For a band that didn’t set out to play arena rock, the Foo Fighters have never had trouble filling stadiums.

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“I wouldn’t want things to go huge, crazy out of control,” Dave Grohl, the band’s versatile front man said in 2000. Since then, with the help of band members Taylor Hawkins, Nate Mendel, and Chris Shiflett, Grohl’s band has sought to keep its roots firmly planted in unconventional, anti-studio rock, even while their popularity has skyrocketed.

In June of 2006, the band played its largest show to date to a crowd of 85,000 in London’s Hyde Park. Their appeal as a live act lies in energetic, hard-driving melodies, Grohl’s characteristic rocker growl, and a mix of old and new songs that keep the audience on its feet.

But what exactly is a Foo Fighter? The band took their name from a term used by US Army Air Force pilots who patrolled German airspace during WWII. The pilots would encounter maneuverable balls of light thought to be a top-secret aerial weapon used by the Nazis. Without a technical term for these weapons, the pilots began referring to them as “Foo Fighters” or “Kraut Balls”.

The driving force behind the Foos, Grohl has the distinction of not only witnessing, but playing a major role in the early 90’s rock revolution known as grunge. The Washington D.C. native began playing guitar in his early teens and by the late 1980’s, he was drumming for the D.C.-based hardcore band, Scream.

The turning point in Grohl’s career came when he joined Nirvana in 1991 at the age of 22 and played drums on the now-classic album Nevermind. Grohl’s penchant for hard-hitting backbeats helped the band achieve its often-imitated sound as Nirvana left a permanent imprint on the face of modern rock. In Utero followed two years later and Nirvana looked ready to lead a growing legion of alternative rock acts that now included Soundgarden and Pearl Jam.

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Following lead singer Kurt Cobain’s death in 1994, and the consequential breakup of Nirvana, a devastated Grohl nearly gave up the music business for good. A year later, it was Grohl’s love for making music that pulled him back onto the scene as he set out to independently record songs he’d written before joining Nirvana. Grohl played nearly every instrument on what would become the Foo Fighter’s first, self-titled album. After a bidding war between record companies anxious to capitalize on Grohl’s connection to Nirvana, Capitol Records signed the album. The disc’s “This Is a Call” quickly saw heavy radio airplay and by 1996 the album had gone platinum in the U.S.

When Grohl decided to take songs from that album on tour, he assembled a band with former Nirvana guitarist Pat Smear, Nate Mendel on bass, and William Goldsmith on drums. Grohl stepped into the role of lead singer with raw, powerful vocals, and an utterly electric stage presence.

A few years and a few changes in band members later, the Foo Fighters were scaling the Billboard charts with their 1997 album, The Colour And The Shape. Hits like “Monkey Wrench”, “Everlong”, and “My Hero” brought the band enormous commercial success and a respectable place in the late ‘90’s post grunge fallout. And while MTV was courting highly packaged pop acts, the Foos remained a bastion of melodic, midtempo, punk-influenced rock.

Upon entering their second decade as the Foo Fighters, the band sought to push their talents even further with their latest album, Echoes, Silence, Patience and Grace. Even the Foos themselves describe it as their “most complex and confident” album yet. The album has a something-for-everyone feel as hook-heavy anthems like “Long Road to Ruin” are balanced with ballads such as “Statues” that feature Grohl’s hidden talent on the piano.

With this level of versatility, it’s no surprise the band most recently took home two Grammy awards for Best Rock Album and Best Hard Rock Performance for Echoes, Silence, Patience and Grace. “This doesn’t get old,” Grohl said as he accepted the group’s 6th Grammy.

As anyone who’s seen the Foo Fighters live will tell you, seeing them rock out on stage doesn’t get old either.