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Foo Fighters’ efforts fall short with an underwhelming return.

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More personal upheaval coats the sonics of their latest, Your Favourite Toy as they surmise and take stock of where they’ve been – and where they can possibly go next.

Of course, for a band literally born from the pain of Cobain’s death, relying on music to help them through difficult times has been their token of success. Some of their greatest works have been born from grief. A better case couldn’t be better with their most recent, 2023’s But Here We Are.

A contemplative and deeply mournful record, the bones of it was made of the band coming to terms with the substantial loss of long-time drummer and compatriot Taylor Hawkins in 2022, aswell as Dave Grohl’s mother, Virginia. A devastating year that would impact all individuals in more ways than one, it saw the band at their most heartfelt, their most earnest. Channelling the spirit from their debut, it was a welcoming return for a band who, against everything, were still fighting the good fight. It can be said that where words fail, music prevails.

Now with their twelfth album, it has been equally strained. Bouts of Grohl’s admissions of infidelity and the firing of Hawkin’s replacement, Josh Freese led to many questions unanswered. In the build up to this record, these questions were left hanging like an elephant in the room. Of course, Dave and company don’t owe us anything, least of all to air their dirty laundry in public, but it certainly left a big stink around the star we used to coin the “nicest man in rock.”

And so, Your Favourite Toy comes with a ruffling of the feathers, while they bat away the circling PR nightmare. An aggressive-sounding Foos who are more committed to the bit, their latest sees the band return to that energetic punk spirit of old. This time around, the matter of loss is met with the loud, rebellious scorched-Earth approach. But amongst the distortion, something has got lost along the way.

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