Dave Grohl of Foo Fighters and producer Greg Kurstin are celebrating Hanukkah and David Lee Roth with a cover of Van Halen’s “Jump”!
The performance, featuring Grohol on drums and vocals along with Kurstin on keyboards, is part of the duo’s second-annual Hanukkah Sessions. Grohl and Kurstin perform covers of songs originally done by Jewish artists and release one song a night for eight consecutive nights, aligning with the Festival Of The Lights.
Grohl posted the video to the Foo Fighters Twitter page adding: “Quite possibly the loudest and proudest of hard-rocking Jews, David Lee Roth has gone on record crediting his Bar Mitzvah preparation as his earliest vocal training. He became a rockstar the day he became a man: Diamond Dreidel DLR and Van Halen…with ‘Jump’.”
Quite possibly the loudest and proudest of hard rocking Jews, @DavidLeeRoth has gone on record crediting his Bar Mitzvah preparation as his earliest vocal training. He became a rockstar the day he became a man: Diamond Dreidel DLR and @VanHalen…with “Jump.”#happyhanukkah pic.twitter.com/9w73lP0Wco
— Foo Fighters (@foofighters) December 1, 2021
Roth talked about his Jewish heritage during an interview with the Washington Post in 2003.
“There’s not a lot of Jewish action figures,” Roth told WP’s David Segal. “Heroes for little Jewish kids are very few and far between when it comes to belligerent enthusiasm, a confrontational red-meat approach. I’m a highly literate slut. I dig only intellectual smut.”
Roth added that he never stopped celebrating his Jewish identity.
“Be different,” said Roth. “Keep it separate. Every neighborhood’s got something to contribute, so let’s not mash it all together, let’s not shop at Beige R Us. No, I want a bagel in the morning and Chinese food at lunch, and I’d like a Russian to teach me chess, and I want a Mexican to make me tacos. And there should be a black guy on bass…Viva la difference, as they say in Israel.”