Foo Fighters Embark on Next Chapter With ‘But Here We Are’ – Billboard

Great art is so often hewn from struggle. Dave Grohl knows all about it.

Following the 1994 suicide of Kurt Cobain, and the immediate disbanding of Nirvana, the grunge great’s drummer Grohl focused his grief and energies on a new project, Foo Fighters.

A year later, Foo Fighters dropped its self-titled debut album. Grohl sang every line and played every instrument, with the exception of a guitar part on “X-Static”.

The Foos are now members of the Rock And Roll Hall of Fame, inducted in 2022 (Grohl was also elevated as a member of Nirvana, in 2014), and 11 albums deep in a rocking career, one that was ignited by struggle.

Grohl and his Foos have had to pick up their shattered pieces once again following the untimely death last March of their talismanic drummer, Taylor Hawkins. Working through heartbreak, the band reassembled those pieces for But Here We Are, the Foos’ 11th and latest studio album, which dropped at the stroke of midnight.

Produced by years-long collaborator Greg Kurstin, the set is described as a “brutally honest and emotionally raw response” to tragedy, and “the first chapter of the band’s new life.”

Spanning 10 tracks, But Here We Are opens with the first single “Rescued,” which dropped April 19.

Grohl returns to his familiar duties behind the kit on the new LP, though Josh Freese was recently unveiled as the Foos’ full-time drummer, making his live concert debut with the group on May 21 for a performance that included new cut “Show Me How” and the title track. Freese, a veteran studio/touring drummer, has played with acts including Guns N’ Roses, A Perfect Circle, and Nine Inch Nails, was revealed as during a livestream, “Foo Fighters: Preparing Music for Concerts”.

The Foos will rumble through the summer with a full itinerary, including more than a dozen festival appearances at Boston Calling, Sonic Temple, Rock Am Ring, Bonnaroo, Ottawa Bluesfest, Harley-Davidson Homecoming, Fuji Rock, Wildlands, Outside Lands, Jazz Aspen Snowmass, Riot Fest, Sea.Hear.Now, Louder Than Life, Ohana and ACL, as well as a number of North American and international headlining dates.

And Here We Are is the followup to 2021’s Medicine at Midnight, which peaked at No. 3 on the Billboard 200, one of the band’s nine top 10 appearances on the chart, two of which hit No. 1.

Stream it below.