Foo Fighters - Sonic Highways

I love me some Foos.  I still love Nirvana, but the Foo Fighters are, in their own right, a really great rock and roll band.  Their first three albums are all really great, and when I saw them play ACL a few years ago the show was extremely fun (except for a 20 minute drum solo in the middle that made me want to punch someone).

Anyway, they have put out their eighth album, Sonic Highways, that goes along with an HBO documentary about travelling the country to get regional flavoring into their songs.  Each song was to be recorded in a different music-loving city (Chicago, D.C., Nashville, Austin, L.A., New Orleans, Seattle, and NY), and the Foos were highly excited that they would get a cool influence for each song that flavored the tune with a regional musical taste.  

I call B.S.  That song in the background of that trailer is the "Chicago" song.  Huh?  And the preview makes it sound like there was a hip hop influence on the album.  Not to my ears.

On the one hand, I like these songs - the disc is good.  But, it sounds like any other Foo Fighters album I have ever heard.  The "Austin" song, What Did I Do?/God as my Witness, purportedly guest starring Gary Clark Jr., sounds like the Foo Fighters without Gary Clark Jr.  Maybe the barroom piano is the Austin touch?  You definitely don't hear a non-Foo-style guitar on the track.  You can maybe hear the Preservation Hall Jazz Band on the "New Orleans" song, but they just play backing horns to the normal guitar sounds that the Foo Fighters use on every album.  

Maybe this is just some big META commentary about the homogenization of America - that you can just find the exact same stuff in any part of the country.  The Foo Fighters are universal, man.

They could have done something much more extreme, truly reflecting the sound of each city, and it would have been awesome.  Do a song in the zydeco style of New Orleans.  Go full county for Nashville.  Make a Laurel Canyon harmony in L.A.  Get bluesy in Chicago.  Go hip hop in New York.  Let Gary Clark Jr. or Willie Nelson be heard and make a cool mashup of the Foos with real Austin.  But as the album stands right now, you would never know that I Am a River is based on New York.  Or at least I wouldn't - maybe you are a connoisseur of regional New York sounds. Good album, but a missed chance to really do what they claimed they were going to do.

I also have to beef with the cover art.  I think the concept is super cool - the cover is separated into nine squares, with eight of them depicting iconic portions of the eight cities represented on the album.


Austin's portion (lower left) has the Frost Bank tower, the Pennybacker bridge, and some grass (?) separated by low concrete walls (?):

Did Frost Bank bankroll this album or something?  How is a ten year old building that looks like a nose clipper the most iconic thing they could come up with in Austin?  I honestly have little problem with that building by now - it actually is pretty cool - but the best thing to exemplify Austin?  How about the pink granite capitol building?  Zilker Park?  (which may be what they are trying to do with the green spaces?) Memorial Stadium?  The UT Tower?  Hell, why not Sixth Street with some inaccurate signage to include Stubb's, Continental Club, Threadgill's, Antone's, etc?  A huge BBQ pit?  I feel like someone should answer for this.