177. Foo Fighters / The Colour And The Shape. 1997. 5/5.

The Foo Fighters eponymous debut album was, as most of you will know, almost completely recorded by Dave Grohl himself, and though released as the band’s first album, the band at that time didn’t actually exist. That’s why when it came to writing and recording the next album, “The Colour and the Shape”, that the band considered it to be their first album. The band, with Pat Smear on guitar, Nate Mendel on bass and William Goldsmith on drums, had been on tour for some time which had allowed them to become close and find their groove together. When they first entered the studio to write and record however, things didn’t go according to plan. They spent four weeks recording and re-recording the songs they had written, and by the time they took a break over Christmas, Grohl’s overwhelming disappointment in the tracks was obvious. In fact, it was more than that, as it turned out.
The band relocated to Hollywood two months later, though without drummer William Goldsmith, who was told he wouldn’t be required at that time. It is very much worth watching the Foo Fighters documentary “Back and Forth” to see the full story play out, but in essence, Dave went through song by song and re-recorded all of the drum tracks on the album without telling William what he was doing. Now, that’s a dick move, even for the drummer of Nirvana. Grohl’s explanation is understandable to a point, that he felt William just didn’t have the song the way he wanted it, and that’s hard to argue. But maybe telling him from the outset that he needed to have the songs sound the way he wanted them would have been the best way to go about it. In the end it was Nate who told William what had been going on, and the eventual conversation saw Dave saying he still wanted William to be the touring drummer but that he wouldn’t be playing on the album, and William deciding that if that was the case he didn’t want to be in the band anymore. Tense times.
This wasn’t the band’s only problem. Not only were they going overtime in delivering the album to the record company, they were also well over budget because of the time spent in the studio getting everything to their standard. The pressure was being applied, and with the drama going on around them there must have been times when the embers wondered if they would be able to complete the project with any sort of success.

One of the big differences on this album from the first album was that there was a lot of inward reflection when it came to the lyric writing for this album - but my intention here is not to go through each track and recount what each song is about. That has been done elsewhere, and if you are interested in that then it is worth checking out. Some people are intuitively interested in each nuance of each lyric of a band, and others only care about listening to them and singing along with them. Suffice to say that Dave has said that it reflects a psych analysts' session, and that he used to songs in that manner to look inside and purge the things he was feeling at the time. It seems fair to say that the subject matter of the songs here is deeper and more meaningful than much of the lyrics from the debut.
The songs though have a similar but more mature sound as those on the first album. The Foo Fighters have an amazing knack of being able to mix quiet periods with clear guitars in their songs in bursting them up with distortion and screams without destroying the essence of the song or turning anyone off the music. This was apparent on the previous album, but comes further into the case here on “The Colour and the Shape”. There are songs that do stay in the quieter sphere for the majority of the track, and others that stay in the aggressiveness for most of the track, but many who combine parts of both.
“February Stars” is a triumph, though as much as I am able to admire the song itself it is one I will never listen to unless I am actually listening to the album itself. But its place on the album is unquestioned and is a centre piece of how the band’s writing had developed since the previous album. The quiet songs find their place nicely in the track list, songs such as “See You” and “Walking After You”, and the slow burn build of the final track “New Way Home” which goes from the quiet and reflective to the hard core departure at the end, a great way to complete the album.
Then you have the heavy punk like opening of “Monkey Wrench”, the first song off the album, and one which gets the joint jumping from the outset. Dave’s vocal qualities combine at their best here with the hard rocking guitars, especially his great chant come scream through the back half of the track. It’s a beauty, and a great song to boot. This is followed by “Hey, Johnny Park!” which remains in my top five Foo Fighters songs. Apart from “Everlong”, I still think this is the perfect song to play that encompasses everything that is great about the band. The great drum and riff opening to the song, the lull into the clear guitar and wonderful vocal qualities of Dave, and the ability of the song to morph from the quiet and reflective to the harder more energetic qualities of the band’s music. This song has everything that makes the Foo Fighters who they are, and I never get tired of listening to it.
How about the three songs that follow, with “My Poor Brain” that is almost Nirvana-like with how hard Dave is hitting the drums and riding high on the chorus. Then “Wind Up” which Dave really gets into his work on the vocals between his harder side and into the screaming side. And finally “Up in Arms” that goes from the slow and quiet into the fast and frantic. Great stuff. I love the way this song builds into itself and then seems to get faster all the way through. Brilliant. Then we have “My Hero”, a song that has been used in any number of movies and ads and campaigns over the years since as the catchphrase to any hero that is needed to be categorised as such. It has been one of the bands most popular songs throughout their years, and while I like it, it does rate anywhere near that high for me in regards to their great songs. And there is more of the punk attitude in the hard hitting and screaming of “Enough Space”
It is a testament to the band that they are able to write and perform such an amazing range of songs without seeming to turn off their fans. Being able to mix “Monkey Wrench” and “February Stars” on the same album without backlash is quite a monumental achievement. Being able to go from the loud and raucous “Enough Space” into the quiet and babbling brook like tones of “February Stars” and then into the spine tingling magnificence of “Everlong” without even making the listener question what is going on is a mark of genius.
I don’t think it would be too bold a statement to suggest that “Everlong” is the best song that has been written in any genre of music in the last 25 years. It is the perfect song in regards to Foo Fighters linking their past and their future. It combines all of the pent up and built up aggression and energy of Grohl’s early music and the first album, and the reflective way the band has evolved in their song writing on this album. The emotion from the very beginning of the track seeps the whole way through, and Dave’s vocals are just perfect throughout. But for me, it is the drumming that is the understated star of the track, from the initial 16/4 timing through to the mixed drum fills prior to the chorus beginning and then the whole nuance of their presence in the entire song. For me they make this song as great as it is. And I encourage everyone to concentrate on just the drums the next time you listen to the song, just to see if you can understand what I mean... like... right now.

I bought the debut album the week it came out, and loved it from the start. It had the kind of energy and fun that, at that time of my life, I not only wanted but needed. I also bought this album in the first week it was released. I remember catching the train home from Utopia Records to Erskineville, and going inside and immediately putting the CD on my stereo. By now I’d heard the single “Monkey Wrench”, so it was what followed it that interested me. And I wasn’t disappointed, as such. Those slower songs threw me for a loop on the first few listens, and the more raucous songs intrigued me. Eventually it was having the album on a loop in my car on the way to and on the way home from work for a couple of weeks that dragged me in and gave me the chance to take it all the pieces of “The Colour and the Shape”. Because, as has been confirmed by the band in the years since, the design of the songs, and where they fit on the album and how they connect to those songs around them, is a deliberate piece of art. And after a while you can hear that, and understand the pattern as it is pieced together.
And I played this album to death at the time it was released. It appealed to everyone – family, friends, customers at work, passers-by on the road as I drove along. It was, and is, an album that I could put on and would be met by approval from most of the people in the vicinity. And that is probably its greatest asset. People know Nirvana when you put it on, but it isn’t universally loved. My kids generally wonder what I see in it sometimes. But in the main everyone knows and enjoys Foo Fighters and especially this album.
I was fortunate enough to see the band on the tour following this album, and a great concert it was. We saw newly instated drummer Taylor Hawkins, who smashed up the night... apart from “Everlong”, which he seemed to want to play too fast and he didn’t get quite right. It was the only time I ever saw him stuff up on the kit, and though he didn’t actually play on this album, it was still the first thing I went to on the news of his sad passing. Even at this point, this was a band that was still building, with the pieces of the band still being put together, and they weren’t the finished product just yet. But this remains my favourite album by the band, with songs that still reverberate through time, that are as important today as they were on the day this was released all those years ago.