Man, everybody I know loves to bag on Dave Grohl. I get it, he’s one of those guys that seems to be everywhere, all the time. He’s in every single music documentary, he’s on TV, the Foo Fighters are on everything imaginable, I get it why some people have decided they hate the guy.
BUTTTTTTTTT… I’d like to stick up for Dave Grohl. Hear me out.
Nirvana was the biggest thing of the 1990s. Huge, giant stars. A small club band turned into the biggest act in the country. And for the most part, those guys couldn’t handle it. Kurt Cobain could have had any guitar he wanted, any woman he wanted, lived anywhere he wanted, had the coolest old car he wanted, and all he did was get married to miserable ol’ Courtney Love, and then he shot himself. That’s really sad, man.
The Nirvana bass player, Krist Novoselic, could have done anything he wanted, could have been a hero to millions, could have done any kind of creative endeavor, and instead he becomes a crusty old fart who praised how “Trump knocked it out of the park” in a tweet. Punk rock? Hardly. If he ever had any punk in him, it passed out of him like a kidney stone. That guy literally seems like a wet fart in a sleeping bag full of rotting fish. Has he done anything in the last thirty years? What a drag!
Pat Smear from the Germs, well, he seems like to like marijuana a lot—probably didn’t mean that much for him to be the fourth guy in Nirvana. But at least he’s got a place to crash that’s better than the old Germs days (and Grohl brought him along in the Foo Fighters).
But Dave Grohl, man, he got to REAP the REWARDS of being in America’s most popular grunge band. The guy always seems like he is having FUN being a rock and roll star, and uses his fame and fortune and leverage to do cool things and have a good time.
For instance, when the famous Sound City studio was going out of business (the studio where Nirvana cut “Smells Like Teen Spirit” as well as the studio that cut a million hits by James Brown, Neil Young, Johnny Cash, Fleetwood Mac, and even Charles Manson!), Dave Grohl ponied up the cash to buy the famous Neve recording console and bring it to his own studio a few miles away. And he paid for a documentary about the history of Sound City.
The Foo Fighters, love ’em or hate ’em (I think they have a handful of great songs), have seemed to be a band that enjoys doing what they do, and Grohl always seems to bring the fun wherever he goes. Whether it’s guesting with Lemmy of Motorhead, acting in the Tenacious D film, inviting Mick Jagger or Paul McCartney to his studio to record, the guy radiates happiness and fun. He seems to be having a blast, and to that, I say—good for him.
Okay, I get it, you’ve seen 100 music documentaries and Dave Grohl is in 101 of those documentaries. You might think, “Gah! I hate that guy! Why is he commenting in this documentary when he obviously doesn’t know that much about the subject!” Well, let me explain something. When you’re in Hollywood and you’re trying to pitch a project on something cool and obscure and not in the mainstream, when you go to the producers and the money men and ask for a budget to make your cool documentary, guess what the first thing is that these corporate types ask? “What celebrities can you get in this documentary to generate interest and get paid butts in the theater seats?” That’s what the business is about. It’s about celebrity. So, Dave Grohl offers himself up, time after time, to sit down in a chair and talk for a few minutes. In exchange, documentaries get made that would never get financed or put into production otherwise. Do you understand what I’m saying here? GIVE THE MAN SOME SLACK, HE’S MAKING SOME COOL STUFF HAPPEN.
Plus, the dude barbecues at his studio (I’ve never been invited, but I swear someday I’m gonna sneak in to one of those, especially since his studio is only a few miles from my house), and I even saw the guy shopping for toys with his kid at my local Target store. You think you’d see Axl Rose doing that? No. Axl Rose would yell at some assistants and have them go do the shopping and then he’d yell at them for not getting the right thing and then he’d smash a vase and yell some more. Dave Grohl just…goes shopping with his kid at Target! He seems like a cool guy!
In short, I’ll never get the chance, because I’ve never had “the look” that those modern-era record label guys were after, and I’ve always played music that was far out of the mainstream. But, if I were in Dave Grohl’s shoes, I’d be doing exactly what he’s doing. All of it. I say, good for him, and I like the guy, even though I’ve never had a chance to actually “hang” with him. Let him reap the rewards of everything he’s done. Do I think the Foo Fighters should be in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame when Link Wray isn’t? Probably not, but I’m not going to begrudge the guy for being successful.
And now, just today, I see the dude has made a super-dumb and great-looking horror movie with his band. The guy is in his FIFTIES! This Is EXACTLY what I’d be doing If I was him. Heck yeah. Haters gonna hate, but I’m just glad to see this guy having such a good time with it.
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