The Making Of Concrete And Gold Chords by Foo Fighters

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ [E] _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ About four years ago I was driving in my [Eb] car and this song came on the [Fm] radio.
[Ab] The band was called The Bird [E] and the Bee.
The song was called Again and Again.
And [Cm] it blew my mind.
It [Fm] was like electronic jazz [E] with this beautiful voice singing [Dbm] over top of it.
[G] But melodically, it was so much more sophisticated than anything I'd ever [Bb] heard.
It had elements of Beach Boys and of [Em] Beatles, but [Bm] it seemed totally [E] modern and I became [A] obsessed.
[G] And a few months later I was down in Hawaii and [C] I was sitting at this restaurant and I
look across the restaurant and I see the guy [Dm] from The Bird and the Bee having dinner with his family.
I'm like, oh my fucking god, that's the guy from The Bird [C] and the Bee.
So I [B] run over to him, [Em] totally interrupt his dinner and say, I'm [D] really sorry, _ I'm such
a huge fan and you're [G] a genius.
And he's like, hi, my name's Greg.
I'm like, hi, I'm Dave.
What's going [C] on with The Bird and the Bee?
He's like, well, we're taking a break right [G] now, about to make another record, but I have
to finish working with Sia and Adele and Pink.
I was like, oh, okay, I get it.
He's [C] _ a huge producer.
So we make friends and every day we would [G] stand waist high in the water and talk about
music and [Bb] we talked about the Beatles and [Bm] we talked about the Bad Brains and we [E] talked
[Bm] about the Beach Boys [E] and we talked about [Db]
Motorhead [Ab] and we would just talk about music all day long.
I [Db] realized this guy's a fucking genius, man.
[A] He's so talented, it's nuts.
_ [Em] So in the meantime, we made Sonic Highways, went [E] out on the road, [Gb] [Gm] I break my [D] leg, we [Em] finish
touring, now Sia's the biggest artist in the world, start to [F] learn how to walk again, Adele's
Hello comes out, [Dbm] Greg is [C] becoming the biggest producer in the world and I can't believe it.
I start thinking, wow, well, maybe [A] for our next record, [E] we've got [Em] to switch it up.
So I talked to my manager, John, [B] I'm like, John, maybe we [G] should make our record with Greg Kirsten.
[A] John's like, good luck, get in [C] line.
You'll never get him.
Everybody [Em] wants Greg Kirsten.
[A] He's the busiest man on the earth, there's an eight month [Em] wait just to do a song with
him or whatever.
And I thought, okay, [B] nevermind.
It's not going to happen.
Next time I'm down in Hawaii, we're having dinner, I get trashed and [Cm] I drunkenly confess
to him, yeah, I wanted you to make our record, but our manager was [G] like, get in line, no way.
And the next day in the pool, Greg says, you know, if you ever want to record stuff, I'd
really love to do [C] it.
Oh my God, _ Greg [N] wants to do the record.
Now he's never really made a heavy rock record.
So I come back to the guys in the band, I'm like, I think Greg Kirsten should do it.
They're like, who's Greg Kirsten?
Well, he's the guy that did like the Adele record and the Sia record. _ _
Okay, how does that? _
It really?
[F] I was like, yeah, man, he's a fucking genius.
So everybody says yes.
Greg says yes.
We decide this time to work in a studio called East West on [N] Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood,
which is this _ famous studio where everyone from Frank Sinatra to the Rolling Stones to
ACDC to the Beach Boys, everybody is recorded in the studio.
It's beautiful.
It sounds great.
So we start recording and our riffs go from being heavy to [E] huge.
So a song like Run, _ _ _ _ _ _ but with Greg producing, it turns _ _ _ _ _ _ into_
_ It's clear that these songs that we have are going from Foo Fighters songs to something
bigger than we'd ever done before in our entire lives.
But it was crazy because every day somebody new would be in the studio as well.
One week Lady Gaga is there.
Another week Jason Bonham is there.
The place is legendary.
_ It's unbelievable.
[G] One day [A] I was sitting [G] outside writing the lyrics to a [A] song called [Dm] Concrete and Gold.
And [G] here comes this guy, Sean, who's in the band Boys to Men.
The song that we were recording that day I thought would sound amazing with a choir.
And I said, hey, man, do you want to sing on a Foo Fighters song?
He said, absolutely.
I play him this song.
It's super heavy and [A] dark.
It's _ like_
_ _ _ _ [B] _ [C] _ _
[G] _ _ But then the chorus explodes into this _
[D] huge_
_ _ He listens to it.
He says, what do you want me to do?
I said, well, [Em] I just want it to kind of sound like a choir.
He says, OK, I'm going to sing a triad.
[D] I'm going to quadruple each track.
Then I'm going to sing a wandering track.
I was like, all right, dude, whatever you got to do.
I didn't understand anything [Em] that he was talking about.
And the chorus went from _ _ being_ To [D] _ like_ _ _ _
Totally blew my [A] mind.
At this point, I'm thinking, OK, all bets are off.
Let's just get everybody to come in and play.
So I call my friend Dave Kaz, who's kind of like the king of smooth jazz. _
Dave, do you want to come in and play on a Foo Fighters record?
He's like, absolutely. _
And Allison from The Kills is in town.
[Em] I'm like, come on down.
Sing on the record.
So she comes down, [A] sings on La Di Da.
Makes it a thousand times cooler.
_ [D] _ [C] Meanwhile, Justin Timberlake is in the studio.
[Bb] And on the last day that he's there, he says, hey, man,
can I sing on [G] your record?
Greg and I [A] look at each other.
We're like, _ _ OK. _
So the backup vocals [Am] on this song called [Gm] Make It Right,
there's a section that goes la la la la la.
So we had him do all the la la [A] la's in the [Em] background.
Let's make it a secret and see if they can figure it out.
We finally finished the record.
_ And melodically, we managed to do the one thing
I really [C] wanted to do.
Make this gigantic Foo Fighters record,
but with Greg Kirsten's sense of jazz and melody
[G] and arrangement, something that we'd never [Bm] done before.
And [E] voila, _ that's some [C] badass shit.
_ _ [G] _ _
I didn't even talk about [Bm] fuck Paul McCartney.
_ [E] _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ [Am] _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ [D] _
_ _ _ _ _ _ [E] _ _
_ _ [Em] _ _ [A] _ _ [E] _ _
_ _ _ _ _ [N] _ _ _