Not long into the Foo Fighters’ three-hour set, the band’s force of nature frontman Dave Grohl remarked to the crowd, “Dare I say this is the biggest fuckin’ [Portland] show for us in thirty years. It was not like this at Satirycon in 1995.” Grohl was referring to the fabled small club where the band got their start, and they sure have come a long way since those early boot-strapping days. Now, the Foo Fighters were back as the first act to headline Portland, Oregon’s soccer stadium, Providence Park, in front of 30,000 fans. Their show on Friday, August 16th, was nearly the end of their Everything or Nothing at All Tour that hit stadiums around the country. And here they were to christen a space that hadn’t been used as a music venue in nearly two decades with a no-expense-spared rock and roll extravaganza. Beyond being a live music milestone for Portland, the show also felt like something of a victory lap for the Foo Fighters as they have found their footing after the tragic 2022 loss of drummer Taylor Hawkins. For the band and their legions of fans, Friday’s show was nothing short of fulfilling.
Being the opening act in a stadium doesn’t always guarantee playing to an attentive audience. Luckily, this wasn’t the case when The Pretenders hit the stage for a tight hour-long set that saw Chrissie Hynde giving a crash course in rock and roll badassery. Hynde was timelessly cool as she steered her backing band of young guns through songs like “Turf Accountant Daddy,” the funk-laded “My City Was Gone,” and a version of the hit tune “Back On The Chain Gang” that sounded as timeless and perfect as ever. This was followed by the rockabilly number “Thumbelina,” complete with a dose of smoking hot guitar work. By the time she hit her famously epic ballad “I’ll Stand By You,” Hynde showed the audience that her voice was as strong as ever as she commanded their attention. When she and her band wrapped their set with the guitar-solo-packed tune “Mystery Achievement,” it was clear that they were more than up for the task of opening for the Foo Fighters.
The excitement for the Foos reached a fever pitch when the crowd caught a glimpse of the band members walking to the stage and collectively lost their minds. Grohl and Co. wasted no time in kicking off with a version of “All My Life” that rocked out with the intensity of an encore despite being only the first song. For the next three hours, they proceeded to melt faces and deliver maximum entertainment as they charged full speed through a career-spanning performance. After dumping a drink on his head the first of many times throughout the night, Grohl led the band through “No Son of Mine” while teasing the audience with snippets of AC/DC and Metallica and challenging them to show their devotion to rock and roll. He looked satisfied with their response as the band blasted their way through “Rescued” before getting to the early highlight of “The Pretender,” segueing into the emotionally stirring “Walk.” The always sentimental “Times Like These” was soulful and almost sermon-like with Rami Jaffee’s moody organ work before they threw it back to the power pop greatness of “Generator,” a major show highlight.
Seeing a Foo Fighters performance means trying to fathom how Dave Grohl can possess so much energy to keep 30,000 fans enraptured for three hours. Grohl took advantage of every inch of the stage as he ran back and forth, shared stories, and playfully chided the audience into reciprocating his rock god charisma. He also brought a sense of intimacy at various junctures, like getting the audience to sing along to “My Hero” before the band built it up to its climax. Following the one-two punch of “Learn to Fly” and “Arlandria” that featured an impressive transition, Grohl and Jaffee (donning an accordion) took on the role of “buskers” for the haunting “Skin and Bones.” Grohl followed it up with his earthy and bluesy acoustic instrumental “Ballad of the Beaconsville Miners,” which was prefaced with a heart-warming story about getting wasted with a Tasmanian miner after the Foo Fighters’ music got him through a mining accident. But some of the show’s biggest and best moments came when the band went back in time “for all [the] nostalgic motherfuckers” with “This Is a Call,” an especially powerful version of “Monkey Wrench” that saw Josh Freese firing off his machine gun skills on the drums, and a version of “Aurora” dedicated to Taylor Hawkins that was simultaneously dark, uplifting, cathartic, and triumphant.
Perhaps no other major rock act besides Bruce Springsteen and Phish is currently playing marathon three-hour shows in arenas and stadiums. In Portland, the Foo Fighters made the loudest statement possible that rock and roll is still the king in venues of this size, even as pop stars and rappers dominate the space. The limitless enthusiasm that Grohl and his bandmates radiated, as well as the power of a catalog that has made them one of the biggest bands on the planet, provided a welcome reminder of just how exhilarating the stadium rock experience can actually be. If acts like the Rolling Stones can still tour stadiums into their 80s, we should only be so lucky if the Foo Fighters follow the same path.
