Foo Fighters frontman Dave Grohl has publicly addressed his highly publicized infidelity. Following his September 2024 confession that he fathered a child outside of his marriage to Jordyn Blum, the rock icon recently discussed the fallout with The Guardian, his intense commitment to therapy, and the underlying traumas that contributed to his mental state.
Detailing the immense amount of professional help he has sought during the band’s recent hiatus, the vocalist revealed just how rigorously he has been working on himself.
“I’ve been in therapy six days a week for 70 weeks. I did the math the other day: over 430 sessions.”
The extensive treatment was not solely focused on his marital transgressions. The musician was also actively processing severe personal losses, including the devastating back-to-back deaths of his bandmate Taylor Hawkins in March 2022 and his mother Virginia just months later.
Explaining why he needed to look beyond songwriting to truly heal from these compounding tragedies, he shared:
“I have to be perfectly honest. Writing songs and writing lyrics about these things is sometimes enough. As far as having a deeper, longer conversation about them, I still do reserve a lot of this for my own personal life, as impersonal and public as it may seem. But I think that for many reasons, I wound up in a place that I needed to stop and sit with myself and re-evaluate myself. It’s an ongoing process.”
Navigating the intense public scrutiny following his confession required a drastic shift in perspective. Addressing how he handled the media spotlight and public opinion, he noted:
“I had to turn everything off, one of those things being my concern for what other people think. Being able to shut off that part of yourself can be sometimes a very healthy exercise in considering life within your immediate radius. Not giving all of that so much currency within yourself that it can completely destroy yourself.”
The conversation also explored his history of burying himself in his work. Reflecting on his constant need to be productive and how it impacted his well-being, he admitted:
“There were years where I was so overly ambitious with things, like a documentary series on HBO, writing a book, whatever. I think having grown up in suburban Virginia with a public-school teacher as a mother, any opportunity you got, you would take. But over time, you spread yourself so thin. And so I look back and I’m like, God, what was I trying to prove? There is such a thing as addiction to achievement, and it’s dangerous. You’ll set a goal for yourself and you put everything you have into it; the world disappears. Then you achieve that finish line, and it feels good for 24 f**king hours, and that feeling immediately goes away. And there’s that hole again, there’s that emptiness, and you’re like, s**t, I need to fill it up with something else.”
When the interviewer asked if this relentless drive and subsequent emptiness directly caused his infidelity, the frontman clarified his mindset at the time.
“No. I think that’s how I ended up overextending myself and getting lost. I wasn’t sitting with myself and really letting [feelings] go from my head into my heart. Getting to the point where I was just like, I need to stop, turn everything off and find my heart.”
Despite the shocking news, the rest of the group rallied behind their singer and his family. Bassist Nate Mendel recalled the immediate reaction from the camp when they found out:
“We just all wanted to run and give him a big hug and let him know — both of them — that we are here.”
Guitarist Chris Shiflett echoed that sentiment, adding that the resulting break from touring ended up being a necessary pause due to his own personal tragedies.
“When Dave called me that morning. I just thought: take all the time you need. And then my house burned down a few months after that [in the California wildfires.] So having an extensive break wound up being necessary for me.”
Moving forward, Foo Fighters are preparing to release their next studio album, Your Favorite Toy, on April 24. The band recently dropped the record’s latest single, “Caught In The Echo“.
Your Favorite Toy Tracklist:
- “Caught In The Echo”
- “Of All People”
- “Window”
- “Your Favorite Toy”
- “If You Only Knew”
- “Spit Shine”
- “Unconditional”
- “Child Actor”
- “Amen, Caveman”
- “Asking For A Friend”
The release of the new album will pave the way for the band’s massive “Take Cover” world tour. Following headline appearances at US festivals like Welcome To Rockville and Bottlerock, the global trek will officially kick off on June 10 at the Unity Arena in Oslo.
Photo credit: Moffly / Depositphotos
