The Foo Fighters are fast becoming irrelevant in my music collection, if they continue the trend of releasing worse and worse albums. Well they've broken that trend, but only because 2002's One By One was so bad, not that In Your Honor is all that good.
Riding from the ashes of the drumkit of Nirvana, Dave Grohl blew away critics in 1995 with the Foo Fighters self-titled debut album, which was essentially a Dave Grohl solo album as he recorded everything himself. Who knew he had it in him? It kicked ass and but was only a preview of the follow-up, 1997's The Colour and the Shape. It's one of the great albums of the 90's and established Grohl as a recognizable rock icon. The Foos also showed deft acting chops in some great videos for these two albums, especially the Mentos-parody for "Big Me," the single-shot/burning house rescue for "My Hero", and the dreamy "Everlong," a video that I consider one of the best music videos ever made.
1999's There Is Nothing Left To Lose was somewhat of a misstep, though it was critically adored and won some grammys. Gone were the arena rockers and punk wailing, and here was a more introspective Grohl. "Learn to Fly" was a big hit, but mostly because of another hilarious video. (The Foo Fighter should get a sitcom. It'd be better then 95% of the crap on TV now). But nothing else proved memorable on this album. In 2002, they released One by One, an album that is hardly listenable. Gone are the hooks, the riffs, the melodies. It's heartless songs that you immediately forget. "Times Like These" is the best they had to offer, but if you can find the acoustic version of this song, it's 100 times better then the electric version on the album. Grohl had lost his songwriting touch. It's OK. It happens. Just make a better follow up, and all will be forgiven.
Well, here come In Your Honor, an ambitious double-album split between a rockin' electric Side 1 and a mellow acoustic Side 2. I must admit I dig the first single, "Best of You." It's stuck in my head, which hadn't had a Foo song up there in a while. But it's the highlight of another laborious boring album. Track 1 "In Your Honor" and track4 "DOA" had me hoping for more, and they'll probably be the next singles, but there's nothing else worthy on the CD. It's a virtual copy of One by One I guess, since I can't remember those songs anyway. As for Disc 2, tie it to your tomato pole to scare the crows away. It's worthless. 10 songs which all sound the same, start the same, have the same instruments, the same melody. It's embarrassing.I don't think Grohl has an albums worth of good material left in him. He'll pull a good single or two, but the days of complete winner albums for the Foo Fighters ended in 1997. And while drummer Taylor Hawkins (think Animal from the Muppets) is entertaining and funny, I must wonder why the Foos 2 best albums had Grohl playing drums. I don't know if I'll buy anymore Foo Fighters albums without hearing a major turn-around from them, I'll just wait for the Greatest Hits disc which I'm sure is coming around 2007.
The Sneaky Cheetah's Grade: C
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