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 revealed what he put Aspirin pills in his wallet for chest pains before playing a gig for the White House during Barack Obama’s first year in office on the Fourth of July. Grohl had heard that if you took an Aspirin when having a heart attack, it could save your life, and he was having chest pains at the time. He ultimately discovered the pain was from drinking too much coffee. Alternative Nation transcribed Grohl’s comments.
Host: Well, explain that to me.
Grohl: Sure!
Host: How and when did that happen?
Grohl: It actually happened right before the Foo Fighters were playing at the White House on the Fourth of July.
Host: Oh wow, how about that.
Grohl: This is [Barack] Obama’s first year in office, the Foo Fighters were invited to play on the south lawn on the Fourth of July. Which, I was like, I am so doing this, not only because we are being asked by the president and not only because it’s Obama but I don’t know if you used to remember what used to happen on the Fourth of July on the mall, the Rock Against Reagan shows?
Host: Sure, right.
Grohl: In the mid-Eighties, they had these Rock Against Reagan shows over by the Lincoln Memorial and all the punk rockers would come out and there would be fifteen punk rockers and that was the Fourth of July. So here I am, thirty years later, playing at the White House for the first African American president, who we all think is rad on the south lawn. I got my kids and my mom with me and I’m thinking that this is some full circle shit.
Grohl continues:
Grohl: About two days before we were supposed to go to D.C. I start to get chest pains.
Host: Oh no.
Grohl: I’m like: “holy fuck, I’m dying.” So I just put some Bayer aspirin in my wallet.
Host: Because you read about aspirin and heart attack?
Grohl: If I have a heart attack I’ll just put this under my tongue and I’ll be fine. So, I put the Bayer in my wallet, we go to D.C. and I’m totally having chest pains.
Host: But did you think about coffee consumption at this point at all?
Grohl: I imagine that it had something to do with that, or stress or the lack of sleep.
During the same show, Grohl 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.
