During the spring and early summer of 2006, the Foo Fighters played a sold-out acoustic tour across North America. Skin and Bones is their first-ever live album, and it culls together 15 songs from the band’s entire discography performed during that tour. Foo Fighters are one of those rare bands that seem to come up with several hits every few years, and this CD is loaded with them — from earlier tracks like “Big Me” (the only song from the Foo’s debut album), “Everlong,” “February Stars,” and “Walking After You,” to “My Hero,” to “Razor,” and “Friend of a Friend,” they perform a lot of songs written over a long period of time. I was nicely surprised to find that the Foo Fighters were joined on this tour by Pat Smear — original Foo Fighters second guitarist and 11th-hour member of Nirvana (and yeah, he was in the Germs, too, if you’re keeping score at home) — and Petra Haden, formerly of That Dog, who performs the violin and mandolin, and contributes some back-up vocals. (That Dog was a great band who never got their just due, and as an aside, I recommend checking them out.) Probably the biggest surprise on this CD is track four: “Marigold,” the only Nirvana song on which Grohl sang lead vocals. It was released as a B-side in 1993 on Nirvana’s “Heart-Shaped Box” single, and for the first time that I’m aware of, Grohl performed it as a Foo Fighters track on this tour. Honestly, it sounds like total shit. I have an MP3 clip on my computer that I downloaded in, oh, I don’t know, 1999 or so of Grohl singing “With Eyes Wide Open” on a radio show and mockingly imitating Scott Stapp of Creed’s lame, over-exaggerated delivery. That’s what Grohl sounds like on this. As if his vocals didn’t ruin the song enough, the instrumentation is too much to bear — Nirvana’s version was a sparse, minimalist rendition, with one layer of drums, vocals, a simple bass line, and Cobain’s haunting riffage. This version is unlistenable. I was thoroughly unimpressed with the rendition of “Walking After You,” as well as dull sounding performances of “February Stars” and “Everlong” — three songs I once enjoyed that very nearly put me to sleep. Conspicuously absent on this album is “What If I Do?” which probably would have been one of the few songs they could pull off flawlessly in a live acoustic setting (since it was originally performed and recorded as an acoustic song). Foo Fighters are a good band, Grohl is a good songwriter, but if ever there was a performer that benefited from “studio magic,” it is he. Foo Fighters have always sounded shitty live; I’ve thought so ever since I first saw them perform live on HBO in 1996 — back when they were still playing “Weenie Beenie” and Grohl’s hair was down to his back. If you’re a diehard fan, go ahead, buy this. But otherwise, Skin and Bones has nothing to offer.

(RCA Records, 1540 Broadway, New York, NY 10036)