Foo Fighters frontman and iconic drummer of Nirvana Dave Grohl was on the Bon Appétit Foodcast recently to promote his new Backbeat BBQ company. During the show, Grohl shared a story about how he finished a song that he had on the Foo Fighters backburner and was paid big money by his bandmates in return for it. Alternative Nation transcribed Grohl’s comments.
Grohl: There was this one song, it was called Seven Corners that we had never finished. We recorded it for every record for twenty years and never finished it and I’m like: “Hey guys, let’s just do Seven Corners.” Taylor [Hawkins] was like: “there is no way you will finish it” and I’m like: “I’ll fucking finish it”. They promised me each a thousand dollars if I could finish it and I said: “I’ll fucking finish it.”
Host: Abso-fucking-lutely!
Grohl: Whether it’s good or not doesn’t even matter, it’s a free EP, I don’t care!
Grohl continues:
Grohl: So I finish it. We had one more European run after that and the first day we get our per diems for that two-week long trip. That per diem for the whole trip was like, a thousand dollars. The tour manager walks in and goes: “Hey everybody, here is your per diem” and Taylor was like: [snapping sound] “Everybody has to give their per diem to Dave because he finished “Seven Corners.” Our bass player, Nate [Mendel] was like: “well, I actually bought you something”.
Host: Hmm.
Grohl: When I came home there was a fucking Big Green Egg grill there
Host: Wow.
Grohl: So that’s how I started doing barbecue.
During the same show, the Foo Fighters frontman shared a story about how drinking too much coffee made him think he was losing his mind, and he said it made him feel like he was on crack cocaine. Alternative Nation transcribed Grohl’s comments.
Grohl: I don’t know if you’re familiar but there once was this YouTube video that was called Fresh Pots, which has millions and millions of views and I’ll tell you why. I was in this band called Them Crooked Vultures with Josh Homme from Queens of the Stone Age and John Paul Jones from Led Zeppelin. So we were making that record and I was drinking so much coffee, I was actually making two records and having my second child at the same time. So I was sleeping four hours a night, I’m an insomniac, I was sleeping four hours a night. I’d not sleep and I’d drink a pot of coffee by myself. Following this, I would go to the studio and drink another pot of coffee, working on this Foo Fighters thing. In between coffee, I would drink this Tejevas stuff. It’s like tea, free based tea.
Host: Hot coffee, cold tea,
Grohl: Hot coffee and cold tea in between, then I would have another pot, go to the Vultures studio and drink another pot so in a day I was drinking – no exaggeration, three to four pots of coffee. I would then get home from the studio at one o’ clock in the morning and be like: “why can’t I sleep?” and I would try to fucking sleep for four hours, wake up and do it all again.
Grohl continues:
Grohl: So, while I was drinking all that coffee, this friend of ours is making a documentary of us making the record. So he was getting all of this on film and I was losing my fucking mind, I was spazzing out hardcore.
Host: Were your eyes twitching?
Grohl: No, I felt like I was on crack like I was out of my fucking mind.
