During the promotion of Dave Grohl's 2021 book The storyteller: tales of life and musicrecalled that he was inspired to form Foo Fighters after meeting an Irish hitchhiker wearing a Kurt Cobain t-shirt. Now, that Irish hitchhiker has given his side of the story.
In a video posted by his cousin Eoin Tighe on TwitterLorcan Dunne explains that he recently realized the connection after watching a video of Grohl talking about getting lost in rural Ireland after Cobain died in 1994. Looking back, Dunne recalled hitchhiking with friends and approaching a car ahead of his group.
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Dunne said that when he saw Grohl (whom he didn't recognize at first) in the passenger seat, he saw “that look of surprise” at seeing his “Nirvana T-shirt with Kurt Cobain on it.” For some reason, Dunne didn't get a ride because the “car just drove away,” but it obviously left an impression on Grohl. Naturally, “no one” believed Dunne when he tried to tell his friends. Watch the video below.
All of this chimes with Grohl’s account of the encounter, in which he recalls taking a “soul-searching” trip to the Ring of Kerry in Ireland, which he described as “the most remote place on Earth.”
“You really feel like you’re at the end of the world,” Grohl explained. “I was driving my rental car down a country road and I saw a guy hitchhiking. And I thought, ‘Well, maybe I’ll pick him up. ’ And as I walked up to him, I saw he had a Kurt Cobain T-shirt on.”
Grohl continued: “It was Kurt’s face staring at me in the middle of nowhere and I realized I couldn’t escape that, so I needed to go home and get back to work. And so I did.”
In the caption to the post, Tighe described Dunne as a “legend.” It’s hard to disagree.
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So my legend of a cousin Lorcan realized that he was quite important to the creation of @foofighters @FooFightersUK He saw a video of Dave Grohl talking about why he returned to work after a visit to Ireland. Lorcan was hitchhiking in his Nirvana T-shirt when Dave stopped him. image.twitter.com/nD7cUE0w8w
— Eoin Tighe (@eointighe) August 15, 2024
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