THE FOO FIGHTERS HAVE A GREAT NIGHT FOR ROCK

I wanted the Foo Fighters' Wasting Light (my second favorite LP of 2011) to win Album of the Year at the Grammys. I'm not mad that Adele won for 21, but wow, Wasting Light was great.

It reunited Dave Grohl with Nirvana bassist Krist Novoselic, Nevermind producer Butch Vig recorded it with them in Dave's garage, and it saw Pat Smear rejoin the band (and there's a great guest appearance by another punk legend, Bob Mould).

I saw some noise on Twitter that the Foo Fighters are the band that always get attention from TV shows.  It's like they are the token rock band for award shows.  And I've read interviews with Dave Grohl where he kind of says that.  I'd agree that some of their albums may get a bit of a "pass," because people buy into Dave so much. They love his story, and by all accounts, he's a really cool guy despite all the band's success.  They have cred, but they're not snobs. Dave can show up at a punk club one night, and then jam with Paul McCartney at the White House.  People love that.

But in 2011, no other band had a rock record with mainstream appeal that worked from start to finish. Great singles, cool videos, but start to finish the LP works.  It's not just my opinion: I think they played every song on the album at their concerts.  How many bands with that many hits, with that many albums, can play all their new songs in concert and have it go over.  And by the way, their concerts are all in arenas.

I remember seeing one of the Foo Fighters' first shows - opening for Mike Watt before the first LP was out. I don't think it was even common knowledge that it was Dave Grohl's band. They were great, but they were a club band. Years later, I saw them at Giants Stadium opening for The Rolling Stones. They seemed  a bit "fish out of water," but they played with a lot of heart and soul. A few years later, I saw them open/co-headline with The Red Hot Chili Peppers and it clicked. Grohl had opened for them years earlier with Nirvana. I think seeing the Chilis handle playing large venues helped it kick in for him. Today they are one of the mightiest arena bands in the land, and I mean that as a 100% compliment.

I was so glad to see them win a ton of Grammys last night, and of course their main performance rocked (the dance music thing felt a bit forced: I'd like to see them do something with Deadmau5 without the other artists that were included in that).  And seeing Dave jamming with Paul McCartney, Joe Walsh and Bruce Springsteen at the end of the night was amazing. But tonight, he could be at a Bad Brains show. That's what's so great about him.

BEST OF 2011 - #2 - FOO FIGHTERS "WASTING LIGHT"

I loved Foo Fighters' Wasting Light the minute I heard it and I said so. Dave Grohl and the boys have never made a bad album, but this is certainly one of their best, if not their absolute best. Considering that the guy has nothing to prove, and has probably lived out all of his rock and roll dreams, it would almost be understandable if he just coasted. But I'm glad he hasn't done that: and as a lifelong rock fan, I think he knows that sinking feeling you get when an artist that you love lets you down.  I doubt he gets too caught up in what people think of him, but I know he doesn't want to put out a lame album. The fact that this comes twenty years after Nirvana's Nevermind (and features Nirvana's Krist Novoselic on two songs, and it is produced by Nevermind's Butch Vig) just shows that Dave has been really vital for a really long time.

I do think that sometimes the Foo Fighters albums get a "pass" because people like the band so much.  Which is nice.  But in this case, it isn't necessary, and that's even nicer.

#20YRSAGO: NIRVANA - NEVERMIND (+ boxset review!)

A lot of incredible albums came out in 1991 (hence my series of "#20yrsago" posts), but none had the game changing impact of Nirvana's Nevermind.

I remember hearing "Smells Like Teen Spirit" for the first time.  I was driving my car on the Meadowbrook Parkway in Long Island while I was in college.  I ejected whatever cassette I was listening to, and my radio was set to 92.7 FM (it was either WLIR or WDRE).  I heard the guitar first. Why are they playing a band as heavy as Metallica?  Of course, when I heard the singer, he sounded nothing like Metallica or anyone else. Who was this?  I soon found out.

I got Nevermind when it first came out. Obviously it is a classic album.  I loved "Lounge Act," I thought it sounded like The Smithereens (I later read that they were, in fact, an influence). At some point, I found Kurt Cobain a bit too precious and annoying (wearing a "corporate magazines still suck" shirt while doing a corporate magazine cover was cute, but complaining about Pearl Jam bugged me), and I stopped listening to them for a bit. That was dumb of me.  They are one of the greatest bands ever, and Nevermind is an incredible album.  I'm sure Dylan said some things about other artists that I like, it would never make me stop listening to his music.

There's lots of stories about Nirvana's concrete impact (the oft-told stories of hair metal bands hearing Nirvana and realizing that their day was done) and how they didn't care about their new-found status (famously turning down opening slots on tours by U2 and Guns N Roses/Metallica). My story is this:  I was DJing at a great rock and roll bar called Fezziwigs, owned by two great guys, ex-hippies who performed at the bar as an acoustic duo.  Almost all of their repertoire was '60s and '70s songs, but they threw in Dire Straits and Traveling Wilburys songs as well. They didn't always "get" the music I played, but Nirvana was the only band they ever paid me to NOT play. $5 extra per night, just as long as they didn't have to hear "Smells Like Teen Spirit." Sometimes I would have to sacrifice the extra fiver, other nights I played "Lounge Act" instead.

Anyway. I've been listening to the super-deluxe box set lately, and I'm stunned by how great it is.  Why did I buy the super deluxe version, instead of the just the deluxe one?  Well, one reason is that it comes with a live concert recording from the era, and a DVD of the same concert.  You could buy that DVD/CD package separately.  There are tons of B-sides and bonus tracks, many of which come with the deluxe version.  I was kind of attracted to the super-delxue by the idea of the Butch Vig's original mixes.  Butch Vig, of course, produced Nevermind, and went on to be a famous producer, as well as the drummer of the band Garbage. But this was one of his first big major label projects, and I guess the label didn't like his mixes, so they hired Andy Wallace to mix it instead.  So, it's cool to hear Butch's original vision for the album. Also included are "boombox demos": literally, the band performing and recording themselves on a cassette deck on a boombox.  It's interesting to hear them in that raw of a format, but I don't think I'll listen to that too often.  Finally, there are some early demos of the songs that pre-date Dave Grohl joining the band: they feature Chad Channing on drums.

Nevermind is an album that I have a complicated relationship with, but it's certainly one of the greatest and most important albums released in my lifetime, and I'm grateful for it.  It helped to wipe out a lot of crap bands (of course, it inspired a movement of those crap bands pretending to be Nirvana, instead of pretending to be Van Halen). It also sort of brought a system of ethics to bands who come from the underground and end up in the mainstream.  Stone Gossard basically admitted as much in Pearl Jam 20.  The idea of Kurt Cobain giving a public beatdown over something that smells like a sell-out helped to keep the band on their best behavior.  For a time, it felt like most of pop music felt the same way. Maybe a lot of us (including some of Kurt's bandmates, friends and fans) have outgrown that rigid ethic, but you know that people are probably influenced by Kurt's personality as much as they are by his songs.

FOO FIGHTERS - WASTING LIGHT

I love this album. The Foo Fighters' Wasting Light is one of their best LPs, certainly their best album since 1997's The Colour and The Shape.

Recorded on all analog tape (a piece of the actual master is included in the album if you pre-ordered, I have one) in Dave Grohl's garage (a "ballad-free" zone) it is loud and rocking. When the band recorded two new songs for their Greatest Hits album in 2009, Dave reunited with Nevermind producer Butch Vig.  I guess they enjoyed working together ("Wheels" is a great song, albeit 100% different from what they've done here), so they decided to do a full album.

Pat Smear, who was a member of the original Foo Fighters band, rejoined as a touring member after the release of 2007's Echoes, Silence Patience and Grace, and now he's back in the band full time... but Chris Shiflett is still in the band also, so they now have a muscular three guitar attack.

Grohl comes from a hardcore punk background, but his great sense of melody comes through on every song he writes.  So even when the guitars and drums are crashing down, there's still great melodies, his songs are memorable.  Some of the recent Foo Fighters albums have had a bit of filler - this album has none. If I write about highlights, I'll end up mentioning every song on the album. Seriously.  But I will mention "Dear Rosemary," which features Bob Mould on guitar and vocals. Grohl is always really cool about citing his influences, and lately he's been saying that without Bob's old band, Husker Du, he wouldn't be doing what he's doing. I think the band's lineup is maxed out at five members, but I'd love to see Bob join the band! Also, Krist Novoselic plays bass and accordion on "I Should Have Known."  It's a great song that will kick ass when they do it live.

It's been a long time since I've said that a Foo Fighters release would be one of my favorite albums of the year, but this will be in the running for my top 10.

FOO FIGHTERS: HIATUS? WHAT HIATUS?

Dave Grohl tells Rolling Stone that the Foo Fighters will do their next album with Butch Vig, who he of course worked with nearly twenty years ago on Nirvana's Nevermind. (Dave also filled in for Vig on drums on "Bad Boyfriend," from Garbage's most recent album). He says that he and Taylor Hawkins are already working on new songs. I kind of thought that Them Crooked Vultures would be a year long project, but maybe that won't be the case. I do hope they work together in the future though. On the other hand, I've read that bassist Nate Mendel is reuniting with Sunny Day Real Estate for a tour, so who knows if there's an actual schedule for the Foos to return to active duty.

TWO NEW FOO FIGHTERS SONGS

I mentioned a while back that The Foo Fighters debuted a new song, "Wheels," when they played the White House's July 4th picnic, and that the song is going to be on their upcoming greatest hits album. Well, it turns out that there's going to be another new song called "Word Forward" which was produced by Butch Vig - who of course Dave Grohl worked with on Nirvana's Nevermind. (Dave also filled in for Butch Vig by playing drums on Garbage's "Bad Boyfriend.")

That will probably be the last we hear from the Foos for a while, as Dave is probably going to be spending a lot of time with Them Crooked Vultures in the next few months.

GREEN DAY'S 21ST CENTURY BREAKDOWN

If you told me in 1999 that that one of the albums I would be looking forward to most in 2009 would be a new album by Green Day, I would not have believed you. I liked Dookie and some of their other songs, but I didn't consider myself a big fan, I even found them a bit annoying. And it seemed like they were on a slow decline artistically and commerically.

Then came a somewhat underrated album called Warning in 2000. I loved the title track - although it was a blatant rip-off of The Kinks' "Picture Book" - but the song that converted me and made me a fan was "Minority." And then came American Idiot in 2004, a classic, their best album ever. And if that wasn't enough, last year, under the alias Foxboro Hot Tubs, they released Stop, Drop and Roll!!!, my favorite album of 2008.

I was glad to see the guys from Green Day at the Grammys (they presented the Album of the Year award to Robert Plant & Alison Krauss). I can't wait to hear their new album, 21st Century Breakdown, produced by Butch Vig. It comes out in May!

BEST OF '08: FOXBORO HOT TUBS' STOP DROP AND ROLL!!!

I've said it already, but Stop Drop and Roll!!! by the Foxboro Hot Tubs was my favorite album of 2008. The Foxboro Hot Tubs, of course, are actually Green Day, a band who never topped my end-of-year chart before (although I am a huge fan of American Idiot). It sounds like the guys were listening to The Underground Garage for weeks on end and then decided to make an album that wasn't as heavy as American Idiot. It's not the deepest album, but it's fun and I love it. I probably listened to it more than any other album that came out in 2008. I'm looking forward to the next Green Day album, which is going to be produced by Butch Vig. But I hope the band will do some Hot Tubs material when they tour.

GREEN DAY WORKING WITH BUTCH VIG

A video that's been making it's way around the web shows about 30 seconds of Green Day in the studio with Butch Vig (his Garbage bandmate and part-time Terminator Shirley Manson sort of let the beans slip in a TV interview that Butch is working with them). That sounds like a great combination.

American Idiot really put the band in a different category. Since that album, not only did they do a real heavy cover of John Lennon's "Working Class Hero" but they also collaborated on a song with U2. Few of their peers would have been able to pull off either of those.

They seemed to have a great time with the Foxboro Hot Tubs album (maybe my favorite album of the year!), so it will be interesting to see what they come with this time around.