44 KERRANG!
Name who was the de facto tour manager,
so I had a level of responsibility in that band
that kept me somewhat on the straight and
narrow. When I joined the Foo Fighters it took
me a little while to get my bearings. I got a
little crazy for a while there!”
Was it a long adjustment period?
“There was a learning curve, for sure. I think
it did take me a while to find my feet, and
in some ways it took me a really long time.
For one thing, it took a few years for me to
actually play on a record. Thinking back,
those years are actually kind of fuzzy. But I did
enjoy them.”
Foo Fighters are one of the few rock bands
that can play stadiums the world over.
What’s the secret of the band’s appeal?
“I don’t know that it’s any specific one thing,
but I think you have to credit a lot of it to
Dave [Grohl] and his personality. People love
that dude. I think he represents something
to a lot of people out there. He has that gift
that means he can make 80,000 people feel
like they’re his best friend. He has that kind of
magic, that x-factor thing. I don’t know how
you define that, or explain that. On top of
that, we’ve consistently put out records every
couple of years. There’s never been a point
where we’ve taken 10 years off because we all
fucking hate each other and have broken up.
Or we’ve all gone off and made reggae records,
or whatever. We go out on the road and we
play. There’s never been a huge diversion from
consistently doing the work. And for people of
a certain age when Nevermind came out, our
band triggers an emotion in them. And now
they bring their kids to the shows.”
Is it true that Foo Fighters earnings are split
equally between band members?
“(Laughs) I can’t get
into that too much, but
it is beyond fair.”
Foo Fighters’ line-up is
uncommonly consistent.
How do you manage to
keep things sweet?
“It’s easy with
the Foo Fighters
because it’s Dave’s
band. He’s gonna
make the decision
about whatever and
everybody goes into
it knowing that without really questioning it.
You have to give him credit because it works. It
also removes that whole thing of people sitting
down, having a vote and arguing about shit.
That doesn’t happen. In that sense it’s easier
than getting five or six people on the same
page. That would be difficult.”
Tell us about your album, Hard Lessons.
“It’s funny for me because it gets presented
as ‘the guy from the Foo Fighters makes a
country record,’ and I really don’t think of it
that way. When compared to the other solo
stuff that I’ve done, the new record is more
representative of a lot of the stuff that I like.
Country music is certainly a huge influence –
I love the instrumentation, the pedal steel guitar
and all that stuff – but to me, Hard Lessons
is more a mish-mash of the Stones and The
Replacements and Social Distortion and Merle
Haggard. All of that stuff. I don’t want people
to think that I think that it’s a country record,
because I don’t.”
As part of an enormous band, do you care
about your solo work escaping that shadow?
“I do have goals for it, but they’re much smaller.
I did a tour a couple of months ago, which
was fucking perfect. It was 200 to 400-capacity
rooms and whatever room I’m playing, I want to
be able to sell the tickets; to be self-sufficient. I
want there to be enough people who give a shit
about it for me to make records and play shows.
I don’t want it to be some kind of vanity thing.”
When you’re playing these clubs, are you
touring in a bus or a van?
“In a van.”
Crikey!
“Let me tell you, that UK tour we did broke my
band up, I swear to God! Things were heading
that way anyway, because when we went to [the
music convention] South
By Southwest [in Austin]
things were starting to
go awry. There was a lot
of complaining going on.
And then on the heels of
that we came over here
and did what was hands
down the best solo tour I’ve
ever done, but it was also
a grind. It was late nights,
early mornings, a lot of long
drives and a lot of flying.
And things unravelled. It’s
my thing, so I’ll endure
that shit and enjoy it. But everybody else who’s
doing it for $200 a night is possibly getting a lot
less out of it. And to be honest, I understand
that. I don’t want to throw anyone under the
bus, but that unit no longer exists.”
What’s the hardest lesson you’ve ever learned?
“Getting my ass chewed out by my band in
Austin! I sucked up a lot of shit, because
I was thinking that if I told them all to go fuck
themselves it would fuck up the shows that we
had booked to play. So I had to be an adult and
bite my tongue to get through it. For me that’s
the hardest thing in the world.”
You should try complaining more in the Foo
Fighters, to see how that works out for you...
“I know, right! Put it this way, I think I have quite
a lot to learn about being a band leader!”
CHRIS SHIFLETT’S new ALBUM HARD
LESSONS IS out NOW on EAST BEACH
RECORDS & TAPES/THIRTY TIGERS
“I DON’T WANT
MY SOLO STUFF
TO BE SOME
VANITY THING”
CHRIS SHIFLETT
Foo Fighters, back in
the day: wet behind the
ears... yeah, sorry
No Use For A Name:
especially not now, as they
are no longer a band
Foo Fighters: annoying
when the bus driver leaves
without you, isn’t it?
‘Hi, we’re Me First And The
Gimme Gimmes and we’ll be
your waiters tonight...’