With the upcoming public grand opening of the new Climate Pledge Arena this Friday night with a Coldplay concert followed Saturday with the 1st home opener of the NHL's Seattle Kraken hockey game, Seattle is currently ground zero in the world of state of the art entertainment arenas with the world's most sustainable and zero carbon certified arena in the world.
Last night was a pre-grand opening that over 13,000 of us lucky few got to witness the insides of the new state-of-the-art arena with a concert by two of Seattle's well known rock bands the Foo Fighters and openers Death Cab For Cutie. A concert originally planned as an private appreciation for the many involved in the 3 year organization/building of the arena also turned into a benefit with limited public ticket sales called "A New Way Home" that sent portions of the ticket sale proceeds to benefit both the Northwest Immigrant Rights Project and Real Rent Duwamish.
With sold-out concert capacities set at 17,200, last night was nice with breathing room at a little over 13,000 as a pre-grand opening dry run for many of the vendors and employees inside the new arena. I've been attending this arena location since 11/21/79 when I first saw KISS play there. At that time it was known as the Seattle Coliseum, it switched 25 years ago to the Key Arena name until Amazon bought the rights to the arena and secured funding that ended in over a $1-billion renovation that gutted the whole arena except the historic roof top. That historic roof now holds 5,155 acoustic panels that will blow your mind for concert sounds. No bouncing echo's just pure sound. I really noticed it after Death Cab For Cutie finished their first song "I Will Possess Your Heart" when the crowd roared and clapped.
Death Cab For Cutie played through their 12 song set that started at 7:30 after a cool video introduction of Climate Pledge Arena for little over an hour. After 9pm Dave Grohl, Taylor Hawkins and the rest of the Foo Fighters came out like an buzzing episode flashback of "Fresh Pots". The energy from Dave and the band was just an overwhelming excitement knowing they were headlining the first concert ever in the new arena and in front of their home town. Grohl probably had flashbacks to when he played with Nirvana on these grounds for the first time in 1994 in the then called Seattle Center Arena.
Blasting through a 21-song set that included the hit songs like "Learn To Fly", "My Hero", "Monkey Wrench", "Everlong" and even covers like "You Should Be Dancing" (Bee Gees) and "Somebody To Love" (Queen), the Foo Fighters knew they were the Kings of Seattle on this night and delivered a performance for the attendees that will be remembered forever in their music world. Dave Grohl was on fire! By the end of the second song of "The Pretender" Dave was dumping water over his head to cool off.
Thank you Climate Pledge Arena PR for the hospitality and Foo Fighters for allowing me/us at Audacy to cover/see this historic event in Seattle music venue history for KISW 99.9FM and our fellow station 107.7 The End who both were pivotal in breaking both Nirvana and the Foo Fighters in their beginnings.
Full Foo Fighters Photo Gallery (KISW): https://www.audacy.com/kisw/latest-from-kisw/gallery/foo-fighters-climate-pledge-arena-seattle-10-19-21
Full Death Cab For Cutie/Foo Fighters Photo Gallery (1077 The End): https://www.audacy.com/1077theend/latest/gallery/foo-fighters-and-death-cab-climate-pledge-arena-grand-opening
