Released recently, along with their latest (and best of their career, in my opinion) album 'Wasting Light' comes 'Back And Forth', a look back at the 16 year history of Foo Fighters, from the early days when Dave Grohl was in Nirvana, up till present day. And while it's an at times fascinating look at the band, things really do tail off towards the end.
I've always liked the Foo's, but never exactly been an expert on them. Obviously, I knew Dave Grohl was originally a drummer, and was in Nirvana, and I knew there had been a lineup change or two over the years, but the things I didn't know totally outweighed what I did.
The film starts talking about Grohl's time in Nirvana, briefly touching on Kurt Cobain's struggle with celebrity that led to a drug overdose and his eventual suicide in May 1994. After this it took some time for Grohl to want to play music again, and he didn't want to play drums, so he recorded some song under the name Foo Fighters and enlisted Nate Mendel and William Goldsmith from Sunny Day Real Estate and Pat Smear to play as a band.
The rest is history, and now everyone knows who the Foo Fighters are, one of, if not THE, biggest rock band in the world. But what I didn't know what was the tension and the drama that went on behind the scenes. At one point, the band almost seemed to have a revolving door of members, and the reasons some of them left (or were asked to leave) were quite dodgy.
Another thing that was mentioned I didn't know about was Taylor Hawkin's heroin overdose, really took me by surprise as he always seems like a mellow, laid back guy. But, it wasn't all miserable revelations - the one that really got me was how close Grohl was to becoming the drummer in Tom Petty's band after Cobain died!
But for all the interesting revelations and honest manner in which it was approached, the longer the film went on, the more seemed to be skimmed over. The last two albums before 'Wasting Light' were mentioned briefly, and I was hoping for a look at some of the bands side projects to be looked at (e.g. Grohl's involvement with Queens Of The Stone Age, Probot, etc. or Hawkin's Coattail Riders) but only a brief mention of Queens was given.
I liked how they gave a bit of time to how monumental their gigs at Wembley Stadium were, but the guest appearances from John Paul Jones (which could have led nicely into a bit about Them Crooked Vultures) and Jimmy Page weren't even mentioned, even though they must have been a career highlight.
After that the film just turns into a making of piece about 'Wasting Light' really, about how the songs were made, who guested, etc. Not to say that wasn't watchable, but there was so much more the film could have said, but I guess in the end it was just made to promote the album, hence the name 'Back And Forth', which is the name of one of the songs from said album.
If you're a big fan of the band, you'll probably love it, but I was just left disappointed that a story as interesting as this ended up as a promotional piece.
***
Starts with some fascinating revelations, but ends up as a glorified 'making of' the latest album. A shame.
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