Guns’n’Roses and Foo Fighters bring nostalgia and new songs around the world

Neither Guns’n Roses nor Foo Fighters have yet been at the top of the list of the loudest bands in the world, which, however, does not deprive them of the status of bands that are able to test the fan’s ears for endurance. This week, the American Thunderbolts started and continued their world tours, and Foo Fighters, unlike Guns’n Roses, carry around the world not only nostalgia, but also songs from the latest album.

Axl Rose & Co celebrated the first day of summer with a hurricane rock set at the Etihad Arena in Abu Dhabi. In some ways, the beginning of their new tour can be called exotic, but given how the modern civilized world has mixed up, there are no boundaries for hard rock anymore.

Now Guns’n’Roses are like a band that almost licked the wounds of the nineties. After the global triumph with the double album Use Your Illussion, the exorbitant fame and corresponding lifestyle quarreled the key members of the team. Left virtually alone, Ex Rose began to record an album reflecting his frightening ambitions, which pretty much intrigued everyone.

Chinese Democracy was first called an album that absolutely everyone would need, and after a scandalously long wait, it was defined as a record that would never be released. And both forecasts did not come true: the album was released eight years after the announcement of the start of work on it and the investment of thirteen million dollars in the process, but, to put it mildly, it did not live up to expectations.

All these years, the band did not stop performing in a line-up that was constantly changing, and some stability was outlined only in 2016, when guitarist Slash and bass player Duff McKagan returned to the team. With their return, the fans got a band very similar to the one that drove everyone crazy in the late eighties.

With Guns’n’Roses it is very difficult to predict anything, but judging by the concerts, the musicians clearly enjoy playing with each other. And the first shows of the new tour are no exception. The group now does not look like a team of old nags who are forced to take up the old for financial reasons. All this is of course very retro, but with a twinkle and without laziness.

There are more than thirty songs in the set list and some of them can be called concert rarities. For example, Anything Goes hasn’t been performed since 1988, and Bad Obsession since 1993. Between It’s So Easy, it kicks off the show and the final Paradise City offers an impressive array of big hits like You Could Be Mine, November Rain, Don’t Cry and a generous helping of classic covers from the Stooges, Wings, Velvet Revolvers and more -authorities. Excel’s penetrating squeal seems to be in good shape, Slash’s top hat is in place.

The band will continue their Middle Eastern voyage with a concert in Tel Aviv, and then until the end of July they will sow rock chaos in Europe.

***

The members of the Foo Fighters released an album called But Here We Are at the beginning of a big tour. Working on new songs has become a kind of psychotherapy for the musicians after the shock.

Last March, the band’s drummer Taylor Hawkins died in Bogota. About a dozen chemicals were found in the musician’s body, which could relate to both drugs and illegal substances. However, the cause of death has not yet been named. That evening, the Foo Fighters were supposed to play at a big Colombian festival, and as a result, instead of the group’s set, there was a candlelight vigil in memory of Hawkins. In the summer and autumn of the same year, first in London and then in Los Angeles, two concerts were held in honor of the deceased musician.

There were rumors that the band was going to take a long hiatus and might not even be looking for a replacement for Taylor. But in January of this year, it became known about the concert plans of the band, and in the spring a new album was announced.

“This is a cruelly honest and emotionally rude response to what we have experienced over the past year,” the musicians wrote in a press release for the album, and perhaps in such a formulation a very accurate assessment of the new songs is given. Perhaps this is the kind of music that is written for healing. It has beauty and tension, bitterness and confidence.

Drums were played by the band’s leader Dave Grohl, who is known to have been Nirvana’s drummer before the Foo Fighters. On past albums, the musicians sometimes decided to collaborate, and unexpectedly with artists like Justin Timberlake or the soul group Boyz II Men. But Here We Are was created solely by the Foo Fighters and producer Greg Kirsten, who had already worked with the band on two albums.

In some ways, the sound of plastic reminds the very first recordings of Foo Fighters, where conciseness went hand in hand with some naivety. However, the experience of ten albums, among which there were Grammy-winning ones, is certainly well heard. And this summer it will rumble in arenas and festival fields on both sides of the Atlantic.