Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace is the sixth studio album by the Foo Fighters, released on September 25, 2007.

The album debuted at the top of the UK album chart, selling 135,685 albums in its first week. The album also went platinum in its first week in both Australia and New Zealand. In the U.S., it entered the Billboard 200 album chart at #3, selling 168,668 copies in its first week, and has since been certified gold. As of September 4th, 2008, it has sold 792,612 copies in US.

The album was the band's fourth to have a song reach the top of the Modern Rock Tracks, with "The Pretender", as well as "Long Road to Ruin" and "Let It Die". With 18 weeks at the summit, "The Pretender" also set the record for longest stretch at #1 on Billboard's Alternative / Modern Rock chart. With "Long Road to Ruin" (7 weeks at #1) and "Let It Die" (4 weeks at #1), the album has a total of 29 weeks atop the chart, making it the most successful album on the chart since Linkin Park's Meteora. Also with "Let It Die", it is the group's first album to spawn 3 Number One hits from the same album on the Modern Rock Tracks charts, it is only the ninth album in history to spawn 3 number 1 hits on this chart.

The album won the 2008 Grammy for Best Rock Album and "The Pretender" won for Best Hard Rock Performance. The album was also nominated for Album of the Year, while "The Pretender" was also nominated for Record of the Year and Best Rock Song. The band had previously won Best Rock Album Grammys for There Is Nothing Left to Lose and One by One.

Background

"We've been in the studio for the past month and a half, and we've got about another month to go. We've been recording with our friend Gil Norton. He worked on our second record (The Colour and the Shape), he's a good guy and he makes amazing albums. So we're making a really big powerful record, which I'm very excited about... I can't wait to jump on stage and do this stuff, it's gonna be great.

Kaki King makes a guest appearance on "Ballad of the Beaconsfield Miners". The instrumental was written by Grohl prior to a meeting with one of the miners involved in the Beaconsfield mine collapse.

The album's first single, "The Pretender", was released on September 17,2007 to CD single, however was released as music download and radio play in August 2007, preceding the album launch. Long Road to Ruin was released as the second single in December 2007.

The album's title comes from a lyric on the album's final song, "Home".

Track listing

1. "The Pretender" – 4:29
2. "Let It Die" – 4:05
3. "Erase/Replace" – 4:13
4. "Long Road to Ruin" – 3:44
5. "Come Alive" – 5:10
6. "Stranger Things Have Happened" – 5:21
7. "Cheer Up, Boys (Your Make Up Is Running)" – 3:41
8. "Summer's End" – 4:37
9. "Ballad of the Beaconsfield Miners" – 2:32
10. "Statues" – 3:47
11. "But, Honestly" – 4:35
12. "Home" – 4:52

Australian Tour Edition

• Standard 12 tracks above.
• DVD: 5 Performances from their Hyde Park live DVD.
• "In Your Honor"
• "All My Life"
• "Best Of You"
• "Generator"
• "Monkey Wrench"

Bonus Tracks

1. "Once & for All (demo)" – 3:47 (Japan, iTunes and UK bonus track)
2. "Seda" - 3:44 (Japan, and iTunes pre-order track)

Personnel

Foo Fighters

• Dave Grohl – lead vocals, rhythm guitar, piano on "Summer's End", "Statues" and "Home"
• Taylor Hawkins – drums, piano on "Summer's End", backing vocals on "Erase/Replace", "Cheer Up, Boys (Your Make Up Is Running)" and "But, Honestly"
• Nate Mendel – bass
• Chris Shiflett – lead guitar

Additional musicians

• Drew Hester – percussion on "Come Alive", "Let it Die", "Cheer Up, Boys (Your Make Up Is Running)", "Long Road to Ruin" and "Summer's End"
• Rami Jaffee – keyboards on "Let it Die", "Erase/Replace", "Long Road to Ruin", "Come Alive" and "But, Honestly", accordion on "Statues"
• Brantley Kearns Jr. – fiddle on "Statues"
• Kaki King – guitar on "Ballad of the Beaconsfield Miners"
• Pat Smear – guitar on "Let it Die"
• Strings by The Section Quartet (arranged and conducted by Audrey Riley)

Production

• Gil Norton – producer
• Adrian Bushby – engineer
• Jake Davies - protools engineer
• John Lousteau – assistant engineer
• Rich Costey – mixer
• Claudius Mittendorfer – assistant mixer
• Brian Gardner – mastering

Artwork

• Don Clark – art direction and design
• Laura Kleinhenz – photography
• Ben Watts – photography

Album charts

Singles charts

Awards

BRIT Awards

References