Foo Fighters Touch Down in TO!! The Grammy Award Winners Kick Off North American Leg at Rogers Stadium
- Justin Michael Carriere
- 8 minutes ago
- 12 min read
By: Justin Michael Carriere
Toronto, Canada - Foo. Fucking. Fighters. To be honest it’s hard to know where to start on this one… Dave Grohl, the original Foo Fighter, has been a pioneer in rock and roll for over 30 years and his list of accomplishments is absolutely immeasurable. But I will say one thing definitively… the man is a Bonafide ROCK STAR!! I can’t even begin to comprehend how he can engage FIFTY THOUSAND people so thoroughly you’d think he was just shootin' the shit with his buddies over beers in the back yard.
With the first stop of the North American Take Cover Tour the Foos landed among a legion of fans on August 4th. Did I mention there were FIFTY THOUSAND of them, ‘cause if not, then my apologies; there were 50,000 people in attendance to watch Mr. Grohl and his bandmates put on a show at Rogers Stadium.
With the latest iteration of FF featuring Rami Jaffee (keyboards), Ilan Rubin (drums, backing vocals), and longtime members Pat Smear (guitar), Nate Mendel (bass, backing vocals) and Chris Shiflett (guitar, backing vocals) the band arrived in TO fresh off the European leg of this current tour and hit the Rogers Stadium stage running. The band has countless accolades and awards to their names (Dave Grohl has even won Emmys!!) but the one thing that will always rise above rest is this; they put on one of the best damn rock shows you’ll ever see in your life!!
And did the weather ever cooperate to allow that to happen! A gloriously hot and dare I say… cloudless… day in Toronto greeted those that arrived early (such as myself) to make sure they got the full Rogers Stadium treatment. With a sprawling space that boasts two lounges and a huge merch location, and oh yeah, a massive outdoor stadium with three gigantic screens, just arriving at the venue makes you feel like you’re about to experience something special.
Mannequin Pussy
Hitting the stage early to kick off the evening was Mannequin Pussy, an indie rock/punk outfit from Philadelphia comprised of Marisa “Missy” Dabice (vocals, guitar), Kaleen Reading (drums), Colins “Bear” Regisford (bass, vocals) and Maxine Steen (guitar). With 4 studio albums to their credit, the band has been growing in acclaim and has had music featured on TV shows Mare of Easttown and The Hunting Wives.
With the addition of guitar player Emily Rosenfield to help out with live duties, the quintet packed quite a punch to open the evening! With a sound reminiscent of nineties acts like Hole and Garbage, their set was short but tight. Opening with “I Got Heaven”, the title track off their latest album, Dabice was immediately on the prowl back and forth from the catwalk which extended about 50 feet out from the main stage. Her vocals were sharp and she had a “no fucks given” attitude and the early crowd was soaking it up! With the two-guitar attack from Rosenfield and Steen, she was free to move about while both Regisford and Reading had her back with the rhythm section.
Working through “I Don’t Know You” and “Of Her” the band then rocketed into “OK? OK! OK? OK!” with Regisford bursting in with vocals and a super thick bassline. With the energy sufficiently amped up, and before closing with “Loud Bark”, Dabice seemed genuinely excited and humbled when she said, “Thank you for braving the sun and joining us for our first stadium show”. Well, I for one would never have been able to tell as they totally killed it. I have no doubt they’ll gather a good chunk of new fans on this tour!
Mannequin Pussy Photo Gallery (all photos by: Justin Michael Carriere)
Queens of the Stone Age
Now, normally this is where I would say something to the extent of “next up was a band called (insert name here) from (insert place here)” … but in this instance I’ll simply say… QOTSA… This show was so big that Queens of the Stone Age, who have no problem headlining their own shows, were gracious enough to join FF and perform opening duties for an EXTREMELY appreciative TO crowd. I actually heard someone say “I’m just here for QotSA, so not sure I’ll stay for the Foos…” such is the deep fandom for Josh Homme and the boys!!
Formed by Homme in 1998, and with 8 studio albums, the band has had a bit of a revolving door of members. But the current line-up, featuring Troy Van Leeuwen (guitar, backing vocals, multi-instrumentalist), Michael Shuman (bass, keyboards, backing vocals), Dean Fertita (keyboards, guitar, backing vocals) and Jon Theodore (drums) is as potent as ever and brings the QotSA sound loud and clear. With a recording of Starland Vocal Band’s “Afternoon Delight” playing throughout the stadium, images of their faces appeared on the screen above the stage and before long started to distort, along with the music, as the band entered…
Exuding undeniable cool and clad in an undershirt and quasi steampunk shades, Homme looked like he’d just emerged from a spirit walk in the desert to bless us with the infinite knowledge of the universe. Every band member had their own distinct summer stadium show style, but every single choice was top shelf and coalesced into quintessential QotSA. They opened their set with “Misfit Love” and the perfectly honed Homme tone is instantly recognizable. A Sabbath-ian guitar fuzz with a slashing staccato mixed with his mellifluous baritone and airy falsetto, it’s not hard to see how he’s managed to garner such a following over the years. But no man is an island (except on his first album, but you get it) and his bandmates are right there with him. Van Leeuwan is unflappable in his guitar work and punctuates his phrasing with kicks, drops and head throws (if that’s a thing??). Fertita moves easily from the keys to guitar and Theodore keeps everything tight behind his kit.
And Shuman… well, it’s hard to put into the words dear reader, so I will say this; sometimes a camera is simply drawn to something. In this particular case, my camera was drawn to Mr. Michael Shuman. He was a livewire with the perfect combination of zero fucks given and all the fucks given (again, not sure if that’s a thing, but that’s how I’m describing it!). Needless to say, he was a joy to photograph and if you happen to catch the next QotSA show give him a watch, you won’t be disappointed!
Okay! I think I’ve probably waxed a little too poetical here, so on with the show!
While the opening “Misfit Love” was a great start, it wasn’t without issue. At one point, Homme’s mic cut out completely. But the professional he was, he didn’t miss a beat, and continued on and trusted it would come back, as indeed it did! Shoutout to the tech guys for gettin’ er done in real time. Moving through “In My Head” and “My God is the Sun”, the latter of which felt very apropos as it was a cooker, they hit us with “I Sat by the Ocean”, “If I Had a Tail” and “Emotion Sickness”. Ever the stoic sage, Homme didn’t say much between tunes, but they kept the pace high, and following “Emotion Sickness” they pounded out what I can only describe as a batch of bangers! To be fair, most of the tunes were bangers, but “Make It Wit Chu”, “Little Sister”, “Go With the Flow” and “Nobody Knows” was mind crippling. Fun fact (that a lot of you may know), but the high part on the chorus of “Make It Wit Chu” is courtesy of Mr. Shuman, and, on this particular night, also courtesy of the good people of the Rogers Stadium.
Before ending with a bit of an extended jam version of “Song For The Dead”, featuring solos of both the guitar and drum kind, Homme thanked the crowd from “all the way over there, to all the way over there, to all the way back there, to all the way right fucking here” and told us to “have a wonderful fucking evening” And if we hadn’t been having one before that, we sure as hell were by the time QotSA took their exit.
Queens of the Stone Age Photo Gallery (all photos by: Justin Michael Carriere)
Foo Fighters
Seems a little paltry to say “next up” when the “next up” is meant for a generation-defying band, so I’ll go with “gracing the stage following QotSA were the dudes 50,000 people had packed the stadium to see” … The motherfucking Foo. Fighters. With red smoke billowing out of the top of the stage and white smoke from the bottom (which I couldn’t capture because I had my zoom lens on but I took a picture of someone’s phone video’ing it!), reverb echoing from the 6 massive speaker towers, the men of the hour came running out… literally! Dave Grohl sprinted down to the end of the runway, put his hands up in the air and screamed “Are you ready??” After a riotous response, the band launched into “All My Life”.
Right off the hop they were in fine form. The sound was incredible, and unbelievably, the same vigour that he started the night with held through the whole show. At one point he asked “do you motherfuckers like rock music? I hope so because we’re gonna play for 3 hours!” At the time I imagined it was simply hyperbole… nope… THREE MOTHERFUCKING (you’re gonna hear that word a lot in the ensuing paragraphs) HOURS of music!! Not sure how many bands can play that long, open with 4 TOP TEN hits, and still continue to churn out a three-hour show with SO MANY MORE!! But such was the case on this night. They followed “All My Life” with “The Pretender”, “Times Like These” and “Rope”. It seems silly that I have to move past such fantastic tunes without saying much but we have a lot of shit to cover!!
After “Stacked Actors” the familiar drumline of “My Hero” came in loud and proud and every person was transported back to how cool they felt when Mr. Grohl first bestowed it upon us. For me there are two instances; reveling in the glory of having just bench pressed 225 lbs for the first time (which I don’t do anymore!) and having watched James Van Der Beek (R.I.P.) win the championship game in Varsity Blues. I imagine the whole stadium was reflecting on their own personal experiences because this was one of the biggest sing alongs of the night!
From there they went right into “Learn to Fly” and “These Days”. And prior to the latter, Mr. Grohl, while underscoring himself with the intro to the song (which my musically feeble brain always finds impressive!) took the time to say that the band tries to play a song from every record. But if it’s not possible at the very least they’ll play “song after song after song after song after song after song after song after song after song” until they’re told to stop. And yes I counted the number of times he said it so I could quote it directly!
After finishing up “Walk”, Grohl called to the lighting team to “light ‘em up, let me see these motherfuckers, I gotta see who I got!”. And upon seeing who he had, then exclaimed “Ladies and gentlemen, this is a big fucking Foo Fighters show!” Hard to argue! At this point Grohl was drenched in sweat, but hadn’t missed a beat. After performing “This is A Call” for all the “old school” fans the band broke into “No Son of Mine” which I wasn’t as familiar with. But if you’ve not heard it, it can best be described as a chuggin southern train! The thumping drums and rolling guitars lent themselves perfectly to an “Ace of Spades” tie in! Lemmy would be proud.
After finishing the above, which featured an epic drum solo courtesy of Mr. Rubin, the band moved some gear to the end of the runway for a stripped down set of 4 songs. Kicking it off with “Wheels”, which according to Dave Grohl is evidently beloved by both Germany AND Canada, it featured Chris Shiflett on backing vocals and was a great start to the “laid back” set. After that, Grohl introduced “Marigold” with a quick anecdote about how he wrote the song when he lived with Kurt Cobain and it was a B side on "Heart Shaped Box". It took me a moment to take in the sheer volume of rock music history in one quick little aside, but it added so much depth to the performance. Next up on the "platform” was “Big Me” and Grohl quipped that they had stopped playing this song for the longest time because people kept throwing Mentos at them (if you know you know).
To close out their mini set, Grohl set up solo for “Under You”, which he dedicated to Shane Hawkins, the son of the late Foos drummer Taylor Hawkins, on his birthday. This was a beautiful performance and I found myself wondering, “how does one stand up by themselves, in front of 50,000 strangers and sing about genuine loss and not completely lose it…” Well, I don’t know the answer, but luckily Dave Grohl does, and we were gifted a very moving performance of the song. I’m sure I wasn’t the only one in the crowd who was getting a little misty eyed.
But it didn’t last long as Grohl and the band were immediately back to the main stage and catapulted right into “La Dee Da” and “Run” which is a perfect stadium song! Driving guitars, epic drums (complete with a solo in this instance) and the sweet spot of screamin vocals with a catchy “sing along” chorus and the stadium was on board to do just that!
At this point in the show Grohl took the time to introduce the band… but not in a way I’ve ever seen before! Since all the members have been in multiple groups before landing with the Foos, they took a chunk of time to play snippets of songs from each man’s individual catalogue! A super creative way to do it (especially if you have three hours to play!). First up was Mr. Chris Shiflett who took over on vocal duties for the No Use for a Name punk tune “Invincible”. Mr. Nate Mendel was next with a Sunny Day Real Estate offering, “Seven”, as Grohl quipped it was a treat for “you Warped Tour motherfuckers”. And it absolutely was! Following that was Rami Jaffee, who kicked into “One Headlight”!! I had no idea, but Jaffee was in The Wallflowers with Jakob Dylan. A fun performance and hilarious “lyrics” from Grohl. Pat Smear was introduced next and as Grohl told us he “was in the most influential American punk rock band from Los Angeles in… a long time ago!” the crowd erupted! The band then played the Germs song “Manimal” (shoutout to Mr. Michael Shuman from QotSA for rocking an old school Germs tee during their set!). And last but far from least was “bad ass motherfucker” Ilan Rubin! And we found out very quickly how just how bad ass! He stepped out from behind the drums, accepted the guitar from Grohl, who took his place behind the kit and the band broke into “Tap Dancing in a Minefield” from The New Regime. And the man can shred! And what a pleasure to see Mr. Dave Grohl behind a drum kit again!
As the most epic band intro I’ve seen came to a close, the band started into "Monkey Wrench", and despite being 2 full hours into the show, they hadn’t lost an ounce of steam! Featuring a pre-show scream check in from Grohl, and another thumping drum solo from Rubin, it felt like the night just kept amping up!
After moving through “Breakdown” and “The Sky is a Neighborhood” they arrived at “Aurora”. Grohl took the time to tell us “this is for Taylor, he used to love playing this one”. Another poignant moment in a night that had thus far given us the gamut of rock show experiences.
Before getting to their last song of the evening, they played a new tune off the latest record Caught In The Echo and then launched into their closer (but not really!) “Best of You”. An amazing note to end on and Grohl’s vocals were still razor sharp which is impressive after three hours of rock n’ roll singin’!! Once they had left the stage (and the house lights hadn’t come on!) the Rogers Stadium crowd knew they were in for an encore!
After a brief (and well earned) respite, the band came back on stage and Grohl dedicated the following song, “The Teacher”, to his late mother. Armed with a double neck guitar, and the with the stage aglow in green, he started by himself before the band joined in on the 10 minute plus opus. A moving tribute which set the stage for the true closer of the evening… “Everlong”. “We’ve got 6 minutes before they cut the fucking power… so let’s sing one more together before we go!” said Grohl and did we ever! 50,000 strong singing loud as FIREWORKS exploded from the top of Rogers Stadium and the Foos concluded what can only be deemed a legendary rock show!
Set List
All My Life
The Pretender
Times Like These
Rope
Stacked Actors
My Hero
Learn to Fly
These Days
Walk
This Is a Call
No Son of Mine
Wheels
Marigold
Big Me
Under You
La Dee Da
Run
Invincible / Seven / One Headlight / Manimal / Tap Dancing in a Minefield
Monkey Wrench
Breakout
The Sky Is a Neighborhood
Aurora
Caught in the Echo
Best of You
Encore:
The Teacher
Everlong
As I filed out with the throngs of people, which is a story unto itself, but since I’m already seven pages deep, we’ll save it for another time, I was honestly in disbelief about what I’d just been a part of. And to echo my thoughts, a fan in full Foo regalia turned to me, gave me a fistbump and said, “how good was that… unbelievable”. So I will leave it there dear reader, because it simply was, unbelievable.
5(0,000) Motherfuckers out of 5(0,000)… Motherfuckers!!
Foo Fighters Photo Gallery (all photos by: Justin Michael Carriere)
Foo Fighters Onilne
Show Date: August 4, 2026
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