Dave Grohl opens up about his hearing loss: 'I'm deaf'
He's been lip reading for two decades
Foo Fighters frontman Dave Grohl says that decades of performing on stage with rock bands have left him with tinnitus and hearing loss.
The 53-year-old rock icon told Howard Stern on his SiriusXM show that he’s been lip-reading “for 20 years”, however, despite this, he insists he can “hear the minutiae of everything” he has created in the recording studio.
Commenting on why he doesn’t use in-ear monitors at Foo Fighters shows, Grohl said: “I tried the in-ear monitor thing before, a long time ago, and the problem I have with it is it removes from the natural atmosphere sound. I wanna hear the audience in front of me … It messes with your spatial understanding of where you are on stage.”
Grohl went on to credit his long-standing sound engineer for helping him hear properly at concerts, explaining: “Even though I’m not using ear monitors, the sound on stage for me is f---ing perfect, cos it’s been (done by) the same (monitor sound engineer), Ian Beveridge, for 31 years – since Nirvana. So I’m not up there just getting my ass kicked by some loud stuff. It sounds great.”
“We’ve been playing shows like this for so long, there’s not much I want to change”, Grohl continued. “When we go in and we’re making a record, and we’re mixing an album, I can hear the slightest little things.
“My ears are still tuned in to certain frequencies, and if I hear something out of tune or a cymbal that’s not bright enough or something like that … in the mix, I can f---ing hear the minutiae of everything we had done to that song, I really can.”
Despite being ok on stage and in the studio, Grohl admits he struggles when out and about.
“If you were sitting next to me at dinner, I wouldn’t understand a f---ing word you were saying to me the whole f---ing time,” he said. “There’s no way. In a crowded restaurant – that’s the worst.
“The worst thing about this pandemic s--- is people wearing masks. I’ve been reading lips for, like, 20 years. So when someone comes up to me (speaks in muffled voice), I say, ‘I’m a rock musician. I’m f---ing deaf. I can’t hear what you’re saying’.”
Foo Fighters’ horror comedy movie Studio 666 hits select UK cinemas this Friday (25th February).
The movie soundtrack features a recently unleashed thrash metal song called ‘March of the Insane’ recorded by Dave Grohl as Dream Widow. A full album is also due to arrive imminently.