Musical Ramblings: Foos new album will disappoint metal fans

Foo Fighters
Echoes Silence Patience and Grace

I have to start this review saying that the title of this new Foo Fighters CD REALLY reflects my listening experience. My friends know that I have such a love for this band and I usually go nuts over every single thing Grohl and company release. This disc, though, is the first time I've ever struggled with a Foo Fighters release.

Let's get back to the title first. I heard “Echoes” of their past live acoustic album and acoustic disc from “In Your Honor.” I sat in “silence” listening to the songs and tried to figure out where the high energy Foo Fighers vanished to on this disc. I had a lot of “patience” sitting through this disc about 10 times now just trying to find more positives than negatives about it. And finally I realized that the band was going for a form of “grace” (or eloquence/acoustic beauty) with this disc, but that leaves me, as a long time fan, very unfulfilled.

The songs, for the most part, are mellower and have a mid to slow tempo range. I can appreciate a really good Foo ballad, acousitic song or hybrid, but there are way too many acoustic songs and performances on this disc. I think Grohl wants to keep capitalizing on the “Skin and Bones” acoustic tour. I have to say that “Come Alive” is the best acoustic driven song on the disc because it does break out into something that you can actually rock to on this disc.

I know people are thinking that “The Pretender” is the rocking song on the disc, but even this track feels like it was from a past session that didn't make it on the last disc because it didn't rock hard enough.

Best song on the album, hands down, goes to “Let it Die.” This song blends the Foos vast pallet and is going to be amazing to hear and build up a crowd in a live environment. This song, for me, was worth buying the album for and is one of the better songs they've ever written.

While the disc has grown on me more over the past three weeks, I just have to say that this one is definitely ranked as the lowest scoring Foo Fighter release ever. I will go back to their past catalogue more times than I will ever listen to this one. There are too many skippable, bubble gum pop-rock, acoustic, mellow tunes on this release for me to keep going back to it. Oh well, let's try again in another two years.