Violet Grohl Gets Supernatural

Violet Grohl has the best ghost stories. The burgeoning alt-rocker (and eldest daughter of Dave Grohl) can trace her most chilling tales back to the two weeks she spent at her friend Persia’s old hunting estate in Scotland, which she so lovingly calls “the most f*cking haunted place I've ever been in my life.” The two friends timed their trip to coincide with a ghost hunting show that was shooting there at the same time, a decision that changed her life forever.

“I saw things that I can't explain and the only explanation is ghosts,” Grohl, 20, tells me. “[The ghosts] came through devices and told us their names and there are historical deaths that are documented on the property.”

Ahead of the May 29 release of her debut album, Be Sweet To Me, Grohl is spending some time in New York before what’s shaping up to be a busy summer for the burgeoning alt-rocker. We stumble onto the topic of the occult as we saunter down the aisles of Posman Books in Chelsea Market and a tarot book stops the musician in her tracks. Her interest, she explains, was originally ignited by the “woo-woo nanny” she had growing up who used to take her and her sisters to metaphysical stores, though she’s always had “weird premonition-like dreams.” While in Scotland, she would dream she was on the property long before the estate was built, back when the grounds were covered in huts. It’s hard to explain, but she swears by the story’s trippiness.

“It really opened my eyes and switched me from being somewhat skeptical like, ‘I have to see it to believe it.’ After that I was like, ‘You can't turn me back from that. I've seen too much sh*t," she says. “Everyone can experience it. You just have to open up to it and not look for it. It's never when you're searching for it.” (In case you’re wondering: Grohl is an Aries sun, Scorpio moon, and Libra rising.)

She also has a passion for genealogy, which has resulted in her becoming the unofficial historian of her family. Both of her parents have ties to Appalachia (another deeply haunted region), but it was only after her family got a farm in the Shenandoah Valley that she discovered her ancestors are buried roughly 20 miles away from the property. “It's so weird that we've come back around and we ended up back here,” says Grohl.

If you couldn’t already tell, Grohl’s got stories for days — and not just supernatural ones. She’s been a huge Billie Eilish fan since the beginning, and In 2018, she and her father performed a cover of Billie Eilish’s “idontwannabeyouanymore” at a charity event. The duet not only caught the “Bad Guy” singer’s attention, but earned Grohl a shout out in Eilish’s Same Interview series with Vanity Fair. That alone was enough to make her “freak the f*ck out,” but it was nothing compared to what would happen backstage at Camp Flog Gnaw a few weeks later.

“Her dad walked over and gave me his headset and let me listen to her vocals, like, basically isolated,” she says. “I was sitting on a road case and crying so hard. It makes me emotional talking about it. It was like the f*cking craziest thing ever.”

It’s safe to assume Grohl will have even more once-in-a-lifetime stories to add to her canon once Be Sweet To Me is out in the world. Created with the help of Kim Gordon’s producer Justin Raisen, the record is rooted in the same alt-rock sound her father helped originate, but don’t call it a grunge revival. Sure, the project has raucous guitar riffs, sludgy tempos, and droning vocals a plenty, but in Grohl’s mind, a few decades-old production choices does not a grunge record make. “I don't think grunge will ever come back,” she says. “It's not really a genre. It's more of an era and a movement.”

So if she’s not trying to spearhead Grunge 2.0, why did she create an album that sounds like it came straight from the ‘90s Seattle scene? "This is just the kind of music I want to make,” she continues. “That's what I've grown up listening to [and] what I lean towards the most on my own listening. When it comes to making music, it helps me get across what I want to get across in the most authentic or the most ‘me’ way that I can.”

Following its release, she’ll play a series of headlining shows and support The Breeders on tour — pretty major considering the influence Kim and Kelley Deal have had on Grohl’s record and career as a whole. “[The Deal sisters] are so fucking badass. I just look at them and I'm like, ‘That's what I want to be,’” she says. She’ll also be popping up at a number of festivals this season, including Leeds and Reading, Electric Picnic, Shaky Knees, and CBGB Fest, where she’ll play alongside fellow heroes Patti Smith and Bikini Kill. “These are f*cking legends when it comes to female, punk, authentic,” says Grohl. “I'm excited to be there, let alone play.”

By the time we’ve finished walking around the store, she’s picked up a 33 ⅓ on Bjork’s Homogenic, The Fran Lebowitz Reader, a title by Eve Babitz, and a sheet of Snoopy stickers. The tarot book did not come home with her that day, though judging by her relationship with the otherworldly, she doesn’t need it.

Photographs by Jillian Giandurco.