Ballad Of The Beaconsfield Miners

Dave Grohl wrote this acoustic instrumental piece for two miners in the Beaconsfield gold mine collapse in Tasmania, Australia, in 2006. A few days after the collapse, while the rescue was still being planned, one of the miners, Brant Webb, requested that an iPod be sent down to them, filled with Foo Fighters songs. Dave Grohl heard about this story, and wrote a note to them stating, "Though I'm halfway around the world right now, my heart is with you both, and I want you to know that when you come home, there's 2 tickets to any Foos show, anywhere, and 2 cold beers waiting for yous. Deal?" The men were safely rescued, and Dave Grohl later met up with Webb during the band's 3-night acoustic tour at the Sydney Opera House in October 2006. Grohl played this piece for the meeting with the miner, and assured him it would be on the next Foo Fighters album.

Grohl was moved to tears when told his tunes were used to lift the miners' spirits a week before they were rescued after 14 days over half a mile underground. Grohl recalled in the Daily Mail November 23, 2007, "It was a massive moment in my life. People have told me that our songs have helped them through a divorce or bereavement, but there was something special about two guys just trying to survive. I wrote that track as a tribute and promised Brant that I'd put it on the album."

Dave Grohl recorded this with American guitar virtuoso Katherine "Kaki" King, who provided the fingerpicking guitar work.