Josh Homme repeatedly promised the audience that the benefit concert he hosted at the Belasco in Los Angeles on Wednesday would be “a night of unexpected things.”
And, of course, the frontman and co-founder of Queens of the Stone Age would know that given all the guests were all his friends, including musicians Dave Grohl of Foo Fighters, Beck, and Chad Smith of Red Hot Chili Peppers, as well as comedians Sarah Silverman and Bill Burr.
But even the guy who knew the run of the show wasn’t prepared for the surprise Grohl had planned: an original song he’d written for and about Homme, which left Homme in tears at its finish.
“My first idea that I had, I was like, you know what, this (stuff) is funny,” Grohl said at the benefit for Sweet Stuff, the foundation Homme and his family started a decade ago to help musicians and recording industry people who’d fallen on hard times. “I’m gonna come out and I’m going do a (bleepin’) Doja Cat song.
“And I spent (bleepin’) days trying to learn that, ‘Yeah, (bleep), I said what I said,’” Grohl continued, singing a snippet of “Paint The Town Red” as the audience roared. “There are so many lyrics to that song!”
Grohl said he woke up in the middle of the night, panicked about his choice. “I didn’t want to roll out ‘Everlong’ for the 1000th time,” he said, adding that things got so bad he found himself at 3 a.m. looking at a Spotify playlist titled Great Acoustic Covers.
Finally, he decided to do something “that’s maybe considered really, really uncool – I wrote a song that’s really earnest about my friend, Josh,” Grohl said. “We’re all here for this one big reason, but I don’t know that we’d all be here if it weren’t for that guy.
“So I thought I’m going to write a song about him and embarrass him in front of all his friends by actually singing about how much I (bleepin’) love you, man,” Grohl finished to more cheers from the audience as Homme watched from the side of the stage.
“If I’m free and you’ve got big plans. Take it from me, I’ll take that chance,” Grohl sang in the chorus of his heartfelt song of a friendship that goes back decades. “Don’t need a reason, I understand. Whatever you need, I’ve got you, man.”
Homme, wiping his eyes as he walked back on stage at the finish, gave Grohl a huge hug, saying, “He always does that (stuff) to me,” as Grohl grinned.
Josh Homme and Friends was, as Homme reminded the crowd, a thank you to them for selling out the show in five minutes and raising $250,000 for Sweet Stuff.
And despite the emotional moment that hit Homme via Grohl’s song, the two hours it ran was otherwise a fun and funny party. Homme served as an entertaining tuxedo-clad emcee, bantering with the audience and performers throughout the night.
“I want make this night something that could never happen,” he said at one point, and for the most art, the performers made that happen, picking unexpected songs to cover, and combining on stage to form a unique set of entertainers.
Where else could you watch a magician – Justin Willman, creator of the Netflix series “Magic For Humans” open a rock show? Where else would the magician be followed by a hard rock band formed by 11- and 12-year-olds including Homme’s son Ryder on drums covering Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath?
On what other night would the Sweet Stuffers house band not only include fellow Queens of the Stone Age members Michael Shuman and Troy Van Leeuwen on bass and guitar, but also Arctic Monkeys drummer Matt Helders and tennis legend John McEnroe on guitar?
After the kids wrapped up Zeppelin’s “Immigrant Song” and Sabbath’s “War Pigs,” Jesse Hughes, a friend of Homme’s since high school in Palm Desert, and with him the cofounder of Eagles of Death Metal, arrived on stage as the first of a run of guest stars.
Like most of the acts that followed, Hughes and Homme pulled out an unexpected cover, the Stealers Wheel classic “Stuck In The Middle,” following that with the “Eagles of Death Metal” song “So Easy,” for which Homme played drums on and around Hughes – his body and guitar as well as the mic stand – as Hughes sang.
The Kills’ Allison Mosshart and Jamie Hince followed with a pair of their songs, “New York” and “Baby Says,” before Homme returned with the house band to do Gerry Rafferty’s “Right Down the Line.”
Beck showed up next, performing a pair of rare, early songs, “Fume,” which he said he’d not played since 1994, and a solo acoustic version of “Hollow Log,” before Home and the Sweet Stuffers house band returned to cover Seals & Crofts’ “Summer Breeze.”
Comedian Sarah Silverman popped for a brief set of mostly unprintable jokes with Annie Clark, the singer-guitarist known as St. Vincent, following her with a lovely reinterpretation of the Patsy Cline classic, “Crazy.”
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Homme, attempting to introduce comedian Bill Burr, got upstaged by Grohl and Chad Smith doing a comic drum battle behind him. We’ll call the battle a tie, with Smith the clear winner of the subcategory of bouncing stick high off your drum and then catching it on its return to earth.
Burr actually was there primarily to play drums with singer Patty Smyth, who sang a pair of Go-Go’s songs – “Our Lips Are Sealed,” for which Ava McEnroe, Smyth’s daughter with husband John McEnroe, also sang, and then “We Got The Beat.
After Grohl made Homme cry, Chad Smith joined the Sweet Stuffers for a cover of the Zombies’ “Time of the Season,” which included a comedy bit where Smith interrupted the vibe with a hard rock drum solo.
Homme looks like a tough rock-and-roller, but the benefit show demonstrated a soft heart inside the tuxedo coat. Not just in the tears that Grohl’s song delivered, but in the sweetness with which he described the work that Sweet Stuff does as he invited all his friends and guests back on stage for the finale, singing the Beatle’s “Hey Jude” as a reminder that together you really can make it better.