one of the trapped miners’ requested for an iPod full of Foo Fighters tunes to be dropped down to him. A beautiful track.

The Kurt and Courtney inspired “Let It Die”, morphs from acoustic into stabbing guitars accompanied by Dave Grohl’s impassioned yelps. It’s the type of thing The Foo Fighters do so well.

There are times when I wish The Foo Fighters would just kick back and rock out in the way they did on their fantastic early albums rather than get bogged down in some misguided attempts at eclecticism. I mean, did they really need to leave their odd country number “Summer’s End” on there? All it does is wear out the “skip” button on my MP3 player.

It is unfortunate that a few songs are just standard album filler. Sometimes I wish we were back in the days of vinyl just so bands could only fit 8 tracks on an album, forcing them to cull the filler material that is all to often a waste of time.

Overall though “Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace” retains the core Foo Fighters sound while broadening their range and crafting some great tunes and it’s always good to hear Pat Smear playing on anything!

Track List

The Pretender
Let It Die
Erase Replace
Long Road To Ruin
Come Alive
Cheer Up Boys, Your Makeup Is Running
Summers End
Ballad Of The Beaconsfield Miners
But Honestly
Home
Band On The Run(B-side)

The Foo Fighters

Dave Grohl – vocals, rhythm guitar, piano on “Summer’s End”, “Statues” and “Home”
Taylor Hawkins – drums, piano on “Summer’s End”, backing vocals on “Erase/Replace”, “Cheer Up, Boys (Your Make Up Is Running)” and “But, Honestly”
Chris Shiflett – lead guitar, backing vocals on “Cheer Up, Boys (Your Make Up Is Running)”
Nate Mendel – bass

Additional musicians

Drew Hester – percussion on “Come Alive”, “Let it Die”, “Cheer Up, Boys (Your Make Up Is Running)”, “Long Road to Ruin” and “Summer’s End”
Rami Jaffee – keyboards on “Let it Die”, “Erase/Replace”, “Long Road to Ruin”, “Come Alive” and “But, Honestly”, accordion on “Statues”
Brantley Kearns Jr. – fiddle on “Statues”
Kaki King – guitar on “Ballad of the Beaconsfield Miners”
Pat Smear – guitar on “Let it Die”
Strings by The Section Quartet (arranged and conducted by Audrey Riley)

Production

Gil Norton – producer
The Foo Fighters – producer
Adrian Bushby – engineer
Jake Davies – pro-tools engineer
John Lousteau – assistant engineer
Rich Costey – mixer
Claudius Mittendorfer – assistant mixer
Brian Gardner – mastering

Awards

Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace won the 2008 Grammy for Best Rock Album and “The Pretender” won for Best Hard Rock Performance. Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace was also nominated for Album of the Year, while “The Pretender” was also nominated for Record of the Year and Best Rock Song.

The Foo Fighters had previously won Best Rock Album Grammys for There Is Nothing Left to Lose and One by One.

Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace also won Best International Album at the 2008 Brit Awards.

Release Information

Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace was originally released in September 2007 on RCA Records in the US and on Roswell Records/RCA/Sony BMG in the UK.

Nirvana Release “Nevermind”

admin — Wed, 25 Sep 1991 01:51:45 +0000

To hear excerpts, just click the Amazon MP3 widget above

Nirvana released Nevermind on September 24, 1991 with 46,251 copies of the album shipped to American record stores and 35,000 copies were shipped in the UK, where Nirvana’s previous album, Bleach, had been successful.

Nirvana’s first album, Bleach, was a heavy affair, influenced by both Chris Novoselic (whose real name is Krist Novoselic, which he also used on some releases) and Kurt Cobain’s love of The Melvins. Along with many of The Melvins records, Sub Pop released Bleach. It went on to become moderately successful on college radio and in the UK.

After Bleach, as Nirvana worked on the demos in Butch Vig’s studio in Wisconsin, the songs Nirvana were coming up with for their next album were more melodic. Kurt Cobain said, “The early songs were really angry … But as time goes on the songs are getting poppier and poppier as I get happier and happier.” This did not sit well with Chad Channing, Nirvana’s drummer from Bleach, who became disillusioned with the sound and his exclusion from the songwriting process. After the demos Chad Channing was fired.

Nirvana hired Mudhoney drummer Dan Peters, to record and release the song “Sliver” on Sub Pop, a sign of the sound to come. However this did not last long and Nirvana were left looking for another drummer.

Buzz Osbourne of the Melvins had introduced Nirvana to Dave Grohl, who was looking for a new band following the break-up of his band Scream, a hardcore punk band. A few days after arriving in Seattle, Chris Novoselic and Kurt Cobain auditioned Dave Grohl, with Chris Novoselic later stating, “We knew in two minutes that he was the right drummer.”

The recruitment of Dave Grohl, along with the release of Sliver, was a pivotal moment for Nirvana. Sliver did not fit with the typical Sub Pop sound and on learning that Sub Pop’s financial worries meant they were looking to be taken over by a major label anyway, Kurt Cobain took Nirvana to Geffen Records on Kim Gordon’s recommendation.

Butch Vig’s services were retained for the album and with a budget of $65,000, Nirvana recorded Nevermind at Sound City Studios in Los Angeles, California in May and June 1991.

Geffen Records hoped that Nevermind would sell around 250,000 copies. The best estimate was that if the band, the management, and the label all worked really hard, the record could possibly be certified gold by September of 1992.

As Nirvana set out for their European tour at the start of November 1991, Nevermind entered the Billboard Top 40 for the first time at number 35. By January 11, 1992 Nevermind became Nirvana’s first number one album, replacing Michael Jackson’s Dangerous at the top of the Billboard charts. Nevermind eventually spent two hundred and fifty-two weeks on the Billboard 200. Geffen president Ed Rosenblatt told the New York Times, “We didn’t do anything. It was just one of those ‘Get out of the way and duck’ records.”

When you now listen Nirvana’s Nevermind it is hard to understand the fuss. The problem is not Nevermind’s greatness, it is simply that everybody who has picked up a guitar since then has been influenced by them at best and ripped them off at worst.

You need to go back to the time Nevermind was released. The 1980s rock scene had descended into farce, with bands seemingly more interested in their hair than even sex, drugs or rock and roll. Even those that cared about their music had found their own decadence in 45 minute long guitar solos, which seemed to punctuate every live show I saw back then.

Kurt Cobain although reportedly originally happy with Andy Wallace’s mixes, later disparagingly described it as “a Motley Crue record”. It is true that there is a sheen that you do not hear on a Pixies or Smithereens record, but Nevermind was as far removed from what was on the rock scene at the time as their 1970s punk predecessors were to the hippy and prog-rock artists of their time. No polished guitar solos and big-hair, just stripped back songs played with passion or “Bay City Rollers getting molested by Black Flag” as Kurt Cobain described it.

Whatever it was, the music world was never going to be the same.

Track Listing

All songs were written by Kurt Cobain, except where noted.

“Smells Like Teen Spirit” (Kurt Cobain , Chris Novoselic, Dave Grohl) – 5:01
“In Bloom” – 4:14
“Come as You Are” – 3:39
“Breed” – 3:03
“Lithium” – 4:17
“Polly” – 2:57
“Territorial Pissings” – 2:22
“Drain You” – 3:43
“Lounge Act” – 2:36
“Stay Away” – 3:32
“On a Plain” – 3:16
“Something in the Way” – 3:55
* “Endless, Nameless” (6:44) is a hidden track on some copies of the record.

Nirvana

Kurt Cobain (appears on the credits for the “Monkey Photo” as Kurdt Kobain) – vocals, guitar, photography
Krist Novoselic (credited as Chris Novoselic) – bass guitar, vocals
Dave Grohl – drums, vocals

Crew

Nirvana – co-producers, engineers
Butch Vig – co-producer, engineer
Kirk Canning – cello on “Something in the Way”
Chad Channing – cymbals on “Polly” (uncredited; song recorded when he was still in the band)
Jeff Sheehan – assistant engineer
Andy Wallace – mixing
Howie Weinberg – mastering
Michael Lavine – photography
Robert Fisher – artwork, art direction, design, cover design
Craig Doubet – assistant engineer, mixing
Kirk Weddle – cover photo
Spencer Elden – infant in cover photo

Release Information

Nevermind was originally released on September 24, 1991 on Geffen Records in the US and on Polydor Records in the UK.

References

Dave Grohl becomes Nirvana’s Drummer

admin — Fri, 21 Sep 1990 14:36:10 +0000

Dave Grohl Arrives in Seattle

On September 21st, 1990 Krist Novoselic and Kurt Cobain picked Dave Grohl up from Seattle’s Sea-Tac airport. He stayed with Kurt Cobain in his “Hellhole” apartment in Olympia and auditioned for the band a few days later. He got the job, with Krist Novoselic later stating, “We knew in two minutes that he was the right drummer.”

This search had been a long and tortuous one and came at the end of a frustrating summer for Nirvana.

Aaron Buckhard, Nirvana’s first Drummer

Kurt Cobain and Krist Novoselic had got together and started playing. In early 1987 they started playing with a neighborhood kid called Aaron Buckhard. There was no audition, as Aaron put it, “They said they needed a drummer and I was a drummer”

However by October 1987 Aaron Buckhard, got a new job as assistant manager of Aberdeen’s Burger King. With the job taking up more of his time he was not prepared to make the trip to Nirvana’s rehersal space in Krist’s basement in Tacoma and he was out of Nirvana. “I thought Kurt’s songs were great, but I never thought there would be a market for them”, said Aaron Buckhard later.

In an attempt to find a new drummer Kurt (or Kurdt as he spelled his name then) decided to place an advert in the Seattle Rocket for a drummer -

SERIOUS DRUMMER WANTED.
Underground Attitude, Black Flag, Melvins, Zeppelin, Scratch Acid, Ethel Merman.
Versatile as heck.
Kurdt 352-0992

By December they still had not found a drummer so started rehearsing with Dale Grover as an interim solution. Soon after they went into Reciprocal Studios with Jack Endino to record their first demo. However in January Dale Grover left to go back to play with the Melvins again soon after Kurt’s 21st birthday.

Before leaving Dale Grover had recommended a hard-living drummer by the name of Dave Foster to Kurt and Krist.

Dave Foster did not look like a the Washington punk that Kurt wanted, but when he mentioned that Dave should, “Get with it” he got and angry retort, “It’s not fair to make fun of the short-haired guy, I’ve got a job!”

He also had the misfortune to get into a fight and beat up the son of the mayor of Cosmopolis. So along with 2 weeks in jail, losing his driver’s license and having to pay thousands for his victim’s medical expenses he was also fired from Nirvana. In actual fact he was not fired, Kurt simply stopped asking him along to practices and asked Chad Channing instead.

Chad Channing

Chad Channing joined Nirvana as things began to happen for them. They recorded “Love Buzz” the first single released on Sub Pop’s record of the month club and their debut album “Bleach” also for Sub Pop. They also embarked on a tour across the US in the back of a van and the relationship between Kurt and Chad began to break down.

By the time Nirvana went to Madison to record the follow up to “Bleach” with Butch Vig at his Smart Studios, although the two respected each other, they could not find common ground on a musical level. He and Kurt’s relationship became very strained during the sessions in Madison.

Kurt had often complained that he was the focal point of the band, with all the stress on him, but whenever Chad had offered to help with the song writing process his ideas had always been ignored, which irked him. Also Chad’s style of drumming did not gel with the music Kurt wanted to make. “Chad was a softer style drummer, but he changed to become harder and more rhythmic.” said Krist Novoselic, “He didn’t like doing that.”

Soon after the Smart Studios sessions at the end of May, Chad Channing left Nirvana.

The Hunt for a Drummer Continues

Nirvana used Mudhoney drummer Dan Peters, to record and release the song “Sliver” on Sub Pop (ironically one of the only songs with a writing credit for Chad Channing), with “Dive” from the Smart sessions on the B-side (you can find both on “Incesticide”) However this was only a temporary arrangement and Nirvana were left looking for another drummer.

, who was looking for a new band following the break-up of his band Scream, a Washington hardcore punk band. The

Dave Grohl Joins Nirvana

Dave Grohl’s band Scream had split up mid-tour in LA. Dave Grohl found himself a long way from home in Washington DC, and Dave Grohl did not have the money to get back to the east coast. So he called his friend Buzz Osbourne of the Melvins, who was living in LA and he introduced Dave to Nirvana.

Nirvana had seen Scream play in San Francisco and liked the way Grohl played, Kurt Cobain frequently compared him favorably with Led Zeppelin’s legendary sticksman, John Bonham. Very quickly he gelled with Nirvana and their summer of frustrations with being unable to play and problems with Sub Pop was at an end.

Now Nirvana were a band again and they set off on a tour of Europe during the fall of 1990. It would also not be long before they had sorted the issues with their record label to as they were now actively pursuing a major label deal.