TVD Live Shots: Foo Fighters 20th Anniversary, 4th of July Celebration at RFK Stadium, 7/4

July 4, 2015, RFK Stadium, Washington, DC. Foo Fighters’ 20TH Anniverssary Blowout.

“The shows we’ve been doing lately are our favorite shows that we’ve ever done,” Dave Grohl told the NME last week. “What seemed like a setback at the time has turned into this beautiful blessing in disguise, where this throne and these crutches and these audiences make us play longer and harder than we ever have.”

Seems true to us. Were Grohl to have even been on his back and bedridden for the Foo Fighters’ 20th Anniversary 4th of July blowout at Washington, DC’s RFK Stadium, the audience still would have turned out in droves. To put it simply, 20 years on, Dave and the band are beloved.

July 4, 2015, RFK Stadium, Washington, DC. Foo Fighters’ 20TH Anniverssary Blowout.

And while we’re at it, let’s not forget the beloved line up of performers who proceeded the Foos on the 4th—Trouble Funk, Buddy Guy, Heart, Joan Jett and the Blackhearts, LL Cool J, Gary Clark, Jr., RDGLDGRN—all played to a rabid, and for a time there, rain soaked crowd.

While away for our own 4th of July vacation thwarted a more timely response to the hue and cry from DC’s increasingly insignificant alt-weekly, our own Richie Downs braved the crowd and the weather to record the day in photos—from the very beginning to the Foos’ closing fireworks. It’s a narrative we think you’d agree is best revealed here on the faces of the performers—and those in attendance. —Ed.