The conversation touched on the health of guitarist Pat Smear, who has been recovering from a broken leg. While Grohl famously used a “throne” to perform after his own leg injury years ago, he revealed that “I don’t think he wanted to use the throne.” Instead, Smear has been keeping spirits high during his recovery. Grohl joked, “He was sending me pictures of like tiki bars where he could sort of like prop up on a stool and drink fruity cocktails.” Despite the injury, the outlook is positive for their upcoming dates: “I think by the time we start hitting the road, he’ll be up to speed. He’ll be good.”
Grohl also shared a hilarious story regarding his childhood obsession with Star Wars. “Star Wars came out when I was seven years old and I was obsessed,” he recalled. “I wanted a Darth Vader mask so badly but we didn’t have any money.” Decades later, as a successful rock star, he finally fulfilled that dream for Halloween, only to face a practical hurdle. “I quickly realized I can’t drink beer through this mask,” Grohl laughed.
The resulting struggle led to a painful morning-after discovery. “I would take the whole thing off, chug a beer, put the whole thing back on,” he explained, but the elastic band proved hazardous. “The next morning, I woke up and my nose was bruised because the more I drank, I would put the face thing back on and it would like slap me in the face. And so that’s why Darth Vader breathed that way.”
Regarding their longevity, Grohl noted that they “only make records when we feel like it’s time to make a record.” Despite this organic approach, he admitted “they’re kind of on a consistent cycle though. It’s once every three years, pretty much for 30 years.” When the spark hits, “we just start writing stuff and we get in the studio, start playing around. And then once it sounds like it’s an album, then it happens pretty quickly.”
Looking ahead to their massive show at Liverpool’s Anfield Stadium, Grohl reached out to local legend Paul McCartney. “When I first found out we were doing that gig, I let him know,” Grohl said. McCartney’s blessing was immediate: “He was like, ‘oh, you’re going to have a blast. It’ll be amazing.’ Yeah, Liverpool’s awesome. That place is great.”
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