Sweet Jesus, I hate the Foo Fighters (by popular demand).

It has come to my attention that my blog is very serious. Despite my strong feelings on certain issues, I do realize that occasionally it doesn’t hurt to lighten things up a bit, give the readers a breath of fresh air by discussing something trivial. This…is not that blog. This is the most seriously important and urgent post I have yet written. Seriously.

I hate the Foo Fighters. I HATE THEM. I want them sterilized immediately. Listening to them makes me want to sterilize myself; I can’t in good conscience bring a child into this world if they will share space with the Foo Fighters. I would burn every single one of their CDs I could get my hands on, but that would require buying them, and consequently supporting them (and I’m not a mongoloid like those assholes who bought Dixie Chicks CDs en masse to do just that). I can’t get away from them. They are god damn everywhere. KROQ, the massive Clear Channel modern-rock station in LA, plays them roughly three times an hour. I listen to the radio all day at my job, so when the first chords of “Skin and Bones” or “The Pretender” start choking my environment, I switch over to Indie 103.1, a much smaller independent station dedicated to playing all the bands KROQ won’t touch. Three songs into that set I get slapped across the face with “Best of You” or “Miracle.” “What the fuck?,” I ask myself. Indie just played The Charlatans UK, Siouxsie and the Banshees, and Elvis Costello, and then they threw the muh-fuckin Foo Fighters in there?? “This has to be a god damn conspiracy,” I mumble to my co-workers, “this can’t honestly be happening to me.” But they shrug me off like the lunatic I am. When I get home, I go to the KROQ website in the hopes of getting some answers, so I can alleviate my Lewis Black-like hysteria. I type in kroq.com, and instantly am greeted with the ass-ugly face of David “Dave” Grohl, and the rest of the Foo (can anyone name another member of the band? I’ll give you five dollars for one member. One. And don’t be a bitch and Wikipedia it or something, I mean off the top of your head). The entire intro page to the KROQ website is a giant photo of the band, with some advertisement for a breakfast show that a “lucky” fan can partake in. Like Oliver Stone, I’m beginning to believe that the Foo’s management company owns Clear Channel or something, because there must be some JFK cover-up going on here regarding the power and influence of this band.

At this point I decide to get so belligerently hammered I can’t feel feelings any more. I meet my friends at a local dive, and guess what is fucking playing as we walk in. No really guess. I throw back three (3) shots of Patron, and mumble to my friends how much I hate the Foo Fighters, but they shrug me off like the lunatic that I am. What happens next blows my mind. One female friend of mine chastises me because she claims to like them. “Let me guess,” I say, “you are going to throw ‘Everlong’ at me.” Whenever someone defends the Foo they always cite Everlong as an example of their brilliant song writing prowess. Ten minutes later, a dude has set up an acoustic guitar and amp in the middle of the bar. There is going to be some live entertainment. His first song…I shit you not…Everlong. Everybody around me starts to coo (this is a college bar). Several couples begin to make out furiously. I grab the nearest spoon and shove it up my ass. Strangely, that feels better.

Why this much hatred you ask? They aren’t that bad, and David “Dave” Grohl seems like a cool guy. I might actually like the Foo Fighters, were they not the most OVERRATED BAND IN THE HISTORY OF POPULAR MUSIC. Yeah, I love the fact that these guys have been together for thirteen years, and in all that time they have written basically one song. I love that David “Dave” Grohl capitalized on his Nirvana years, and the death of Kurt Cobain, to launch the instant success of his Foo Fighters project (and it seems that ever since, rock critics feel like criticizing the Foo is pissing on Kurt’s grave or something). I love the fact that every single time they come out with a new album, they are pretty much guaranteed a Grammy, unlimited press coverage, unprecedented rotation on every radio station in the world, and breakfast with a KROQ listener, even if that album completely sucks balls. Why? KROQ loves to suck them off so much, and I’m not the only one who notices. Comedian Bobby Slayton was a guest on the Kevin and Bean morning show. In his typical style, he was riffing with the guys very quickly, and when they asked him why he talks so fast, he said, “Well on your show I never know when you are going to cut me off for a commercial, or a Foo Fighters song, so I have to get as much material out while I can”.

They haven’t developed as musicians at all. The same crap they spewed out this year could have come out in ’95. But, you say, maybe they embody the punk spirit of accessible music, and don’t want to seem like snobs by producing a song that doesn’t sound like it was written by a second grader on his recorder. A: good Punk music is catchy, which the Foo are completely not, and 2: people with contempt for music shouldn’t make a living as musicians. And just so you know that I’m not just a complete music snob (which I am), the Foo Fighters are also bad people. For years, the guys actively championed an organization called Alive and Well, which has dedicated itself to denying the link between HIV and AIDS. They even lent their songs to a documentary produced by Alive and Well, called The Other Side of AIDS, which alarmed the medical community with its brash denial of evidence of the lethality of HIV. After public pressure, the band dropped Alive and Well from their list of supported organizations.

When it comes down to it, I just want them to go away. Their entire persona is that of a Punk band, and there could not be a more text-book definition of corporate rock in all rock history. I am sick of their tremendous stature amongst the alternative community, while bands that are a thousand times more edgy and talented get brushed aside. But I don’t want to pick on them exclusively. Let me throw out some other bands that make me pass out from hatred.

The Decemberists. Oh Christ. What a pussy ass, bland, potato chip, bubble bath, bunch of nonsense. These guys are a manila folder taped to a white wall. I LOVED when Stephen Colbert challenged Decemberist guitarist Chris Funk to a guitar solo competition (Stephen Colbert is a subtle genius, so maybe this was his intention), but feigning a wrist injury, he matched Christ Funk with his substitution, Peter Frampton, who, of course, completely obliterated Funk. The Decemberists have never even heard of the concept of a guitar solo, so God bless Colbert for backing them into that corner.

She Wants Revenge. Yeah, I love talk-singing. I love Interpol rip-offs, who, in-turn, are ripping off Joy Division, so She Wants Revenge are 2nd degree fakers, and not good fakers at that (which Interpol manages to be). I love the basic synth beat of duh, duh duh, duh, duh, duh, duh duh, duh, duh, duh. Isn’t that beat number one? And don’t stop with lyrics like: “…her popsicle melts, she’s in the bathroom, she pleasures herself,” and, “I want to hold you close, I want to fucking tear you apart.” Vomit.

The Polyphonic Spree…too easy.

and finally, yes I’m about to do this, The Police. Listen you bastards, you had one “good” album and broke up because you couldn’t stand each other. Good…I can’t stand you either. People couldn’t fucking let you go after that, and now I have to deal with twenty five-year-old morons (also Genesis and Supertramp fans) who lose their mind with the idea of a Police reunion. The fact that “Roxanne” was used so dramatically in Moulin Rouge ruined that movie for me. I would rather be involved in a spoon train with Dick Cheney, AND his lesbian daughter, than listen to Sting’s (Gordon Sumner’s) whiny ass Police voice. UB40 was a better white Reggae band, you hacks.

Someone brilliant once said, “After silence, that which comes closest to expressing the inexpressible, is music.” Maybe these bands should have picked the first option.

More to come. Thanks for caring.

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Published:
March 27, 2008 / 4:42 pm
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