Run is a song by the Foo Fighters. It was released as a single on June 1, 2017, and is off their ninth studio album, Concrete and Gold. The song performed well commercially and critically, topping the Billboard US Mainstream Rock Songs chart.
The song won the Grammy Award for Best Rock Song and was nominated for Best Rock Performance at the 2018 Grammys.
The song had first been played live in February 2017. The studio version of the song was released as a single on June 1, 2017, making it the band’s first single since Saint Cecilia in 2015.
Many music journalists noted the song was expected, but not confirmed, to be off of the band’s then upcoming ninth studio album, Concrete and Gold. The single was a surprise release, without any prior indication being made of its existence, other than the band’s vague allusions to working on music over the course of 2017.
Seven weeks after its initial release, the song topped the US Billboard Mainstream Rock Songs chart, the seventh song from the band to do so.
Tracklist:
- Run
A music video for the song was released on the same day. The video features the band performing the song in a nursing home (abandoned St Luke’s Hospital in Pasadena, CA), in makeup making them appear as elderly versions of themselves, and end up inciting a riot amongst other patients and orderlies.
The nurse in the video is played by Missi Pyle. Multiple outlets, including Billboard and People magazines, felt the music video was an homage to One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, while Team Rock noted its additional similarity to the film Cocoon.
The video ends with a brief choreographed dance routine, noted by Variety and ABC News as being similar to the routine done in Michael Jackson‘s video for the song Thriller. The video was directed by band frontman Dave Grohl. The old age makeups were designed by Tony Gardner, and created by Alterian, Inc.
The video was inspired by drummer Taylor Hawkins lamenting having to do promotional work for the song and album cycle while the band was beginning to look older; when Grohl told him that “it doesn’t really matter”, Hawkins proposed taking it in the opposite direction, and purposefully making themselves look older, inspiring Grohl to write up a treatment for the video.
Foo Fighters
Dave Groh: vocals, guitar, percussion
Chris Shiflett: guitar, percussion
Pat Smear: guitar, percussion
Nate Mendel: bass, percussion
Taylor Hawkins: drums, percussion
Rami Jaffee: Mellotron, Casio SK1, organ, percussion
Other musicians
Greg Kurstin: piano
Taylor Hawkins (February 17, 1972 March 25, 2022).
