Dave Grohl has saved one of his most touching “Dave’s True Stories” entries for Father’s Day, penning a tribute to his late father, James Harper Grohl.
In the deeply personal missive, Grohl shares a tale of rebellion, personal growth and eventually understanding of his father and the commonalities that they shared.
The Foo Fighters frontman titled his piece, “Your writing has punch, David. Punch is power,” words that were shared with him from a key turning point in his relationship with his father.
The singer says, “After all these years, this simple message, my first words of true validation as a fledgling writer, has never left me. It echoes in my mind like a long canyon scream each time I sit down to a blank page, and inspired me to fill it with my true voice.”
Dave describes his dad as “an actor, writer, award-winning journalist, lover of art and food, and a ferocious, classically trained musician. A true Renaissance man, yet so conservative that he would sometimes be mistaken in public for the legendary political commentator George Will. All this and more, poured into a crisp, clean seersucker suit.”
If that image seems to clash with what you think of Dave himself, the singer agrees, stating that he viewed their relationship in his teen years as “the Odd Couple on acid. I mean, you can’t really blame the guy for feeling terminally frustrated throughout my adolescent years.”
Grohl says he was never a great student at school, but found his passion in music and by his teenage years he was anxious to play shows with his high school band Mission Impossible. However, his father had grounded him for failing to keep up his grades with the punishment being that he couldn’t play with the group.
That didn’t stop Dave, who found work arounds while trying to set up a club gig that he would ultimately escape his grounding to play. But his father knew what was up and a confrontation was coming.
“Beyond all our differences, if there is one gene that I am most thankful for, it is the one that fueled my love for music, a love that long ago inspired me to give my father his first taste of my literary prowess: a runaway note that I left on his dining-room table in 1985,” writes the singer.
He recalled after being challenged about what he wanted to do with his life, putting all his fury and determination into the note which expressed his desire to leave to pursue his dreams. Rather than further drama came the message from his dad about Dave’s writing with a phone call and the request, “Don’t ever do that again.”
“From that day forward, my father and I forged a new dynamic in our relationship and over the years we developed a friendship based on mutual respect,” says Grohl, who adds that they were able to work through past differences. In his latter years, Grohl says he and his father would have lengthy email discussions utilizing his father’s extensive vocabulary.
“He was endlessly entertaining, and, without realizing it, inadvertently shaping my sense of composition and prose while quickly becoming my favorite read,” says Dave.
He adds, “My father was my first, and best, reader. It was through him that I found my love of writing, filling me with the same sense of purpose and accomplishment that I felt that night at the Bethesda Community Center as a rebellious teen. So much that I’ve even considered trying my hand at writing a book someday. Imagine that. Just call it ‘kicking the apple back up the hill a bit.’ If only he were still around to read it.”
Read through Dave Grohl’s tribute to his father in full below:
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