(Credits: Far Out / Raphael Pour-Hashemi)
Tue 2 December 2025 19:37, UK
When Nirvana split up following the tragic death of Kurt Cobain, nobody expected Dave Grohl to become one of the best songwriters of his generation.
Yet when a self-titled album was released in 1995 – an effort that Grohl had written and recorded himself entirely – no one in the industry could quite believe it was him. The legendary drummer had stepped out from behind the kit and pushed himself into the songwriting spotlight.
Since that moment, he has grown and grown into becoming one of the foremost rock songwriters of the last 30 years. With Foo Fighters, Grohl has established himself as one of the best, taking a range of influences into his work to create truly anthemic rock music. The Beatles, Rush and Led Zeppelin can all be heard in the band’s tunes.
It might seem challenging to place Grohl’s songwriting influences from that first album. Like his ex-bandmate Cobain, Grohl clearly held a special place in his heart for the Beatles, but last year, he gave us an insight into the clear influences on his writing. Discussing those to have impacted his own creative vision, he claimed to be indebted to Hüsker Dü’s Bob Mould.
“I grew up with The Beatles, I loved Led Zeppelin, I fucking loved the Bad Brains and punk rock,” Grohl told Classic Rock in 2011. “But when it comes to guitar playing and song structure, I think that Hüsker Dü might be my biggest songwriting influence. I was a huge Hüsker Dü fan, and obviously Bob Mould’s music has influenced the way I write music and the way I play guitar. A lot of what I do comes from Bob.”
Dave Grohl performing with Foo Fighters. (Credits: Raph Pour-Hashemi)
Grohl continued in his praise of Mould: “Bob Mould should be placed in the highest ranks of America’s greatest songwriters and lyricists. You can argue that he’s just as influential in his own right as Tom Petty – he’s a classic American songwriter, only writing from a different place to most.”
Punk music was Grohl’s first sonic love, and he eventually played in the hardcore punk band Scream before joining Nirvana. Discussing punk, Hüsker Dü and Mould, in particular, Grohl said: “When I discovered punk rock in the early ’80s, there were bands that stood out because of their heaviness or speed or dissonance. But Hüsker Dü, which was Bob Mould’s original band, had this sense of classic melody – it was almost like a punk rock band playing Byrds songs.”
Evidently, the melodic nature of Mould’s Hüsker Dü songs touched something in Grohl, most likely to do with that profound love for Lennon and McCartney’s writing. Grohl added: “[Hüsker Dü] were the first punk rock band that I listened to that had a double album – the Zen Arcade record, which went from breakneck thrash buzzsaw guitars to acoustic ballads. And having been raised on The Beatles and loving the White Album, there was something about that dynamic that I loved.”
Grohl had, of course, been known for his pounding drumming, which is why the sensitivity of the early Foo Fighters output was all the more surprising, but it’s clear that he took significant influence from Mould. He added, “If you go back and listen, you’ll hear his influence in the stuff I’ve done. So much that I reference Hüsker Dü in a lot of lyrics.” In fact, Grohl had recently referenced Hüsker Dü on last year’s LP, Medicine at Midnight.
Fortunately for Grohl, he finally managed to meet his hero and express his gratitude. “I’d seen him play in 1984 or ’85, but I was just a stage-diving, slam-dancing kid singing along to the songs,” he said. “I finally got to meet him maybe ten years ago. I said, ‘I just have to thank you because I’ve really taken a lot from your music.’ And he said, ‘I know’.”
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