Raw Music.

On Wednesday night, Henry, Mara and I went to see the Foo Fighter's acoustic gig at the Sydney Opera House. Now, firstly, let me say that the esplanade looks better than the opera house, but that's only because the design is newer. I live just opposite the opera house so it was about time we went and had a closer look.


I took mostly videos of their performance because obviously the flash didn't work, and non-flash images were so very shaky and blurred. I'm still trying to figure youtube out to try and post the videos.
The performance was absolutely breathataking. I literally had goose bumps from the pure... melody that came out of Dave Grohl. Would would have thought that the drummer of legendary Nirvana had such an amazing voice and so much skill. The entire two hour long concert was peppered with hilarious and some very personal anecdotes from Dave Grohl, and his showmanship was amazing. I felt like I was at a stand up comedy show at some points. You can see the chemistry that he and his band mates have, and it's so comforting to know that they're not those high-and-mighty sort who can't just sit back and have a laugh at themselves.

Dave Grohl did some performances alone, after the encore. He sang 'the best of you' - it was just him and his guitar. For those of you who have heard the song, it begins with 'I"VE GOT ANOTHER CONFESSION TO MAKE' - he literally screams it. He came on stage and unexpectedly belted it out. I was stunned because the whole evening he was just singing melodious... acoustic songs. Now whenever I hear that song I get the tingles (like Henry said). Unreal.
He wrote a ballad that he titled the beaconsfield miner's ballad and played it the night we were there because one of the miners were present. He was actually sitting just two rows behind us. For those of you who don't know, the beaconsfield mine collapsed some weeks ago, killing one miner and trapping two others (it was in Australia, of course). The two who were trapped were underground for days because it took the rescue that long to get to them. One of the miners, Brant Webb, asked for Foo Fighters on an iPod. Dave Grohl got word of this, and told triple J radio that once they get out, he would buy them a beer wherever he was. So on wednesday night, Dave Grohl and Brant Webb met after the performance for a beer. And Dave Grohl was quoted as saying that he wouldn't just buy one beer - they would go all the way. It's so real of him to do that, and I was very touched by that ballad that he wrote for them.

I can't really describe the performance so well, because my words won't do it much justice, if at all. So here are just some of the very memorable moments that night.



Hilarity:

- He was taking about how he likes acoustic performances, and that all their songs begin with just the voice and the guitar:
"I don't sit watching the tv with the f*cken' Marshall stack behind me."

- He was trying to get the crowd to stop yelling because he couldn't hear what they were saying, so he started out as if he were placating a baby:
"shhhhh... tsk tsk tsk shhhhh... no no no no, quiet, quiet. shhh shhh."
and then it turned into:
"shhhh.. no no no. hold it. *silence* ahhhhhhh."
as if he were having an orgasm.

- So the band was playing some 'background music' while Dave Grohl was talking, and halfway through his sentence he said:
"Here we are playing this f*cken' spy music..."

- Petra (who was on violin/tambourine etc) was very quiet the whole time, and would only end up laughing whenever Dave Grohl said something, and Dave said this about her:
"yeah you think she's very shy and quiet but she's the one later on who will be throwing TVs out the window"

- He was introducing Taylor Hawkins, the drummer, and how he was going to sing one of their songs. Then he said of Taylor:
"This guy is like the secret weapon you never knew you had. He's the drummer who can sing. It's like being in a street fight and then all of a sudden finding a wrench. Wait what the hell am I saying?! That doesn't make no f*cken' sense!"
To which Taylor replied:
"I'm the wrench!"
And Dave Grohl exclaimed:
"Ah you get it!"
Their Taylor-Dave banter continued as Dave Grohl said:
"I love this guy. I love this guy. I love you man (and Taylor's head was down). Look at me when I tell you that (Taylor raised his head slightly). I love you! (said really quickly - Taylor looked down). Look at me man... I wanna tell you I love you! Iloveyou! Iloveyou!"
And all this while Taylor is hitting the kick drum in regular 4-4 beat. Finally Dave Grohl says:
"Ha! I said it three times! And you looked me in the eye!"
So it really was a very relaxed... and funny environment.

- When he was introducing a separate song that he wrote when he first joined Nirvana (which is the song that started the In Your Honour album), he talked about how he ended up as the drummer for Nirvana. Basically he dropped out of school, and started touring with his friends - his idea of tour was basically the 8 of them touring in a 6 person van. Eventually, at one of their gigs (they were in a punk band, Scream), Nirvana watched it and Chris Novoselic (the bassist of Nirvana) told Kurt Cobain, "we need a drummer like that". Somebody heard this, told Dave Grohl and suggested that he give them a call. He did, but they said that at that point they had a friend who was playing with them at the minute. The next day, Nirvana called back and said "but you should come out and hang with us". They were at Tacona, which is near Seattle. Dave Grohl decided to move to Seattle now that Scream had broken up, and he describes Tacona as "the worst place in the world" because of all the paper mills. In his words, it was like "somebody had shoved broccoli up their bum and boiled it". He lived in Chris Novoselic's apartment which was basically an attic - Chris was 1.97m, and apparently couldn't even stand up in his own apartment. Nirvana already released Bleach, so Dave Grohl was their drummer from then on.

- Then Dave Grohl went to live with Kurt Cobain, and remembers thinking that they were just weird. He slept on Kurt Cobain's sofa, and remembers that Kurt Cobain used to keep turtles but never clean the tank. Because of that, the turtles (which were situated just next to the couch) would keep trying to get out of the tank all night and when Dave Grohl tried to sleep, they would go 'boom, boom, boom'. At this point, Dave Grohl kept walking into the mic while banging his head with it for effect.

- They filmed Big Me in Australia, and Dave Grohl mentioned it. Someone in the crowd then yelled out "which street!" and Dave Grohl replied:
"I don't know what f*cken' street! I just sit in my limousine and watch the world go by."
Later on, the "what street!" became a running joke when Dave Grohl told the audience that he was sitting in his hotel room when he composed the ballad for the beaconsfield miners. Someone yelled out "what street was it on!" (his hotel) and I can't remember what Dave Grohl replied, but I'm sure there were some curses. :)

These were just some of the many highlights of the performance. I would go through all of them but then Henry and I are just leaving to drive up to Hunter Valley for wine tasting and then to Ports Stephens to spot some whales/dolphins/hammerheads.

I really, really love Australia.


So to end this post off, here are the flowers that greeted me yesterday when I opened the door at home. From Henry, Happy Friday Afternoon. :)


x

Noise: In Your Honour by Foo Fighters.