Foo Fighters - Matthew Knight Arena - Eugene, OR

Eugene, Oregon, also known as TrackTown USA, is a haven to hipsters working on their facial hair and the iGeneration seeking their post-secondary education. It is also not necessarily the first place you’d think of to host one of the biggest bands on planet Earth, but that’s exactly what happened December 5th, 2017.

The Matthew Knight Arena, home to the University of Oregon Ducks basketball and indoor volleyball programs, is a state of the art facility capable of sheltering just over 12,000 men, women, and children. But on this foggy, cold evening in December, its doors were opened to the Northwest’s own Foo Fighters.

But before we would be experiencing the fighters of the Foo, we were treated to an absolutely incredible performance by a 4-piece from across the pond called The Struts. The Struts, made up of lead singer Luke Spiller, guitarist Adam Slack, bassist Jed Elliot, and drummer Gethin Davies, absolutely blew the Matthew Knight Arena away. The flamboyant, charismatic Luke Spiller engaged with every soul in the venue, inspiring each person to wave their arms, stand up, dance around, and cheer. I have never in all my years seen an opening band get the crowd as engaged as this foursome did.

Luke addressed the crowd saying, “I know that none of you are here to see us tonight, but thank you for checking us out and giving us the time of day. Thank you.” He went on later to say, “Back home in the UK, we don’t get this kind of attention, so we bought four tickets and came to the USA, and we’re playing the shows of our lives in front of the best people in the world and now supporting the Foos. Thanks to all of you, and thanks to the Foo Fighters.”

There are a lot of parallels that I could draw between The Struts and some other well-known and familiar bands, but I think it would be better for you to lay your senses on them. Then, come back and tell me what you think.

The Foo Fighters were a bit late getting on stage, which meant that the crowd in Eugene was in for a very long night. Afterall, this is not a band that’s best known for adhering to curfew. Opening up with the song “Run” from their recent release, Concrete and Gold, the Foo came out with both barrels blazing. Singer Dave Grohl frantically paced the front of the enormous stage making sure that every eye in the venue was on him and his band. He then went on to say that the Foo Fighters intend to play for roughly six and a half hours which just got the already rambunxious crowd even more fired up. Dave then laughed, saying, “Oh come on, nobody wants to hear ANY band for six fucking hours.”

During one particularly poingiant moment, Dave walked out to the front center of the stage, his beautiful blue Gibson hollow-body in hand and began playing “My Hero.” Dave played and the crowd cheered. As he sang the first two verses without any other accompaniment, it was as if the oxygen just got sucked out of the arena. When the rest of the band kicked in, the roar of the crowd became deafening.

Dave polled the audience to see how many fans have been with them for the past 22 years and how many have never seen the Foos before. It seemed to be a pretty even split from what I could tell. “I guess you old school fans will have to show everybody what to do then,” Dave said.

The band then played “Times Like These.” Before playing the next song, “Breakout,” Dave asked for all the lights in the arena to be turned off and for us to all illuminate the Matthew Knight Arena with our cell phones. Complete darkness gave way to “twilight” as thousands of stars illuminated the space. From my seat, I could see Dave coerce one of his stage crew into giving up one of their headlamps which he then affixed to his head before going on to play the song. After “Breakout” was over, the lights came back up with Dave saying, “That’s the first time I’ve ever worn a headlamp on stage. It just seemed appropriate.”

There were several moments throughout the show when Dave connected with the audience. For example, there was a guy in a banana costume about midway back in the GA section. “Was that just laying around your house, and you decided to wear it to a rock show? How did you get it in, did you just wear it in? It’s fucking Eugene, Oregon… anything goes,” he said. To which, Banana-man nodded. “I guess I need to have a talk with security,” Dave laughed. The Foos then went on to play the Alice Cooper song “Under My Wheels,” dedicated to the sad and lonely Banana-man.

Just a moment later, Dave called out a guy in the front row wearing a Rush shirt. He said “Dude, you in the Rush shirt. I saw you walking to the arena. You were walking alone, and I saw that Rush shirt, and I knew we were going to have a rock show because of that shit right there. I saw you from my stretch limo where I was doing a ton of cocaine, but I saw you!”

The Foos then began playing Rush’s “Tom Sawyer.” After a minute or so, the band stopped and Dave said, “I love you, honestly, but do you really think the Foos would play a Rush song? After a few laughs, they went on to play more “Tom Sawyer” which again got cut short. Dave then got into a “discussion” with “Rush shirt guy” about the last time the Foo Fighters played in Eugene, Oregon. At this point, the fans took a stance insisting that the Foos have never played Eugene. “Well, when we come back, in 22 more years, and that fucker with the Rush shirt is here again, we’ll play the whole song”.

The setlist was great, and the Foos played several cover songs. During Queen’s “Under Pressure,” Luke Spiller from The Struts joined Taylor Hawkins for the vocals, while Dave did his old schtik on the kit. For “Big Me,” Dave got to bring on long time friend and bass player Krist Novoselic whom he credits for helping create the hit.

In an uncharacteristic move, the Foos did the whole encore bit. After “Best Of Me,” they left the stage. While the darkened arena clapped and chanted “Foo,” the enormous diamond shaped video screen displayed Dave and Taylor backstage silently bickering about how many Encore songs they would come out and do. We ended up getting three more, “Dirty Water” from the latest record, a very lengthy and drawn-out tribute to Tom Petty with “Breakdown,” and closing with “Everlong.”

The Foo Fighters played and kept us mesmerized for three hours, a bit short of the six alluded to in the opening. We waited 22 years. We could have stayed for six hours. Thanks Dave and the rest of the incredible Foo Fighters for breathing out so the 12,000+ of us could breathe you in.

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All Writing & Photography:  Terry L. White

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