Foo Fighters

Foo Fighters is an American rock band, formed in Seattle in 1994. It was founded by Nirvana drummer Dave Grohl as a one-man project following the death of Kurt Cobain and the resulting dissolution of his previous band. The group got its name from the UFOs and various aerial phenomena that were reported by Allied aircraft pilots in World War II, which were known collectively as foo fighters.

Prior to the release of Foo Fighters' 1995 debut album Foo Fighters, which featured Grohl as the only official member, Grohl recruited bassist Nate Mendel and drummer William Goldsmith, both formerly of Sunny Day Real Estate, as well as Nirvana touring guitarist Pat Smear to complete the lineup. The band began with performances in Portland, Oregon. Goldsmith quit during the recording of the group's second album, The Colour and the Shape (1997), when most of the drum parts were re-recorded by Grohl himself. Smear's departure followed soon afterward.

Sonic Highways

Sonic Highways is the eighth studio album by the American rock band Foo Fighters. It was produced by Butch Vig and was released on November 10, 2014, on RCA Records. In writing the album's eight songs, singer and guitarist Dave Grohl traveled to eight cities across the United States to conduct interviews with musicians, recording engineers, record producers, and other individuals discussing each city's musical history, which he used as inspiration for the songs' lyrics. The band and Vig then traveled to a different recording location in each city to record the songs. Each track features contributions from one or more musicians with ties to that city's musical history. The process was filmed for a companion television series, Foo Fighters: Sonic Highways, which was broadcast on HBO in the months surrounding the album's release.

Background and writing

Despite initially announcing a break after supporting Wasting Light, Grohl later stated in January 2013 that the band had started writing material for an eighth studio album. On February 20, 2013, at the Brit Awards, Grohl said he was flying back to America the following day to start work on the next album. In an August 2013 interview with XFM, Grohl announced that their next album has been slated for a 2014 release, saying:

Sonic

Sonic or Sonic may refer to:

Companies

Music

Science and technology

HBO

HBO (Home Box Office) is an American premium cable and satellite television network that is owned by Home Box Office Inc., the cable flagship division of Time Warner. HBO's programming consists primarily of theatrically released motion pictures and original television series, along with made-for-cable movies and documentaries, boxing matches and occasional stand-up comedy and concert specials.

It is the oldest and longest continuously operating pay television service (basic or premium) in the United States, having been in operation since November 8, 1972. In 2014, HBO had an adjusted operating income of US$1.79 billion, compared to the US$1.68 billion it accrued in 2013.

Overview

As of July 2015, HBO's programming is available to approximately 36,483,000 households with at least one television set (31.3% of all cable, satellite and telco customers) in the United States (36,013,000 subscribers or 30.9% of all households with pay television service receive at least HBO's primary channel), making it the second largest premium channel in the United States (Encore's programming reaches 40.54 million pay television households as of July 2015). In addition to its U.S. subscriber base, HBO broadcasts in at least 151 countries, covering approximately 122 million subscribers worldwide.

Foo Fighters: Sonic Highways

Sonic Highways is a 2014 American documentary miniseries directed by Dave Grohl and written by Mark Monroe. The documentary was made concurrently with Foo Fighters' eighth album, Sonic Highways, and was broadcast on HBO. Grohl described the project as "a love letter to the history of American music". Each of the eight episodes is presented as an exploration of the musical history of a different American city through a series of interviews by Grohl. The group is also shown incorporating what they learned from the interviews into the writing and recording of a new song in or near that city. The series debuted on October 17, 2014.

Development

After the success of Grohl's 2013 documentary film Sound City, he expressed interest to Billboard of doing something similar. According to Grohl,

On May 15, 2014, it was announced that Foo Fighters' eighth album would be released in the fall of 2014, and that Foo Fighters would commemorate the album and 20th anniversary with the TV series. Each song on the new album was recorded in a different city, featuring “local legends” on each song and lyrics inspired by the ”experiences, interviews and personalities that became part of the process.”