Passing JudgmentIf you don't own this record, or haven't heard it, you are pretty much a giant square in my book. I fucking hate Arcade Fire so you can chide me for that in return if you wish. With every instrument played by Dave Grohl, save for one guitar track played by Greg Dulli from the Afghan Whigs on X-Static, the Foo Fighters' first eponymous album is a one man tour de force. Dave had to prove he would not linger in Kurt Cobain's shadow and in my humble (lol) opinion he vaulted over it on his first try. Nirvana bears the curse of being "the band" of their era. As a result, while the music is still excellent, I've heard it so much that I never need to listen to it again. Just like Metallica's "Master of Puppets", I know every note on "Nevermind". And possibly because of this or maybe because I just prefer what Grohl created if I was forced to pick, I would keep the first two Foo albums in my collection over the first 2 Nirvana records. And though Nevermind got me fiddling around with my guitar more, this album drove me to practice. I spent hours every day working on my bar chord slides trying to keep up. I could only dream of writing something as intense, varied, and sincere as this record. That dream is not dead, btw. This record is 16 years old and it is still in a regular rotation in my life. Lyrically, the album is sometimes campy and weak, but not all of it. Obviously, the drums are outstanding. And writing both guitar parts for a song? There are plenty of musicians that do this, but that doesn't mean it's any good. Most dual guitar bands split that duty (someone comes up with a riff, the other compliments it) but he wrote both parts which is another source of awesome. I can easily put this album in my top twenty of all time. Music and the love of it is all subjective, of course. But between simply loving the songs, identifying with the more "honest" lyrics, and the motivation it gave me to actually play the guitar I paid money for, this album is a building block of my spirit and attitude. Thank you, Dave Grohl. I'll stick around (The video quality is horrible but the audio is mother-fucking tizz-ight!) LINKED MEDIA
|
|
|
