Dave Grohl is like most of us in that he, too, brings his phone with him to the bathroom. It’s a good thing he does or else he would’ve missed an important call one time from Saturday Night Live creator Lorne Michaels.
Grohl recalled the moment in an appearance on last night’s episode (May 6) of Late Night with Seth Meyers where he was promoting his two latest streaming projects: The Paramount+ series From Cradle to Stage and What Drives Us, which is available on Amazon Prime’s Coda Collection. At the 5:04 mark in the video below, Grohl talks about how Foo Fighters were tapped to be Mick Jagger’s backing band during a May 2012 episode of SNL.
“I was literally sitting on the toilet when Lorne called. I answered the phone. I said, ‘Hello,’ and it was like, ‘Hold for Lorne Michaels.’ He was like [imitating Michaels], ‘Uhh, David…wanted to call and say…’ He was calling to say that Mick was going to be the host [and musical guest], but he didn’t have a band. So, he called and asked if we would be his band.”
Grohl continued, “I said, ‘Of course!’ I looked at my schedule and I realized we had a show that night. I think it was in New Jersey. so I said, ‘Okay, I’ll make that show go away.’ Because there was no way I was going to miss this opportunity. I call my manager, and he says, ‘You can’t make that show go away. It’s already sold out. You’re the headliner.’”
Grohl concluded, “So, we literally soundchecked at 30 Rock and then took a helicopter to the gig, played for two-and-a-half hours, took a helicopter back, were Mick Jagger’s backing band on the show, and then we played the after-party. Remember the after-party? We played for another hour-and-a-half. It was the greatest day of my life! It was amazing!”
Also amazing was Foo Fighters performance on Late Night where they played “Chasing Birds” from their latest album, Medicine at Midnight.
