“Heeyyyy!” howls Dave Grohl, igniting pent up frustration with feral intensity. “You had to wait all night for this shit, and we’ve got to squeeze in 31 years to this fuckin’ set. Are you ready?!”
Damn right, Rockville is ready. After severe thunderstorms saw the festival site evacuated for a couple of hours, leading some acts to cancel altogether, the Foo Fighters frontman leads his band on as the unyielding hero, ready to save the day at the literal eleventh hour. Opening with a cover of Late!’s Winnebago, the first song Foos ever jammed together, isn’t the barn-burning beginning most would want as the clock ticks towards midnight, but a tarmac-rattling All My Life sets shit off.
“We’ve played shows before where the weather has fucked stuff up,” Dave pauses for breath after the initial onslaught, the lights going up on a massive main stage crowd. “Everybody goes away to their cars and I always wonder whether they’ll come back. So I’m very thankful that you have. And now we’re all here? We’re going to play songs and you’ll sing along until they pull the plug!”
It’s been a busy 2026 already for Dave and the boys. Back in January, they romped a handful of big one-off shows – Mexico’s Feria de León, Los Angeles’ Kia Forum, a landmark stadium headline in Tasmania – but since then they’ve been fuelling the hype train for 12th album Your Favorite Toy with more intimate engagements. From London’s 2,000-cap O2 Shepherd’s Bush Empire to the 80-cap St James’ Church in Dingle, Ireland, small rooms have routinely been reduced to rubble.