Asked about this episode, Grohl just shrugs. "We got over it."
Since then Grohl has lent his robust beats to bands including Garbage, Killing Joke and Nine Inch Nails. After appearing in the Foo Fighters' video for Learn To Fly - a typically zany promo set on a plane with the band sporting comedy moustaches and, in Hawkins' case, large fake breasts - actor Jack Black asked Grohl to help him out with 2001's self-titled debut album by his rock jester two-piece Tenacious D. Grohl was glad to oblige.
"Dave's a good barometer," Black tells me. "If he doesn't like you there's probably something wrong with you, as opposed to the other way round."
Despite seeming to have his fingers in a number of pies, Grohl downplays any idea that he is some kind of music business player. "A what? Oh, a play-a. Well I don't really do much outside of my band I mean, I do projects with other people but...I remember reading in some magazine where I was listed as one of the Top 50 most powerful people in rock music and I was surprised at how high up I was on the list. I might have been around 10. I was fucking amazed. I don't consider myself that way. I'm a drummer, man."
As yet, Grohl's proposed thrash treatment of Christin Aguilera hits, Aguilerica, remains an unfilled vanity project. Probot, however, is a piece of fanboy wish-fulfilment that made it off the drawing board. Masterminded by Grohl, the 2004 record features guest appearances by his favourite metal singers. Among them was Lemmy, who Grohl describes as "my hero". Grohl vividly remembers introducing his wife to the hardy Motorhead supremo, "He goes, Hello, dear, then he turns to me and he says, She's far too good-looking to be with you, mate." Despite this blunt observation, Grohl has become something of a pin-up for women who want wit, a smile and old-fashioned manners as part of the package. "It doesn't make any sense at all," he says. "I'm totally comfortable with myself but for the longest time I had this great insecurity that I wasn't smart enough or handsome enough...this was all through my teens. Everybody has their insecurities, of course, but I feel pretty good about everything, really. I mean, I know I'm not perfect and I know I'm not the fucking sharpest tool in the shed but I don't really need to be. Having been everyone's friend my whole life I can't imagine being anyone's crush."
Is your wife happy with you being the thinking woman's rock crumpet?
"I suppose [laughs]. I don't know. If you were to tell her that there was any pin-up status I think she'd be really surprised." (Jordyn giggles when asked about her husband's sex appeal. "I've never heard that before," she says.")
GROHL'S FAVOURITE restaurant, a hot dog place called The Stand, is five minutes' drive from his front door. His wife will shortly be collecting him too run a few errands - picking up dog food, dry cleaning and so on - but he has time to for a quick bite to eat before then. As Grohl is a regular here, I ask him to order me whatever he's having. Soon a couple of hot dogs slathered in coleslaw are brought over. Then two more arrive with a side order of fries. "You want what I fucking got," says Grohl at the suggestion that this seems a bit excessive." Come on! You asked for it!"
The Foo Fighters videos seems to have got a bit more serious since things like Learn To Fly. Was that a conscious decision?
"No, it depends on the song. The '90s was just a celebration of irony because the idea that you could be in a rock band was so ridiculous that you couldn't take it seriously. Well, things have changed now. When you come to see one of our shows it's a fucking arena rock show and I'm dead serious. We have lasers."
If the next Foo Fighters album didn't do well, would you call it a day?
'Whatever happens I'd still make music. I'll end up in some freaky Cream reunion at the Royal Albert Hall. I'll be one of those dudes. Like, That's him? Really? He looks like shit. " So is it really that great being Dave Grohl? "Sure, man! I have no complaints. No complaints."
THE SOUND of '70s rocker Eddie Money's Baby, Hold On sends Grohl reaching for his phone. "Hi, baby doll...yeah...two minutes."
He apologises for the interruption and continues. "There are times now when I think that life is turning out to be how I really always wanted it to be..."
It's taken 15 years and more than a touch of resilience, but it looks like that crash course in how to be a rock star is, eventually, paying off. Dave Grohl takes a huge bite from his second hot-dog and washes it down with a swig of strawberry lemonade.
"I think my ride's here."
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