Foo Fighters Drop New ‘Medicine at Midnight’ Song ‘Waiting on a War’

The Foo Fighters have released a new song, “Waiting on a War,” from their upcoming album, Medicine at Midnight, which is set to arrive February 5th.

The track begins as an aching ballad with frontman Dave Grohl singing over a steady acoustic strum as strings linger in the background. Toward the end of the song, the electric guitars finally arrive, leading the track to its epic conclusion as Grohl repeats the refrain, “Just waiting on a war for this and that/There’s got to be more to this than that.”

In a statement, Grohl explained that the song was inspired by a frank and somewhat unnerving conversation he’d had with his daughter: “Last fall, as I was driving my daughter to school, she turned to me and asked, ‘Daddy, is there going to be a war?’ My heart sank as I realized that she was now living under the same dark cloud that I had felt 40 years ago. I wrote ‘Waiting on a War’ that day. Every day waiting for the sky to fall. Is there more to this than that? Is there more to this than just waiting on a war? Because I need more. We all do. This song was written for my daughter, Harper, who deserves a future, just as every child does.”

Grohl echoed that sentiment in a series of tweets posted Wednesday, January 13th, where he recounted the looming threat of war that came especially with growing up in the suburbs of Washington, D.C., during the height of the Cold War. “I had nightmares of missiles in the sky and soldiers in my backyard, most likely brought upon by the political tension of the early Eighties and my proximity to the Nation’s Capitol,” Grohl wrote. “My youth was spent under the dark cloud of a hopeless future.”

“Waiting on a War” marks the third offering from Medicine at Midnight, following “No Son of Mine,” which was released on New Year’s Day, and “Shame Shame,” which arrived last November. Medicine at Midnight is the Foo Fighters’ 10th studio album and follows their 2017 album, Concrete and Gold.