THE FOO FIGHTERS FLY INTO DETROIT

Enable frames

THE FOO FIGHTERS FLY INTO DETROIT

Dateline: Cobo Arena, May 29, 2003


by Marilu DAngela

Photos by Kay McEntee

At the outset let's say that it is surprising with the popularity
of the Foo Fighters combined with the TV exposure that mainman Dave Grohl
has been getting lately, that there was a half empty Cobo Arena when I
arrived.

This was not indicative of the great sounds that entertained the grade
school to gray haired audience at the Concert. There was a bonus warm up
band, Chevelle  ("Send the Pain Below" and "Red"), 3 brothers from Chicago;
Sam, Pete, and Joe Loeffler came out with high energy that transported the
audience through a rollercoaster ride of true and primal vocals and sound.

The bass player disappeared for a bit and next thing I know he's walking
right in front of me as I stood on the main floor, playing his parts as he
walked into the crowd. Chevelle is a great band in its own right, but it
was obvious whom the crowd was there for.

A huge curtain dropped down, covering the stage with the big reddish orange
FF symbols of the Foo Fighters along with lines and lines of typewriter
font words from their lyrics as the band prepared for their performance.

'Foo Fighter' was the name that was given to unexplainable energy balls of

light that World War II jet fighters would see off their wings in flight.
They had a DJ spinning discs during each transition. All of a sudden the
speakers were silent, the lights went down, and you heard those familiar
guitar riffs from their latest song, "All My Life".

Dave Grohl

The curtain dropped and the Foo Fighters were there. Grohl starts singing, "all my life I've been searching for something..." There were no mystical foo fighting floating balls of light around, but there was an explosion of sound that kept pushing at you like a freight train.

They continued that pace through "The One", "My Hero", "Times Like These", "Have It All", and "Learn To Fly". Indeed, the band was mesmerizing!

Grohl finally took a breather to talk to the crowd, saying how its been awhile since they played Detroit and how the crowds have grown, throwing in a few choice expletives now and then.

He started back up with a song about his ex-wife from local Grosse Pointe, "For All The Cows ". The highlight of the evening came when they went onto a kick ass rendition of "Stacked Actors".

Playing his clear acrylic guitar, the band built to a crescendo where Grohl
and Taylor Hawkins on drums duked it out with a brilliant tribal flair drum
solo, showing how gifted and outstanding a musician Hawkins is.

Chris Shiflet played lead guitar; Nate Mendel was on bass. Dave Grohl of
course played guitar and did lead vocals, brilliant in his honesty and
heartfelt renditions with gusto. His voice stayed strong despite the
interjecting screams that kicked up the energy of his songs.

The concert continued with "Hey JP", "Low" and  "Monkeywrench". Then Grohl
and Shiflet gave Hawkins and Mendel a short break, putting out a heartfelt
dual guitar rendition of "Tired".

They all came back together to bring the show to a close with "This Is A Call", but of course the crowd wanted more. It wasn't long before an image of the Earth and spinning spirals appeared in the backdrop creating a great atmosphere for their encore of "Aurora".

Finally, the night came to a close with "Everlong".

It was obvious the Foo Fighters were enjoying their jobs, but maybe because it was a Thursday night, the crowd exhibited a rather muted exuberance.

Nonetheless the concert showed an aspect of the Foo Fighters you're not going to get from any 2-D media or music videos. It was pure unadulterated Foo, nothing but the Foo, and a great Foo it was!

The band has been together for 8 years and hopefully will continue gracing us with their music for many more.

Nate Mendel

Enable frames