A “favourite” album of musician Dave Grohl is actually the soundtrack to a classic Harry Dean Stanton film.
Paris, Texas offered Grohl his most beloved album, with the drummer-turned-frontman suggesting the film’s soundtrack could not be bettered. The Nirvana and Foo Fighters member would suggest the playing of Ry Cooder was what sold him on the album, and what makes it one of his favourites. Grohl would speak with GQ about the songs and musicians he admired most, with the Paris, Texas soundtrack seemingly inspiring Grohl. He said: “There is an instrumental record by an American legend named Ry Cooder. He scored a 1984 movie called Paris, Texas in the ’80s, and the soundtrack to that film is my favourite album of all time.”
Cooder himself would go on to discuss his work on the soundtrack. He said: “[Wenders] did a very good job at capturing the ambience out there in the desert, just letting the microphones and the Nagra machine roll and get tones and sound from the desert itself, which I discovered was E-flat, was in the key of E-flat – that’s the wind, you know, was nice. So we tuned everything to E-flat.”
Grohl would go on to praise Led Zeppelin guitarist Jimmy Page, adding: “It’s that sort of fearlessness that I respect most in musicians, not perfection or any sort of clean technical proficiency. I really like to see musicians right on the edge of falling apart. He did that in the most beautiful way.”
Fellow music legends would soon end up working with Grohl, who had established Foo Fighters as one of the biggest rock and roll outfits around. He and Paul McCartney would collaborate on a song with Nirvana members Krist Novoselic and Pat Smear.
The Grammy-winning song, Cut Me Some Slack, was the result of their efforts in the studio, with McCartney himself describing the song as a “Nirvana reunion.”
Novoselic would go on to dub their McCartney collaboration “Sirvana,” a play on words of Sir Paul McCartney and Nirvana. While the song may have surprised listeners, the performance at a benefit gig and a further showcase on Saturday Night Live has thrilled fans, who are praising the song still, over a decade on from its release.
A post of the performance to the r/Nirvana subreddit had fans praising the McCartney and Nirvana overlap. One fan wrote: “Watching Paul just create this song out of thin air on that very guitar in Sonic Highways is amazing. And Dave apologising and saying he can do better. Just awesome.”
Another wrote: “This was such a fucking great song and performance. I can’t even imagine what Dave, Krist and Pat must’ve been feeling seeing another lefty guitar player who wasn’t Kurt jamming with them, let alone a Beatle.”
A third added: “McCartney could really rock it when he wanted to. I mean this song and Helter Skelter is proof positive.” Fellow listeners even dubbed the song Helter Skelter 2, and were left wanting more from Sirvana.
