Review Summary: Dave Grohl yet again does not bring anything completely new to the table, but still manages to come up strong with another solid album.
After the Foo Fighter’s most recent album
In Your Honor, many fans were left wondering where Dave Grohl would take the band with their next release. Would they continue to delve into a foray of acoustic works, or would Dave Grohl choose to churn out a straight up rock album in the vein of the band’s self titled debut and
The Colour And The Shape, which are both often regarded as the band’s two best albums. When the news came out that the producer for
The Colour And The Shape, Gil Norton, would be producing the Foo’s newest effort, it created a bright light upon the eagerly awaited new release. However, a particular Dave Grohl quote spun some unwanted concern about the new album to others. When discussing the upcoming
Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace, Grohl dropped the “It sounds like (band name), but its got a totally new sound!” with his exact statement of “
So the album that we're making sounds like a Foo Fighters album, but it's definitely moving in a few different directions. It's cool man, I love it”. Would Dave Grohl actually bring something new to the table, or stick with the same tried-and-true methods of previous albums?
The debut single
The Pretender is a straight up rocker that is one of the best Foo Fighters songs since 1997. With a strong, eerie clean guitar into, the song quickly bursts into an upbeat, guitar driven song which sounds much more inspired than anything that has been released lately by the Foo Fighters. The slightly varied song structure towards the middle and end add a new element and make
The Pretender an absolutely fantastic song. However, the strength of the single was not found everywhere throughout the album. Many, including myself, were led to believe through
The Pretender that the album would potentially be a balls to the wall rocker. But who were we kidding? This is Dave Grohl we are talking about…
While the album would obviously not be a rock n’ roll blast, Dave Grohl still did not disappoint. Several songs feature a soft/hard/melodic ordeal, such as
Let It Die and
But, Honestly, which end up being two of the best songs on the album. Both tracks feature a primarily soft intro and first few sections of the song, with
Let It Die in particular having a massive feeling that the song is building up to something far bigger than what we are being shown. Both songs explode into endings that show some true life from the band instead of keeping the calm of the song, which hence would keep it lifeless.
Erase/Replace and
Long Road to Ruin, are fine examples of what Dave Grohl can do with mid-tempo rockers. In both cases, he takes what should be vastly boring songs, and manages to somehow step it up and make two solid tracks. The first having a very interesting sound which is not usually found in the Foo Fighters, with some strong lead guitar work throughout the song.
Long Road to Ruin sounds like the typical Foo Fighters song, and yet appears to be the only song on here which follows that formula, enabling the song to feel fairly fresh. The solid guitar solo at the end adds a good element to round out the song.
Towards the end of the album, things start to slow down.
Come Alive is a soft track that is not a bad song, but by no means does it add anything in particular to the album.
Statues is the exact same way, not exactly going anywhere, yet manages to have some enjoyable parts. Luckily Dave Grohl adds some nice lyrics in the lines “
We’re just ordinary people, you and me/Time will turn us into statues, eventually” to give the song a nice touch. But one track towards the end is what we all expected to hear after
The Pretender.
Cheer Up, Boys (Your Make-Up Is Running) is a fun song that is quite possibly the best song on the album, with a remarkably catchy chorus and some very strong guitar work throughout the whole track.
The album rounds out with the closer,
Home, a vapid, deft of life track that seems to have no purpose other than the idea that any song named ‘Home’ would sound right at the end of an album just because of the title of the track. However, the song starts off lifeless, and ends of going nowhere. Listening to the song just makes me feel that the powerful ending of
But, Honestly would have been a far better closer to an overall good album.
Although
Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace is a solid album, it is obvious that Dave Grohl is beginning to scrape the bottom of the barrel for song ideas. With this album, he has left himself seemingly nowhere to go with the band’s sound. The fast rockers were there, the mid-tempos were there, the hybrid-buildup tracks were present, and the soft songs were also there. While Grohl has never dramatically changed his sound, now may be the time, as
Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace could be the Foo Fighter’s last stand.
