 Grohl 's first musical performance following the demise of Nirvana was performing with The Backbeat Band at the 1994 MTV Movie Awards in June , during which he was invited by Mike Watt to take part in his album Ball @-@ Hog or Tugboat ? . After enjoying the performance , Grohl figured he could do his own musical project , which could work as " some sort of cathartic therapy , to go out and record these songs that I 'd written by myself . " Grohl afterwards booked six days at Seattle 's Robert Lang Studios , which were located near his house , where he would record " my favorite songs I had written in the past four , five years that no one had heard " with the assistance of producer Barrett Jones , with whom he had recorded the demo tape Pocketwatch in 1992 . The idea was to have Grohl playing all instruments and release it under a name that would make people believe it was a band , similar to Stewart Copeland 's Klark Kent . 
