Dave Grohl says performing in Tasmania feels like “coming over to a friend’s house for a beer” as the Foo Fighters prepare for a massive one-off Australian concert tomorrow night.
The rock legend told Triple M the band is flying in for just 48 hours to play UTAS Stadium in Launceston.
“We’re gonna take a nap, we’re gonna jump on stage and blast it out for a couple hours, three hours whatever and then come home and get back in our sweatpants and watch TV,” Grohl said.
The frontman revealed the exclusive gig was born out of a casual band meeting.
“We have a very special relationship with Tasmania, as we do with all of Australia,” he said.
“We have these little meetings sometimes where the band sits around at the studio with all of our team and we think of fun stuff to do and, you know, all roads lead to Australia.”
“And so we sat and we looked at the calendar and we’re like well let’s pop down for a gig.”
Grohl also spoke at length about the band’s connection to the Beaconsfield mine disaster, where Tasmanian miners Brant Webb and Todd Russell were trapped underground for two weeks in 2006.
He said learning the pair had listened to Foo Fighters music while awaiting rescue marked a turning point for him.
“To hear that someone on the other side of the planet finds comfort in a song that you’ve written, that you’ve literally written on the back of a piece of paper that was next to the microphone, that was a huge revelation for me,” he said.
Grohl later wrote an instrumental track called Ballad of the Beaconsfield Miners specifically for Webb, after meeting him at a Sydney Opera House show.
He told Triple M he nearly forgot to include it on the band’s next album.
“I was like, oh s–t, I promised that miner guy to put this song on a record,” he said.
“I’m glad that I did and I still play it to this day. It’s one of my favourite things that I’ve ever written.”
“It’s one of those songs that it really, it means a lot to me and it was written for the right reasons.”
The 57-year-old traced his love affair with Australia back to touring with Nirvana in 1992.
Grohl said he first played Tasmania around 1998 and again in 2015, joking his clearest memory was visiting MONA – which he dubbed the “poop museum”.
Asked if the band might take the Spirit of Tasmania ferry across the Bass Strait, Grohl kept it playful.
“I’ve never been one to take the easy way,” he said.
“If we have the time, maybe we’ll do that. Maybe we’ll play on the ferry as well. Who knows?”
The Foo Fighters will play to about 26,000 fans at UTAS Stadium in Launceston tomorrow night.
