Reviews >Reviews 2006 > Foo Fighters

Charlotte Subway - Cute, Cute,Cute, Cute (ok we get the idea-everyone else)

Open air large venue gigs in Manchester in June are becoming a bit of a ritual almost on a par with the annual visits to, say Leeds or Glastonbury. In recent years the city's stadia have hosted such luminaries as The Cure, Red Hot Chili Peppers and REM. So it is with a degree of familiarity that we descend once again on Old Trafford Cricket ground. This time it is the Foo Fighters playing the last of a handful of dates around Europe. With little in the way of brand new product on offer we assume they are either filming for a live DVD or just coming out because its fun.I would like to think it is the latter.

Walking towards the ground I check my ticket and am mildly surprised to see not Old Trafford worded on it but Lancs CCC. The reason for this dates back to an Oasis show at the same venue. The staunch blues refused to have any reference to Old Trafford home of their deadly football rivals printed on the tickets and the procedure has stuck, perhaps just in case Dave Grohl is a closet Man City fan. Anyway back to matters in hand, we arrive get straight in and are not even searched, result!, especially for the vodka carriers. The Eagles of Death Metal are already on as we make our way in and halt at the edge of the pitch for the traditional fucking about session (wees, beers, tokens, food etc. etc.). Consequently they remain specks in the distance, though a glimpse of the screen tells me that Josh Homme is playing the drums. Queens of the Stone Age and Dave Grohl go back a long way and that may be how the Eagles got the gig. However they don't rely solely on famous friends, their blend of basic riff friendly rock and roll goes down well with the sizeable crowd. We could do without being told that we rock between every song, we already know that of course. Perhaps lacking in songs that make up for with riffs and noise and I will be checking them out a bit more closely as a result. Oh and the singer has an almost perfect moustache.

Weather wise its a bit grey and grim and we need something to brighten things up. How about some garage rock? How about The Subways? How about a very cute bass player in hot pants? Well 3 out of 3 ain 't too shabby. They play perhaps knowing they are not well known by too many of the crowd and are out to win friends. During 'Oh Yeah' which comes early in the set, singer Billy drops his guitar, runs down the huge walkway which runs out from the main stage, and dives into the front row. Its a simple gesture, but it wins over the crowd. Charlotte looks so cute and is this year's Abi Zuton/Charlotte Ash object of affection from a lot of the audience, well me anyway. She really knows how to rock as well and sings more too, perhaps to cover for Billy whose voice problems may still not be fully over. Truth to tell the songs are only average garagy rock but the ace up the sleeve is 'Rock n Roll Queen' a great tune which closes the set and wins genuine warmth in the applause. A very lively half hour. Lively is not a word I would use to immediately describe Angels and Airwaves. They are the new play thing of former blink 182 frontman Tom DeLonge. They don't cut much stage presence at all, even DeLonge who is happy to just be one of the lads. It starts off quite promisingly with the frontman's distinctive vocals carrying the first two or so songs. They then spoil it by going into an over long rap about the Gulf War and trying to get the crowd singing along to a chorus most have never heard before. The track, 'The Adventure' is their debut single and apparently got to No.20 in the charts, meaning of course it sold about 10 copies given the current nature of the UK top 40. It is also their best song. The rest of the set passes me by with the band wanting to be U2, or perhaps reproduce the more epic songs that Green Day came up with on their last album. In a word dull. So here is an interesting fact about blink 182. The group were originally called blink but an Irish group already had the name so the numbers 182 were appended to their name. Rumour has it that 182 refers the number of times Al Pacino utters the word 'fuck' in Scarface. Back to review mode and it is surprising given the almost supergroup nature of the band that they are so lacking in stage presence. Maybe they were nervous or something. Oh, and it also rains quite heavily. Not really a good day for them. It takes an appearance on a nearby balcony from one David Grohl to really spark the crowd to life and get them revved up for the main support.

Foos - Laserquest

On the face of it The Strokes also strike a similar stage presence, they don't move about a lot or say too much to the crowd. However there are 2 crucial differences between them and the previous act. They have that NYC cool, and they have the songs. And what songs. There are some cracking tunes on the new album none better than 'Heart in a cage' which dominates the early set. 'Juicebox' is played early too and gets a great reception. However predictably its the debut album stuff which everyone wants to hear. 'Someday', 'Hard to Explain' and a monumental 'Last Nite' are all set highlights. Room on fire, (not such a bad album, give it a good listen), is represented by 'Reptilia' and 'The End has no End' and it all finishes as usual with 'NYC Cops' and 'Take it or Leave it'. I've always been a taker myself.

At this time of the year the headline bands come on stage when it is still pretty light. This necessitates the use of a pretty spectacular light set in order to back up the songs and have an impact when the sun can still be out. And do the Foo Fighters ever have one of these. As they take the stage to 'In your Honor' giant video screens spark into life, huge lighting tubes do their thing, and people look nervously over their shoulders hoping incoming traffic for Manchester Airport haven't been set on the wrong path by all the colour. It is also apparent that the audience is going seriously apeshit and even though we are quite a way back, everyone jumps up and down when they play 'All my Life' second song up. As I have mentioned before probably in reference to their Leeds Festival show last year, the Foos are one of the great singles bands and 'Times like These' 'Learn to Fly' and 'My Hero' just go to confirm this. It is ironic that given the amazing technology on stage, that when he talks to the audience for the first time his mike packs up. Dave plays along with this mishap with the air of a man at ease with doing shows like these. Perhaps wary of more mike trouble he says not too much else until the encores, except telling us that the Hyde Park audience 'Sucked' and we didn't. Hoorah.

Notable song highlights in the set were 'Walking after You' which calms things down for a bit, 'Stacked Actors' which sees Dave come down the walkway for some Geeetaar work, a seriously mad singalong to 'Breakout' with spectacular green laser effects shooting round the ground, and a dip into the debut album for 'This is a Call'. All too soon its 'Monkey Wrench' closing the main set and it's encore time. These are brilliant with the best song on the current album 'D.O.A', and a Taylor Hawkins vocal on 'Cold day in the Sun', the drummer warning us to expect some "Seriously shocking guitar playing". Luckily his vocals are up to the mark. After Dave promises to get us all free beer next time around he comes down to the front of the walkway and plays a stunning slow version of my personal favourite 'Everlong'. It rocks out at the end and they melt off stage to a stunning firework display that lights up half of Manchester. Coming out of the show there are smiles all round and despite the weather it has been a great day. Gig of the year so far for me by a mile. Now its off to graffiti all over any Old Trafford references we can find around the ground. Oasis would be so proud.

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