When Kurt Cobain killed himself in 1994, all of a sudden one of the greatest bands in the world was over. Nirvana was done, sadly. But the band’s drummer Dave Grohl still had a lot of music left in him. So, when the dust had settled, Grohl started to write his own songs—tracks he would sing and play guitar on and perform.
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Originally created as a one-man solo project, Foo Fighters quickly blossomed into a full band once Grohl proved to be a talented composer. He released the band’s self-titled debut LP in 1995 and the sophomore follow-up The Colour and the Shape in 1997. Along the way, Foo Fighters became one of the biggest bands on Earth and created some truly indelible songs. Here below are a trio of those.
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“Everlong” from The Colour and the Shape (1997)
A love song written as Dave Grohl was going through a divorce, this song has become perhaps the group’s most popular track. It also has the distinction to be the last song the late drummer Taylor Hawkins played with the group before his death in South America in 2022. Grohl wrote the tune as he was falling head over heels for the musician Louise Post of the group Veruca Salt. The track gained extra attention in 1998 when he played a starring acoustic rendition during a radio interview with Howard Stern. In many ways, that performance solidfied Grohl as a rock star in his own right. On the track, he sings,
Hello
I’ve waited here for you
Everlong
Tonight, I throw myself into
And out of the red
Out of her head, she sang
Come down and waste away with me
Down with me
Slow, how you wanted it to be
I’m over my head
Out of her head, she sang
“My Hero” from The Colour and the Shape (1997)
A song Grohl wrote about “ordinary” heroes, this track from The Colour and the Shape has become another signature track for the Foos. The band often plays it during live shows to honor fallen friends, including their late drummer Taylor Hawkins. Some have thought Grohl was inspired by to write the track by Cobain, someone he learned a great deal from as an artist. But in a 2009 interview with VH1, Grohl said he wrote the song while watching the 1983 Shakespeare-inspired film Valley Girl, which stars Nicolas Cage. On the track of devotion, Grohl sings,
Too alarmin’ now to talk about
Take your pictures down and shake it out
Truth or consequence, say it aloud
Use that evidence, race it around
There goes my hero
Watch him as he goes
There goes my hero
He’s ordinary
“Learn to Fly” from There Is Nothing Left to Lose (1999)
Among the band’s most famous music videos, this one for “Learn to Fly” might be the most well known. Featuring Grohl playing many characters from a little girl to a stewardess, the vid for this track was iconic upon its release in 1999 from the band’s third album There Is Nothing Left to Lose. The work even won a Grammy Award for Best Short Form Video in 2001. As for the track, which became the band’s highest-charting tune on the Billboard Hot 100 upon its release (peaking at No. 19), it is about achieving your highest mark, doing the best you can and finding success. On it, Grohl sings,
Run and tell all of the angels
This could take all night
Think I need a devil to help me get things right
Hook me up a new revolution
‘Cause this one is a lie
We sat around laughin’ and watched the last one die
Now, I’m lookin’ to the sky to save me
Lookin’ for a sign of life
Lookin’ for somethin’ to help me burn out bright
And I’m lookin’ for a complication
Lookin’ ’cause I’m tired of lyin’
Make my way back home when I learn to fly high
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