Foo Fighters - Wembley Arena, London (11.22.02)
Posted by Phil McCann on 11.25.2002
How much can one man’s hair rule?
Concert Review- Foo Fighters 11.22.2002, Wembley Arena, London
”> Phil McCann
Well Dave Grohl is the luckiest man on earth…probably. A member of Nirvana, the founder of the Foo Fighters, respected worldwide, adored by millions, and…he has great hair. The man has put together a band that you can pretty much guarantee no one will have any qualms with. You say Foo Fighters, you may hear ‘a little bit pop’, or ‘he’s in it for the money’, but never do you hear ‘this sucks’. The fact is they are so good at writing insanely catchy rock songs that it’s hard to dislike them.
And in finding it hard to dislike them, six of us trekked down to Wembley to find out exactly how good they were live. Unlike others gigs I’ve been to, I wasn’t at all worried that they wouldn’t deliver, because there’s no real reason why they wouldn’t, it just seemed impossible to think of this gig as having the ability to ‘suck’.
Anyway, not going off on a tangent at all, whilst the London clouds opened up and soaked the masses, we walked into the standing area and looked impressively at the stage. The ‘Cave In’ banner hung at the front, but behind the banners from the ‘All My Life’ video were clearly visible, as well as a large banner hanging over the front of the stage.
And onto Cave In, one of Dave Grohl’s favourite bands, and one who, after numerous media appearances, have started to make a small name for themselves. They played through most of their EP in great style, with a ‘pure rock’ feel to the performance. They were nothing flashy, they were just hard, in-your-face rock and I loved it, just to see a band that didn’t try to be anything other than loud guitars and thumping drums. They finished off their set with a cover of Led Zeppelin’s ‘Dazed and Confused’, a note perfect, long version of the classic. It didn’t thrill most of the audience, but it was great to see Cave In perform it anyway.
Well…the Foo Fighters. The banner at the front of the stage was lowered to obscure our views, and about fifteen minutes later the lights went down. Awe inspiring says it all for me. A rabid crowd, cheering wildly just for the entrance of their new favourite band…well I gave them about an hour fourty-five to make their minds up. So the opening notes of ‘All My Life’ started to play, and the crowd exploded. A crowd that had been dead in the water for Cave In absolutely exploded for the first few notes, and a less-than violent, push and shove pit started up. Just like they’ve performed it live recently, ‘All My Life’ was incredible, with Grohl busting out his HUGE scream for the end of the song. Overall a great start, despite the disappointment of the band not bringing along the red screen from the video.
Next up was ‘There Goes My Hero’, which calmed the crowd down, but still managed to keep up the atmosphere. From that point on the band played ‘Monkey Wrench’, ‘Generator’, ‘Learn to Fly’ and ‘The One’, along with three more tracks off of the new album ‘Low’, ‘Times Like These’ and the exquisite ‘Tired’. The new songs were highly impressive live, and showed that, however much criticism the new album receives, there are some very memorable moments on it.
‘Monkey Wrench’ was a highlight of the evening. After the second chorus Grohl decide to go walk-about. Finding his way to the seating section he stood on the handrails on various sets of stairs and rocked along on his guitar for about five minutes, leaving the band to support from stage. When he finally went back the band launched right into the shouting tirade that comes after the chorus, a show of energy that pretty much summed up the whole evening.
After the usual fake ending the band came out with an extra long ‘Everlong’ (fittingly I guess), and ‘Breakout’ and ‘Aurora’, not in that order…possibly. ‘Breakout’ however was possibly the best track of the night. Grohl teased the crowd singing along, and the band stopped playing twice, just so that they could keep the song their own, one word- legends.
So the concert- brilliant. Both bands played their roles to perfection, with Grohl goofing around with the crowd, and Cave In just inexplicably ruling, well according to me anyway. Safe to say however much the new album gets slated, the Foo Fighters still have their live performances to show just how good they are, or were, but I’ll try not to be cynical. The night was one with an explosive rock feel, and I left it in the best of moods- two bands on form, and two bands with great music, not much more else to ask for.
The 411: If they go anyway near you…within…say…half a country- go see them, the Foo Fighters literally to ‘rock’ live.
