Foo Fighters' 2026 Aussie Setlist Revealed

The Foo Fighters returned to Australian shores overnight, delivering a special one-off show to their Tasmanian fans.

They came, they saw, and they conquered Tasmania for the first time in over a decade. That’s the major takeaway from the Foo Fighters’ special one-off Australian show overnight.

First announced in early December, the rock icons revealed they would be including an exclusive Tasmanian date as part of their current Take Cover tour, which launched in Mexico just two weeks ago.

Supported by Brisbane rockers Full Flower Moon Band and local psych rock outfit Spooky Eyes, Stadiums Tasmania boss James Avery detailed that the Tasmanian government and the Launceston City Council would be paying $650,000 for the Foo Fighters to play the show — with $500,000 coming from the state, and $150,000 from the council.

Needless to say, excitement was high for the show, which would mark the first time that drummer Ilan Rubin had toured with the group. Unfortunately, it was revealed that longtime member Pat Smear would not be attending the local jaunt, with the group detailing his absence in a socials post earlier this month.

“In the classic tradition of rockstars having bizarre gardening accidents, Pat Smear has apparently rung in the new year by smashing the shit out of his left foot,” they explained, adding that “Beck and St. Vincent guitar wizard Jason Falkner will be filling in for Pat while he’s on the mend.”

After all the excitement in the lead-up to proceedings, however, the Foo Fighters took to the stage on Saturday night for what many are hoping will serve as a taster of their eventual return for a full-scale national tour.

Performing a 22-song set, a large portion of the evening was spent reflecting on the group's earlier material. While the night opened with All My Life and Times Like These from 2002's One By One, cuts like The Pretender and La Dee Da gave way to material from the band's self-titled 1995 debut, 1997's The Colour And The Shape, and 1999's There Is Nothing Left To Lose.

Knowing the audience enough to realise that newer material usually only lands for good reason, only two tracks from the past five years made an appearance. While 2021's No Son Of Mine was presented as a tribute to late Motörhead frontman Lemmy Kilmister, so too was 2023's Under You presented as a Dave Grohl solo venture, with the rocker paying tribute to his late bandmate Taylor Hawkins.

Closing out the main set with classic tracks such as Monkey Wrench; Hey, Johnny Park!; and Best Of You, the Foo Fighters’ encore launched in a very Tasmanian way, with Brant Webb – one of the miners involved in the 2006 Beaconsfield Mine collapse – introducing a solo Grohl, who performed the acoustic cut written in their honour, the fittingly-titled Ballad Of The Beaconsfield Miners.

After taking things back to the closing song of their debut album with Exhausted, the Foo Fighters wrapped proceedings with the enduring Everlong, closing out the night in a way that clearly left the thousands of fans in attendance (and jealous onlookers interstate) hoping a larger national tour will be incoming.