Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace

After listening to the album four times in a row, what stands out the most is that Grohl obviously took a lot away from the acoustic tour they did in support of the second (quieter) half of `In Your Honour' (which provided the material for 2006's live album and DVD `Skin and Bones'). The new acoustic arrangements of old Foo Fighters songs must have sparked something inside Grohl's head because `Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace' is full of orchestral touches that provide a whole new dimension to his songwriting.

Of course there are the standard rock anthems (albiet with new acoustic/orchestral touches) that you expect from Foo Fighters, like first single "The Pretender", "Erase Replace", "Long Road to Ruin" (my guess for next single #1), and "Cheer Up Boys (Your Makeup's Running)" (my guess for next single #2). But what really stands out are the mellower acoustic/piano heavy tracks that make up the majority of the album.

"Let it Die" starts out as a quiet, gentle acoustic solo piece with only Grohl's vocals and an acoustic guitar. But it slowly builds, growing more and more urgent until around the two-minute mark you're hit with a few bars of loud, crunch-heavy guitar leading into a full-on rock chorus/outro. This is Dave Grohl taking Jimmy Page's concept of light and shade to the extreme.

"Come Alive" is another example of this light and shade concept, building from a mid-tempo melodic piece to balls to the wall, bombast and howling rock.

"Stranger Things Have Happened" is purely acoustic with Grohl singing over one guitar, with a second guitar joining in occassionally to add accents with some nice acoustic licks.

"Summer's End" is a laid-back electric track with a California country aura and a chorus whose melody has hints of Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young's "Carry On".

"The Ballad of the Beaconsfield Miners" is an acoustic instrumental that sounds like `In Your Honour's "Razor" at double-speed.

"Statues" is the centerpiece. It is by far the best track on the album and one of the most interesting pieces of music Dave Grohl has ever written. It's like nothing you've ever heard from this band before, but I hope Grohl's got more like this in him. The only downside is that it's only three minutes and forty-seven seconds long. I want more.

"But Honestly" is another acoustic>rock, light and shade song. They use the formula a lot on this album, but it doesn't get old because it works. If it was good enough for Led Zeppelin, it's good enough for me.

"Home" is a slow piano ballad in the vein of The White Stripes` "I'm Lonely (But I Ain't That Lonely Yet)" from `Get Behind Me Satan'. While Grohl doesn't have the raw emotion that Jack White spills out, it's still a really beautiful way to close the album. Though I am a big sucker for album-closing piano ballads (see Aerosmith's "You See Me Crying" from `Toys in the Attic' and "Home Tonight" from `Rocks')

Overall it's an amazing album. It really shows Dave Grohl growing as a songwriter and is a great end result of the experimentation on `In Your Honour'. If `In Your Honour' was their `Physical Graffiti', then `Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace' is their `Led Zeppelin III'.

When `In Your Honour' was released, I thought it was amazing, but wondered if they would be able to pass the decade mark and still remain relevant. This new record shows that not only have they survived, but there's a whole new chapter that's just beginning.

This is the sixth studio album from the 'Foo Fighters'. I have followed these guys since their debut back in 1995, and they have developed their sound substantially since then.

While it's probably true that their finest hour was 1997's 'The Colour And The Shape', they haven't had any album that's come close to it....until now.

Working once again with Gil Norton (Who, incidentally, produced 'The Colour and the Shape'), he's brought back the things that some previous Foos records since maybe forgot- a bit of punk and all-out soulful rocking anthems.

And 'Echoes, Silence, patience & Grace' has all of this in bucketloads.

There's variation here. It's a solid progression since their last album, 'In Your Honour'.

It opens with the raucous anthem singalong, 'The Pretender'. It starts disturbingly like Led Zeppelin's 'Stairway to Heaven', but it develops into anything but that. It develops into a punk verse before exploding in the chorus and maintaining that sequence throughout afterwards for four and a half minutes. 'Let It Die' is similar, in the sense that it starts acoustically, before exploding into a stadium-rock singalong. 'Erase/Replace' is different. There is no acoustic intro here at all. It simply feeds in the guitars from the beginning before bursting into punk verses and a mammoth singalong chorus nicely sandwiched in between. 'Long Road To Ruin' is more mainstream, and an obvious future release. The chorus is infectiously catchy and will be a crowd favourite at stadiums around the world, I'm certain of that.

'Come Alive' is perhaps the most spectacular track on the album apart from 'The Pretender'. It's over five minutes long and it's somewhat similar to 'Let It Die'. But it's different because it builds up and up and up before exploding into a giant monster of an anthem. It takes over three minutes to build up to boiling point, but it's well worth it. Unbelievable track. Dave Grohl's screaming voice is relentless as he repeats 'Come alive!' over and over and over. Things quieten down on the slightly disappointing 'Stranger Things Have Happened'. But this song needs to be here somewhere as thirteen tracks of all-out rock would render it to be boring as a record. 'Cheer Up Boys' is classic 'Colour And The Shape' Foos, if only a little more accomplished, however the intro is typical Foos punk as is the pre-chorus. The song itself is decent enough and those of you who appreciate early (ish) Foos punk rock will appreciate this song. 'Summer's End' is a song I really like and while I didn't to begin with, I appreciate it more as time's gone by. It's typical Foo Fighters, but it has a more mature sound somehow. 'Ballad of the Beaconsfield Miners' is awesome- it features Kaki King as guest guitarist here on this interesting instrumental. A clever song, and it's anything but normal Foo Fighters. Superb. 'Statues' is different again, and that's what I enjoy so much about this album overall. Grohl gets behind the piano here and sings. It's a great song, I really like this one. 'But, Honestly' is next, referring back to the early stages of the record, where things started acoustically before building up into heavier stuff later in the song. This is the same, and again we see a more aggressive Foo Fighters and very much a punk presence in the second half of the song. 'Home' is a great track. It's simply Grohl behind the piano once again. It's so simple, and so beautiful. 'Once and For All' is a bonus track, again featuring Grohl behind the piano, and it's a more collective effort from the band as it's more soulful and has more of a purpose about it.

Overall then, there is very little wrong with this record by the Foo Fighters, it's a vry accmplished record here they've produced. And if number seven is an improvement on this one here, it probably will be their best yet, as this is on a similar level to 1997's 'The Colour And The Shape'- but Grohl's mature songwriting and more expansive instrumental knowledge (on piano) create further diversity, and that can't be a bad thing.

Buy it if you haven't already. 9/10.

I've never given the Foo Fighters the time or day, just never really got into them post Nirvana. Bought this album upon recommendation by a Foo fan. Upon first listen (whilst clearing out the garage) I knew there was something very important happening to me. Quite simply at that moment I became an instant Grohl/Foo fan. Having now backtracked on most of the Foo's catalogue from my own perspective, this is not only my favourite of theirs but quite possibly the most important 'rock' album in my CD collection and remains a permanent fixture in the car ! Love it Love it Love it. It's so good, I find it difficult to believe these aren't reworkings of old classics, but of course respect Dave Grohl's song writing abilities as well as his virtuoso performance abilities.