At approximately 9:59AM on the Tuesday before Halloween, The Foo Fighters tweeted “Hey Nashville…See you on Halloween night!!! @theryman Tix on sale Wed. Oct 29th – 10am.
Within moments, the announcement was read on every radio station and posted on every social media site.
The show quickly became the most anticipated event Nashville had seen in a while at this capacity. The next 24 hours seemed to come and go with the not-so fleeting thoughts and calculations no one could ignore: The Ryman holds but 2,3oo patrons. And were talking about Nashville here, so it was also important to take into consideration the amount of non-general public tickets already promised. That puts us down to probably 2000. Demand would far outweigh supply during the coming days.
Initial speculation was that the tickets would only be made available at Box office as the band did at their previous secret show in DC. However that did not happen. Tickets were sold ONLY online, ONLY on Ticketmaster and required proof of credit card and swipe upon entering the venue to print out your 2 (max) tickets. These measures were taken in order to deter scalpers and second party sites and keep tickets authenticy intact. Still, when 10:00AM rolled around on Wednesday, several things happened. Tickets went on sale. Tickets sold out. A record 30,000 people visited the Ryman website. According to several different twitter users live tweeting during the process, no one seemed to have gotten tickets. There was a growing problem. Tickets were showing up all over the internet on second party websites at almost a 2000% mark up from the original $20 price tag. The Ryman twitter account reassured people that they were investigating the claims and encouraged anyone that had information on any secondary sites to come forward to help end the problem. The Foo Fighters also took to twitter heeding a warning “Guys…don’t buy tickets for the @TheRyman from scalpers or secondary sellers. Those tickets will not be honored.” During the next two days there was uncertainty from fans as to the fate of secondary bought tickets and if they were going to be cancelled and re-released. Generally in Nashville, there is always a way to get to a show even if it’s sold out. However for this show, this was not the case. There were no Tickets anywhere. A few radio stations were doing drawings and call-ins for what seemed like the last tickets on the planet. Local radio station Lightning 100 held a food drive for Second Harvest food bank on Thursday. Every five pounds of food brought gave 1 ticket in the drawing to win two tickets. The station ended up gathering over 3,000 lbs of food. Those tickets came and went. Friday morning the tides shifted, as the secondary bought tickets were cancelled. Catching everyone off guard, The Ryman re-released the select amount of tickets. The surprise announcement prevented the secondary markets from buying all of them again. The show was officially sold out and when showtime came there wasn’t an empty seat in the venue.
Showtime
Upon entering the mother church, people were overheard saying things like, “I can’t believe we are here”, “we made it,” and “we get to see the foo’s tonight, on HALLOWEEN.” The tone for the evening was gratefulness. The lights lowered, it all began.
First up was a screening of Sonic Highways. Sonic Highways is an eight –part HBO docuseries where Dave Grohl and the rest of the band visit eight cities. They call it a ”Musical map of America.” In each city the band takes a week to learn about the culture and music that makes up the city. They spend their days recording music and nights interviewing people that have helped shape each cities music scene. On the final day, Dave takes words and thoughts from interviews and experiences from the week and puts them to paper. That’s how each song is written, on the last day. “This isn’t just the making of our most ambitious album, this is a love letter to the history of American music,“ says, Grohl.
Each week focuses on a different city. The first week featured Chicago and the second week Washington, Dc. This week, the 3rd installment, featured the music and history of Nashville. Concert attendee’s watched as Dave interviewed musical legends and influencers like Willie Nelson, Dolly Parton Carrie Underwood, Dan Auerbach and Zac Brown. They all told stories of their times in Nashville, songwriting, disappointments, reaching goals and playing the opry. Each person had something different to add to the grand picture of what has become the current Nashville music scene. Being in the middle of the Bible belt, Dolly and Carrie spoke on faith and religion and growing up with gospel music backgrounds and singing in church choir and the influence that it played on their careers. The song that premiered at the end of the episode is called “Congregation.”
Lyrically, Dave sings about mysteries in wood and ghosts in roots, tangled beneath southern grounds. One can assume he’s speaking about Zac Brown’s Southern Ground Studio. The band harnesses a different temperature in the guitars on this song (think 1960s rock and roll melody) and it features a little more twang than the uniform Foo.
In a Promo for Sonic Highways, Dave talks about how the atmosphere, humidity and weather can affect the sound an instrument plays and that’s that makes it unique to each city. It’s an accomplishment to produce a 100% Nashville sounding track while still encapsulating everything that is true to Foo. It is clear the band is working very hard on keeping music history alive, and the importance of knowing where our musical roots come from.
The Music
Within moments of Sonic Highway’s rolling credits, Foo Fighters took the stage and we began our 3 hour adventure. Opening with “All my life,” A corpse-like face painted Band greeted the crowd and went for it. In the first hour the band covered several classics including” Rope,” “The pretender,” “Learn to fly” and “My Hero.” Grohl greeted everyone and spoke about the night, vowing to play every song they know. He even geeked out a bit, teiiling of his excitement about playing the Ryman, and decided he wanted to pay homage and play barefoot for the entirety of the show. “I just want to feel it, the stage,” he said. Taylor Hawkins lead from behind the drum kit on ”Cold day in the sun” and after a few classics, they introduced to the first special guest of the evening, Tony Joe White. The Legendary 71-year-old songwriter and swamp rock singer lead the band with his song “Polk Salad Annie,” a song also recorded by Elvis Presley and Tom Jones. After a jam with Tony, the band went into a set of covers. At this point the band got “weird “as Dave said. It was story time. First up was Cheap Trick’s “Stiff Competition” with Grohl on drums, Hawkins on vocals.
Hawkins told the story about singing the same song on Letterman in a wicked white 70’s suit just the week before during the band’s 5 night residency. Next up, the band covered “Under Pressure” by David Bowie & Queen. During the famed intro Grohl told the story of being in 9th grade and entering a competition with that very song. He went on to say that the notes he hit should never be heard in a Rock and Roll song and the version of the song he played was not good enough to win the competition, but the way he looks at it, he’s singing it in front of all of these people on stage at the Ryman. Continuing on the rabbit trail, they cover Van Halen’s “Aint Talkin Bout Love” and “Break Down” by Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers.
Dave then mentioned to the crowd something to the effect of, if we keep down this trail no one’s getting out of here and we are staying all night. So back to originals the Foo’s went. “Best of you” is always a crowd favorite. As the night wound down to its last quarter the band pulled out two songs from the very first album and dedicated one of them to the producer of the very first Foo Album, who was in attendance that night. The last song (pre-encore) of the night was the live premiere of “Congregation.” It was like witnessing a song fulfilling its purpose, being birthed into listeners in the hallowed pews of the Ryman. Instead of leaving only to return for an encore, the band opts to just stay on stage and finish. Grohl talks about knowing one person in Nashville, Zac Brown. As he introduced Brown to the stage, he talked about how when they met he knew he had made a friend for life. He talks about Brown’s talent and his passion for Southern Ground Studio. “After a week in this city, I didn’t want to leave because I love this city so much. The roots of this city are more important than any city in the world,” Grohl said to his Ryman congregation. He spoke about how even though things are changing and buildings are being built, our roots are still here and we have to fight to keep them.
Dave Grohl: Music activist.
After the lengthy intro, Brown joined the band, also in corpse face paint. The band, along with Brown, cover Black Sabbath’s “War Pigs.”
The Foo Fighters ended their set at 2 am with “Everlong.” Just like the closing campfire song at summer camp, the room was nostalgic. Everyone was holding onto every note, knowing the night was about end. And that was it. No trick and all treat. The church opened her doors, and a fulfilled congregation was dismissed.
