Foo Fighters
Echoes, Silence, Patience and Grace

THE REVIEW

"In your honor", the previous work by Foo Fighters, was probably the best American music album of the 2000s along with "R" by Queens of the Stone Age and the first by Kings of Leon, with its simple and powerful chords and the mix of nearly stoner distortions and accessible melodies. The success of that album and the single "Best of you" greatly benefited the Foo, who perhaps hadn't seen a real success since 1999, from "Learn to Fly" or "Next Year", and so Dave Grohl returned to be cited as a living legend of rock'n'roll - which he indeed is - and his band as a guardian deity of the current American music scene.

Since "In your honor", from the Grammys, the MTV Awards, etc., two years have passed, and here emerges on the horizon a new work by Grohl and company, "Echoes, Silence, Patience and Grace", which they worked on for just 3 weeks, with rougher and more direct production standards, to highlight the raw and genuine character of the compositions. And if the initial, extremely powerful "The Pretender" - despite the arpeggio that's a direct match to that of "Stairway to Heaven" - could very well have been on the rock record of "In your honor", already from the second track, "Let it die", dedicated to Kurt Cobain, new acoustic guitars appear, predominant throughout the song and only swept away in the chorus by Dave's usual flashy distortion. And so it happens for the subsequent tracks, like "Stranger Things Have Happened" or "Summer's End", with a bluesy pace, and the mind of the (knowledgeable) listener cannot help but fly to the electro-acoustic composition method used by Led Zeppelin in "Over the hills and so far away" or "Ramble on", without the Foo obviously reaching those heights. But then, always the same knowledgeable listener will ask, what happened to the good old Foo power pop songs? They're still there, don't worry, just in fewer numbers: "Long Way To Ruin", with the distorted arpeggio reminiscent of Pearl Jam, and the anti-emo invective of "Cheers Up, Boys, Your Make Up Is Running", to tell us that the fun'n'roll side of the Seattle band is still alive, just a little dormant. In conclusion, "Home", a ballad with a lot of piano accompanying Grohl's low and lilting voice. What to say? An ugly album? Certainly not, quite the opposite. Very enjoyable, but perhaps a bit flat: trying to redo "Led Zeppelin III", nowadays, is not exactly ideal, but the Foo have talent, and Dave Grohl is indeed a living legend of rock'n'roll, so after all, we can forgive them. If nothing else, because they'll always give us some beautiful songs. Just hoping that in the next album they don't decide to dive into the '80s and try to recreate "Girls Girls Girls". That would be pathetic. Peace.