Dave Grohl

In rock, the normal thing is to have one trade. Dave Grohl had two. First he was the drummer who hit Nirvana's drums as if he wanted to break them, and for many he is still the best of his generation. Then, when that band ended in the worst way possible, he put a guitar on at the front and wrote the anthems of Foo Fighters. That second trade was not in the script: nobody expected songs from the man who sat at the back. And there is a third trait, less showy than the other two, that explains his whole career better: the habit of turning up on other people's records, often without claiming the lead.

The boy from Warren who hit harder

David Eric Grohl was born on 14 January 1969 in Warren, Ohio, and grew up in Springfield, Virginia, on the doorstep of Washington. At seventeen he left school to go on tour: in 1986 he joined Scream, one of the capital's hardcore bands, as drummer, and spent four years in vans and on other people's sofas. That schooling matters, because it explains the sound. Grohl did not learn to play in an academy but in basements with no soundproofing, where the drums had to impose themselves over two guitars at full volume.

In September 1990, after Scream fell apart halfway through a tour, he arrived in Seattle recommended by Buzz Osborne, of the Melvins, to try out with Kurt Cobain and Krist Novoselic. Nevermind came out in September 1991 and its drumming is half the explanation of the album: enormous hits, the time nailed down, and a way of coming in that turns every chorus into a slammed door. In Utero (1993) followed, and the acoustic recording for MTV made in November 1993.

What almost nobody noticed then is that he was already writing. In 1992 he released an album of his own on cassette, Pocketwatch, signed with the pseudonym Late!, and in 1993 one of his songs, "Marigold", appeared as the B-side of a Nirvana single, with him singing. It was the only clue to what was coming.

He did not want to be anybody else's drummer

Kurt Cobain died by suicide on 5 April 1994, at the age of twenty-seven. Grohl has said that for months he could not listen to music, and that the idea of sitting behind another band again struck him as unbearable: it would have meant accepting the role of "the drummer of" for ever. The offers were there. Tom Petty invited him to stay in the Heartbreakers after they played together on television, in November 1994, and he said no.

What he did instead was to record alone, over six days in October 1994, an album of his own songs, and to hand out about a hundred cassette copies under a made-up band name —Foo Fighters, the term Second World War pilots used for the lights they could not identify— so that nobody would know it was him. It was not modesty: it was hiding. By the time the tape started to circulate and the labels called, the disguise had already turned into a real band.

Probot, two Queens albums and a basement full of guests

Grohl's generosity is not a character trait anybody has to be taken at their word for: it is in the credits. In 2004 he released Probot, a metal album he recorded in the basement of his house and to which he invited, one by one, the singers he had listened to as a teenager: Lemmy of Motörhead, the Dane King Diamond, the Brazilian Max Cavalera. He played nearly everything and left the microphone to others, which is exactly the opposite of what a star usually does.

With Queens of the Stone Age he recorded two albums, and on each one he played a different part. On Songs for the Deaf (2002) he plays the drums from start to finish and then went on tour with the band, as one more member. On ...Like Clockwork (2013) he came in when the recording was a third of the way through and Joey Castillo had left it: he ended up playing six of the ten tracks. In 2002 he was the album's drummer; in 2013 he was the one who rescued a half-finished album.

In July 2009 he put together Them Crooked Vultures with Josh Homme on vocals and guitar and with John Paul Jones, Led Zeppelin's bassist, on bass and keyboards. The trio's only album came out in November of that same year. In a supergroup that could have carried his name at the front, Grohl again chose the back seat.

The one who films the others

The other half of that impulse is documentary. He directed Sound City (2013), about the Van Nuys studio where Nevermind was recorded, the series Sonic Highways (2014), about the music scenes of eight American cities, and What Drives Us (2021), which is basically a love letter to the tour van. In 2018 he released Play, a twenty-three-minute instrumental piece on which he plays every instrument himself, and in October 2021 his memoir, The Storyteller. In all four cases the subject is the same: how this is done and who did it before.

The recognition came through both doors. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame twice: with Nirvana in 2014 and with Foo Fighters in 2021. Very few musicians get in twice, and fewer still get in once for what they played and once for what they wrote.

What to remember

Dave Grohl is one of the most influential drummers rock has produced —for many, the best of his generation, although there is no record or award that settles that— and, on top of it, the author of a catalogue of songs that fills stadiums. But what describes him best is neither of those two things on its own: it is the willingness to keep getting involved in other people's projects when he no longer needed to. Probot, the two Queens albums, the Vultures, the documentaries. A sideman's CV signed by someone who could have lived off his own name.

His story also has a cruel symmetry: he lost his best friend twice, twenty-eight years apart. Cobain in April 1994, Taylor Hawkins in March 2022. Both times the answer was the same, going back to the studio and carrying on playing, and it is worth saying so while leaving a door open alongside: in Chile, the Ministry of Health's *4141 answers twenty-four hours a day and gives guidance on suicide prevention, free of charge and from any telephone.

---

Sources

David Eric Grohl was born on 14 January 1969 in Warren, Ohio, and grew up in Springfield, Virginia. He was the drummer of Scream from 1986, at the age of seventeen, until the group broke up halfway through a tour in 1990. He joined Nirvana in September 1990, recommended by Buzz Osborne (Melvins) to Kurt Cobain and Krist Novoselic; he recorded "Nevermind" (September 1991), "In Utero" (1993) and the acoustic concert for MTV recorded in November 1993. In 1992 he released the album "Pocketwatch" on cassette under the pseudonym Late!, and his song "Marigold" appeared in 1993 as the B-side of a Nirvana single. Kurt Cobain died by suicide on 5 April 1994, at the age of 27. In October 1994 Grohl recorded alone the album that gave rise to Foo Fighters and handed out around a hundred cassettes under that made-up band name, taken from the term Second World War pilots used for unidentified lights; in November 1994 he played with Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers on television and declined the invitation to join the group. In 2004 he released "Probot", a metal album recorded in his basement with guest singers including Lemmy Kilmister (Motörhead), King Diamond and Max Cavalera. With Queens of the Stone Age he recorded two albums: "Songs for the Deaf" (2002), on which he plays the drums throughout the record and which was followed by a tour, and "...Like Clockwork" (2013), which he joined with the recording a third of the way through following Joey Castillo's departure and on which he plays six of the ten tracks. Them Crooked Vultures was formed in July 2009 with Josh Homme (vocals and guitar) and John Paul Jones (Led Zeppelin) and released its only album in November 2009. He directed the documentaries "Sound City" (2013) and "What Drives Us" (2021) and the series "Sonic Highways" (2014); in 2018 he released the twenty-three-minute instrumental piece "Play", with every instrument played by him, and in October 2021 his memoir, "The Storyteller". He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame twice: with Nirvana in 2014 and with Foo Fighters in 2021. Taylor Hawkins, Foo Fighters' drummer and a close friend of Grohl's, died on 25 March 2022 in Bogotá, Colombia. He is considered one of the most influential drummers of his generation. Profile compiled for Rebobinados with fact-checking; interpretations of the meaning of the work are offered as the author's reading. No song lyrics are reproduced, for copyright reasons. Information drawn from Wikipedia, Rolling Stone and other coverage.