Album Review: Foo Fighters - 'Wasting Light'

The Foo Fighters are a group that needs no introduction, they are without question, one of the biggest rock bands in the world today, possibly ever. Their career hit a new milestone with two sold out shows at Wembley Stadium, playing to a crowd of 85,000 each night, which left the band with the question, what next?

They started work on their seventh studio album and to keep things interesting, they decided to record to tape, in Dave Grohl’s garage, using analogue equipment.

The result is ‘Wasting Light,’ one of their heaviest records to date, which may take a few listens to warm up to due to the lack of stand-out singles. In somewhat of a reflective mood, Grohl opted to hire Butch Vig to produce the album whom he had not worked with since Nirvana’s ‘Nevermind.’ He also extended the band’s line-up to five members, having original guitarist Pat Smear re-join the group and asking Nirvana bass player Krist Novoselic to record bass and accordion on the album's most heartfelt track, I Should Have Known.

As with all of the Foo's music, guitars are the most powerful element, more so now that there are three of them, all of which work well in tandem, especially during the verses of Dear Rosemary, in which the stab and riff all over the place. The first single, Rope, sounds more reminiscent of the music on the 1995 debut self titled record than anything the band has produced in the later years, the chorus is along the same vein of tracks such as This Is A Call and I'll Stick Around.

The highlights come when Grohl is at his heaviest vocally, such as on the opening track Bridge Burning, which he begins with the scream “These are my famous last words,” and the stand out unofficial single White Limo, a Motorhead inspired rock outing which is the band's heaviest offering since Watershed.

At this point in the Foo Fighters career it would be very easy to plateau and release straight forward radio rock tracks whilst living off of their back catalogue. Instead they have opted to keep things interesting for themselves and their fans by making a back to basics rock album from a garage (albeit a big one full of expensive equipment), and as a result 'Wasting Light' is a record extremely worthy of their brilliant discography.

1. Bridge Burning
2. Rope
3. Dear Rosemary
4. White Limo
5. Arlandria
6. These Days
7. Back Forth
8. A Matter Of Time
9. Miss The Misery
10. I Should Have Known
11. Walk