The show that made Dave Grohl want to play music forever: “I was totally inspired”
Every artist is usually in danger of falling out of favour with the public from the minute they start performing. They might have some great tunes in their arsenal, but if they managed to make one wrong movie, that might be enough for some fans to give them the one-finger salute and never be seen at one of their concerts again. Even for someone like Dave Grohl, who has hit the lottery when it comes to being a rockstar, it’s not out of the question to have moments where things go a little haywire.
Outside of the massive heartache he dealt with in his personal life, anyone who had joined a band like Nirvana was bound to be questioning their life decisions when Kurt Cobain passed away. He was the guiding light for an entire generation of kids, and now that the mouthpiece of the next generation was gone, Grohl could have easily decided to hang it up and never play music again.
Even if he realised that music was going to get him out of his funk, it wasn’t like playing with Foo Fighters was going to be easy. The idea of the drummer turning into the frontman has only been pulled off effectively a handful of times, and while Grohl had the chops for it, all the attention on him at once would have been enough for anyone to crack up when they were still learning the ropes of their job.
But there was still a guiding light for Grohl, and that light’s name was Neil Young. Outside of being known as the ‘Godfather of Grunge’, Young was the kind of person who never took orders from anyone but himself when making his records. He knew that no suit could tell him what he was best at, and even if they had some good points, it didn’t take Young long to move in the exact opposite direction when making albums like Everybody’s Rockin’.
It’s one thing to lead by example, but Grohl got his major education when attending the Bridge School benefit gigs with Foo Fighters. Despite some of the show’s veterans being the biggest names in rock and roll, Grohl was less starstruck by everything and more respectful of the camaraderie between everyone in the room when they met the night before at Young’s house.
Grohl was already down to earth and grateful to play rock and roll, but this was the first time he got a sense of what he could do without the massive crowds, saying, “For someone that’s considered a legend to walk into their world and realise that it’s so grounded and beautiful and natural, it gives you hope and faith that real music is still there and made for the real reasons. When we came from that, I was totally inspired, like, ‘Wow, I think I could probably make music for the rest of my life as long as I do it on my own terms, at my own pace.’ It seems like that’s what he’s managed to do.”
And while it may seem bittersweet, that wasn’t all that different from what Cobain had said during his final years on this earth. When talking about the future of Nirvana, Cobain had talked about wanting to strip things back and be able to strum his guitar when he’s older like Johnny Cash did, so this was a case of Grohl fulfilling those ambitions that Cobain never had the chance to.
If anything, the fact that Grohl could see the beauty in playing Bridge School tells you more about the kind of artist he was. Anyone could try to make money and be the most famous rockstar in the world, but Grohl always appreciated looking at his music from a fan’s perspective before anything else.
