Foo Fighters and creative freedom

Foo Fighters bassist Nate Mendel recently made his debut as a film composer on an independent movie called Our Burden Is Light, but he's hardly the first member of the Foos to work on an outside project. Frontman Dave Grohl has played drums on albums by Queens Of The Stone Age and Nine Inch Nails, while drummer Taylor Hawkins is working on a solo album and Mendel himself plays in a band called The Fire Theft. The bass player told us that he enjoys having creative freedom while still being a member of Foo Fighters: "You know, the Foo Fighters was kind of imprinted with Dave's personality right from the start, and it's also developed into its own thing outside of him. It's got its own sort of culture around it, and that's fantastic. We all meet and we create that, but, you know, it's nice to be able to do creative things outside the stricture of that."

Foo Fighters were recently added to the lineup of the Voodoo Music Experience, the annual music festival taking place on October 29th and 30th in New Orleans, Louisiana. They join Nine Inch Nails, the Bravery, Queens Of The Stone Age, My Chemical Romance, Louis XIV, Social Distortion and more than 40 other acts.

Foo Fighters will kick off an autumn North American tour with Weezer on September 8th in Atlanta, Georgia. Tickets for the first few shows are on sale now, with more dates to be announced in the weeks ahead.

The band's new double CD, In Your Honor, has been certified platinum for sales of over one million copies.