Tina Basich, former girlfriend of Foo Fighters frontman Dave Grohl, opened up about their tumultuous relationship in her 2003 memoir Pretty Good for a Girl: The Autobiography of a Snowboarding Pioneer, revealing how Grohl’s cheating abruptly ended their romance. The revelations in Basich’s book have resurfaced following the recent news that Grohl, now 55, fathered a child out of wedlock during his marriage to Jordyn Blum.
Basich, 55, a renowned X Games-winning snowboarder, dated Grohl for about two years in the late 1990s. In her memoir, she candidly detailed the emotional fallout from their relationship, including how she discovered Grohl had been secretly seeing another woman while they were still together.
“I don’t know how anyone in his profession can have a normal relationship with a girlfriend… or two, as it turned out,” Basich wrote, expressing her shock upon learning of Grohl’s infidelity. “I found out secondhand, through the grapevine, when it seemed like everyone else in the world knew about it but me.”
The breakup, which occurred while Basich was recovering from a broken leg, was particularly harsh. Basich recounted how Grohl ended things with a brief phone call after she had spent weeks trying to get in touch with him. “Breakups suck, but Rockstar exits are the worst,” she wrote. “All I got was a five-minute phone call from him, after five weeks of me calling and trying to get ahold of him.”
Grohl’s swift and unceremonious exit from her life left Basich struggling to cope, as his fame made it impossible for her to escape reminders of him. She described hearing the elevator-music version of Foo Fighters’ Learn to Fly while grocery shopping, which made her stomach churn, and seeing his face on the cover of Guitar magazine at the checkout line.
Reflecting on the relationship, Basich admitted that she had lost herself while trying to make things work with the rock star. “You can only give up so much of your heart and your career and your time and your spirit, and here I was, giving it all up for a guy and losing myself in the process,” she wrote.
Grohl recently made headlines again when he announced on Instagram that he had fathered a child outside of his 21-year marriage to Jordyn Blum, with whom he shares three daughters: Violet Maye, 18, Harper Willow, 15, and Ophelia Saint, 10. The announcement has brought new attention to Basich’s reflections on her time with Grohl.
“I’ve recently become the father of a new baby daughter, born outside of my marriage,” Grohl wrote. “I plan to be a loving and supportive parent to her. I love my wife and my children, and I am doing everything I can to regain their trust and earn their forgiveness.”
While Grohl did not disclose the identity of the child’s mother, the news has reignited interest in his past relationships, including his first marriage to photographer Jennifer Leigh Youngblood, which ended in 1997. The Foo Fighters’ frontman, who rose to fame as Nirvana’s drummer before forming his own band in 1994, has weathered numerous personal challenges over the years, including the death of his longtime friend and Foo Fighters drummer Taylor Hawkins in 2022.
As Grohl navigates the fallout from his latest revelation, Basich’s memoir stands as a reminder of the complex relationships that often accompany the life of a rock star.
