Amazon.com Review: Having commemorated their tenth anniversary with a year-plus run commencing with In Your Honor (a double album the New York Times called an "unexpected magnum opus"), sold out rock arena shows and a toned down intimate theater trek, and a headlining gig at London's Hyde Park for a crowd of 85,000, the question looms larger than any in the Foo Fighters' career to date: What do they do for an encore?!? The answer comes in the form of "The Pretender," the first single from the band's sixth studio album Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace, out on Roswell/RCA. Produced by Gil Norton, who last worked with the band on 1997's double-platinum The Colour and The Shape (recently reissued in deluxe 10th anniversary form), Dave Grohl, bassist Nate Mendel, drummer Taylor Hawkins and guitarist Chris Shiflett have crafted a 12-track milestone that showcases and reconciles the band's every strength and sensibility in the most complex and confident Foo Fighters album to date.
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More from Foo Fighters
Skin and Bones
The Colour and the Shape
In Your Honor
There Is Nothing Left to Lose
One by One
Foo Fighters
In 1997, Foo Fighters teamed with alt-rock production cornerstone Gil Norton to make their best album, The Colour and the Shape. Ten years later, they've regrouped with Norton for a disc that's more sophisticated and diverse, if a tad less rockin'. The curveballs include "Stranger Things Have Happened," a solo soul-searcher where leader Dave Grohl's accompanied by just his acoustic guitar and a ticking metronome, and "Ballad of the Beaconsfield Miners," an acoustic guitar duet for Grohl and guest virtuoso Kaki King. Plus "Summers End" tickles the Foos' classic-rock fetish with a dead-on Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young arrangement. There's still enough of the intense, snarling power-pop that's Foo Fighters' longtime forte. "The Pretender," "Erase/Replace," and "Long Road to Ruin" combine sheer thrust, zeal, and melody like no other group currently on the charts. Yet the finale, "Home," makes its clear that this is a changed band--or, at least, that Grohl's a changed man. With only his piano for company, Grohl's pleading voice reveals fragile layers of insecurity and loneliness as he sings "all I want is to be home." Seems this rock & roll road warrior's mellowed some, albeit without compromising Foo Fighters' vitality. --Ted Drozdowski
Artist: Foo Fighters |
Album: The Colour and the Shape |
Label: RCA |
Type: Audio CD |
Release Date: 2007-07-10 |
Amazon.com Price: $7.14 |
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Amazon.com Review:
Album Description: Includes the bonus tracks Requiem, Drive Me Wild, Down In The Park, Baker St, Dear Lover and Color & Shape.Amazon.co.ukA major criticism of the Foo Fighters' self-titled debut was its supposed lack of passion despite the well-crafted songs and well-crafted rock. This time out, if it's wreckage you want, it's wreckage you get. The Colour and the Shape grows deeper the more it's played, with the band's ripping power is more than matched by Dave Grohl's fascinating examinations of pain and divorce. There is even a convincing long slow ballad, "November Stars", whose intensity should win over doubters. If that doesn't work, then the screaming "My Hero" will.--Rickey Wright
Artist: Foo Fighters |
Album: Skin and Bones |
Label: RCA |
Type: Audio CD |
Release Date: 2006-11-07 |
Amazon.com Price: $5.97 |
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Amazon.com Review: Album DetailsJapanese Limited Edition Issue of the Album Classic in a Deluxe, Miniaturized LP Sleeve Replica of the Original Vinyl Album Artwork.From Amazon.co.ukHere's Dave Grohl as you've seldom seen him before: not just live, but as the title Skin And Bones may hint, stripped down to his acoustic core. Well actually, not quite. Rather than just Grohl and a six-string, this collection--recorded at the Pantages Theatre in Los Angeles--harks back to the ensemble feel of Nirvana's 1994 album Unplugged in New York, familiar songs rebuilt by the Foos and a cast of musicians including violinist Petra Haden, keyboardist Rami Jaffee, and even a member of that now legendary Nirvana session, Pat Smear. Stripped of the anthemic breeziness and solid, muscular riffing that have become Foo trademarks, Skin And Bones relies more on prettifying the arrangements with strings, shakers, and slow splashes of cymbal, and occasionally uncovering new levels of pathos beneath the sweat and grit. "Walking After You" feels custom-written for this format, while the crescendos of "My Hero" gain a little more humanity in this more intimate setting. And when the bigger hits come, Grohl makes up for the absence of feedback and fireworks with sheer frontman charisma, summoning up some throaty Springsteen emotiveness on "Best of You" and climaxing with a heroic "Everlong." --Louis Pattison