Photo by Laura Jerele
“Bucket list? Checked!” joked Dave Grohl, nine songs into the Foo Fighters’ 10-song set opening for AC/DC. It’s an event that wasn’t even supposed to happen: the opener for the rest of the tour is the Pretty Reckless. But when that band’s frontwoman (St. Louis native Taylor Momsen) got the call for an even bigger gig (filling in for the late Chris Cornell as singer for a reunited Soundgarden at a Seattle Seahawks game the next night), she offered her hometown gig to Grohl who, as it turns out, is an AC/DC superfan. And that’s how the Foo Fighters, a band that can fill arenas and stadiums on their own, ended up as an opening act for one night only. “Thank you to the Pretty Reckless,” Grohl joked as he told the story, “send them a cheese basket!”
The sold-out show pulled the kind of crowd into downtown that you usually only see during a Cardinals playoff run—it was the kind of buzz you could still feel blocks away from the Dome as the streets swarmed with people in black t-shirts and blinking red light-up devil horns. This also meant that the streets were a disaster, with your intrepid reporter still stuck on 4th Street as the Foo Fighters kicked off their set.
Fortunately, The Arts STL photographer Laura Jerele was already on site to capture the first few songs. She reports that the scene was chaotic, with many more people than just yours truly running late and streaming into the venue to find their seats as the Foos’ set started right at their 7:00pm call time. “It was crazy and confusing but fun,” Laura said, and that “they kicked into high gear and just bolted,” blasting off with “All My Life,” “The Pretender,” and “Times Like These.”
I finally reached my seat (which was on the opposite end of the Dome from where I entered, because of course it was) in time for “This Is a Call.” A lot of Foo Fighters songs contain a breakdown and build up to a big blast of a final chorus, and that effect was only amplified in the live setting; on “This Is a Call,” for example, the volume dropped as Grohl sang the chorus quiet and sweetly, patting and smoothing out his hair as he sang like he was a pretty pretty princess, only to launch into throat-shredding territory for the song’s final chorus. Ditto for “No Son of Mine,” which started as hardcore chaos, its charging riff warping into Motorhead’s “Ace of Spades” for a few bars, but after dueling guitar solos from Grohl and Chris Shiflett, all of the other Foos dropped out so that Grohl could sing the breakdown a cappella. During “Monkey Wrench,” Grohl egged on the crowd to scream loud enough for AC/DC to hear us backstage, then, saying he would scream for them too, launching into the “One last thing before I quit…” coda at his loudest possible wail. He also made room in that song for newcomer drummer Ilan Rubin to put in a thunderous drum solo.
These exaggerated breakdowns and build-ups are how the Foos, a band that writes mostly 4-minute songs, only fit 10 songs into a 65-minute set. That, and because Grohl was endearingly chatty. He told the story of how he and a childhood friend named Larry snuck out of their small Virginia town at age 11 to go to the big city and see the 1980 concert film AC/DC: Let There Be Rock. That movie “changed my fucking life,” Grohl said, and dedicated “Best of You” to his friend Larry, who was in attendance at the show. “Best of You,” unfortunately, was far from the best song of the night: it’s insane how hard Grohl is able to push his scream but for this song he pushed it past raspy to ragged and kept it there almost the entire song; it got grating pretty quickly. All was forgiven when he wrapped up the set with an epic run through “Everlong,” which got every head in the place bobbing and inspired a big singalong from the crowd. With that, he wished us a good night and declared “We’ll see you on the dance floor, motherfuckers!”
“We’re going to do what we always do,” AC/DC singer Brian Johnson declared after their opening number, “we’re gonna make some rock n’ roll.” And that’s what they did, one of the best bands to ever do it, and still doing it at that elite level. There’s no shame in a band adjusting to their age—slowing things down, changing keys to fit the singer’s range as they get older. But AC/DC? Not a chance. Brian Johnson’s raspy howl is not only intact, it sounded like it was straight off of 1992’s AC/DC Live. And guitarist Angus Young must have sold his soul to the devil to have this much boundless energy and finger dexterity at 71.
The band burst out of the gate with “If You Want Blood (You’ve Got It),” setting the template for the night. Angus sported his classic schoolboy outfit in red, white, and blue while Johnson had his typical uniform (black sleeveless Harley-Davidson shirt and a flat cap with a shock of curly hair cascading out the back). The stage featured two small rectangular outcroppings on either side of the center, plus a catwalk that came out from centerstage to a small circular secondary stage. Johnson and Angus would take turns hamming it up as the crowd’s focal point, Angus marching down the catwalk to wield his squealing guitar solos surrounded on all sides, then retreating to the main stage to let Johnson hold court on either of the two side rectangles or strut around the middle area. The other three members—rhythm guitarist Stevie Young (Angus’ nephew), and the semi-recently hired touring rhythm section of bassist Chris Chaney and drummer Matt Laug—hung back in a sort of alcove within the raised rear stage that contained the pyro and props. It was drums in the center, Chaney to the right, Stevie to the left, and they remained locked in those positions as they held down the rhythm. When it came time to sing backing vocals, Chaney and Stevie would take about ten steps forward in unison to reach their microphones, sing their part with determined exuberance, and immediately step back to their drumside positions. And every song ended with Angus playing a bit of a vamp, jumping up in the air, and all four instrumentalists stopping on a dime as they hit one final note in unison just as his feet hit the ground. The stage lights would dim, there’d be about 20 seconds of silence, and the next song would kick in.
It’s downright amazing how solid this band still sounds, how they’re able to impeccably recreate the songs the way you’ve always heard them yet still sound a little loose and in the pocket. Surely one of the reasons why is because they still find the fun in these very fun songs. Johnson has to have sung “Shot Down in Flames” literally thousands of times at this point, yet he still chuckled at his own line delivery, like a naughty imp who can’t believe he’s still getting away with singing this stuff. After Angus wrapped “Have a Drink on Me” with a particularly ripping guitar solo, Johnson laughed out “I’ll get the check!” And Angus Young was just a flurry of motion, his legs constantly pumping up and down in place when he wasn’t strutting and duck-walking like a man half his age. His stamina really is unreal. I wonder if anyone has ever put a pedometer on him during a show, I bet he hits at least 20,000 steps.
The number of highlights is almost too many to mention, but I’ll try. “Thunderstruck” had the crowd going nuts from the instant its inimitable opening riff started, the floor literally shaking beneath my feet. Somehow the reaction was even bigger for “Highway to Hell,” with a huge crowd singalong and blasts of actual pyro to go with the flames on the video screens, and Johnson playing with his delivery on the second verse, making it sound like a joke he just thought up and not a song he’s been singing for 46 years. The band was dialed in to pure perfection on their run through “Shoot to Thrill,” particularly Laug, who got a spotlight on the video screen as he pounded the ever-loving shit out of his drum kit in the song’s back half. Stevie and Chaney took more of a central role on “Jailbreak,” really driving the song’s central groove with their playing and backing vocals. “Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap” was so ominous and so badass, with Angus firing off a pair of blistering solos, the first one partially played one-handed. During the song’s last verse, Johnson and Angus were both out on the catwalk, Johnson shoving the mic in Young’s face every other line so the two could share vocal duties. It was a blast and a half.
The band peppered the setlist with a few post-heyday songs, and while the songs lack some of the familiarity of the stone classics, it’s impressive how well the newer ones sit alongside the old ones. (Cue the old joke: “AC/DC only writes one song over and over again, but luckily, it’s a really good song.”) “Shot in the Dark” followed “Hells Bells” like it belonged on Back in Black, 2000’s “Stiff Upper Lip” got a bigger crowd reception than I would have expected (I should remind myself that album did go platinum…), and “Sin City” grabbed attention with a solo that Angus played using his necktie like Jimmy Page used to use a violin bow.
The main set came in for a landing with plenty of crowdpleasing, most notably the ultimate crowdpleaser “You Shook Me All Night Long.” The stop-start stomp of “Whole Lotta Rosie” impressed, too; it played like quite possibly the most rock n’ roll thing ever.
Though his voice was so strong throughout the night, Johnson seemed to finally be hitting his vocal limits during “Rosie” as the show rolled toward the two-hour mark. A little bit of a respite was definitely in order, but what we got was quite unexpected: the band launched into “Let There Be Rock” and it just kept going…and going…and going. Angus started soloing with the rest of the band still hitting the song’s dirty, bluesy groove behind him, his guitar aimed at a fan holding an “ANGUS ROCKS” sign near the catwalk. Eventually the rest of the band dropped out, but he kept playing. He ran back onto the stage, up some stairs to the raised portion where the pyro flames were, and kept playing. The crowd’s energy really started to wane as he started a whole call-and-response thing, where he would play a skronk of notes and goad the crowd into shouting back at him. Had I known what was coming, I would have time-stamped it for you; I can say with certainty that the solo was at least 18 minutes long, and very likely broke 20. It was way too much, for way too little payoff, and when Stevie, Chaney, and Laug rejoined him to bring the song in for a landing, it felt like a relief.
Having had a break pretty much long enough to watch an entire episode of TV without commercials, the band took the stage for the encore so fresh that it seemed like they could play for another two hours. (Yes, including Angus, who unlike the others was only offstage for like two minutes. The man must be immortal.) Instead, we only got two more songs, but they were doozies: everyone shouted along to the oi’s of “T.N.T.” while “For Those About to Rock (We Salute You)” wrapped up the entire thing in an orgy of fire works and cannon fire that shook the Dome and shattered ear drums.
When all was said and done, the concert stretched for two hours and 20 minutes, wrapping right at 11:00pm curfew. The setlist was packed with crowd favorites while still leaving enough big hits in the chamber (“It’s a Long Way to the Top,” “Girls Got Rhythm,” “Rock n’ Roll Ain’t Noise Pollution,” “Moneytalks,” “Who Made Who,” and “Big Gun,” just to name a few I would have loved to hear) to fill another hour. Interminable guitar solo aside, wow, what a show. | Jason Green
Foo Fighters setlist:
All My Life
The Pretender
Times Like These
My Hero
Learn to Fly
This Is a Call
No Son of Mine/Ace of Spades
Monkey Wrench
Best of You
Everlong
AC/DC setlist:
If You Want Blood (You’ve Got It)
Back in Black
Demon Fire
Shot Down in Flames
Thunderstruck
Have a Drink on Me
Hells Bells
Shot in the Dark
Stiff Upper Lip
Highway to Hell
Shoot to Thrill
Sin City
Jailbreak
Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap
High Voltage
Riff Raff
You Shook Me All Night Long
Whole Lotta Rosie
Let There Be Rock
Encore:
T.N.T.
For Those About to Rock (We Salute You)
