The Storyteller: Tales of Life and Music

The narrative skips forward again to 2008, when Grohl found himself at the White House getting ready to perform for President George W. Bush at the Kennedy Center Honors tribute concert to The Who. Grohl asked himself, “how on earth did I get here?” (247), in shock at how far he had come in his musical career. He was asked to give a speech before the performance and was handed what he considered a ridiculous, “dude-speak” speech that he could not possibly read. He decided instead to improvise, discussing the unconventional band roles the members of The Who played. The next day, Grohl sat with the President and several other notable people, including The Who, to watch them receive their honorary medals. Although Grohl disagreed with Bush’s politics, he agreed to take a picture with him for the sake of unity.

In another pivotal moment, he performed “Band on the Run” in 2010 for Paul McCartney’s Library of Congress Gershwin Prize ceremony, awarded for a lifetime of contributions to music. Grohl once again asked himself how he got there, but as the show began, he realized that this moment was “in every way the most full-circle moment of [his] life” (254), performing for the President and Paul McCartney, his lifelong musical hero.