Out Of The Shadows
Last modified: 17:29:43 CET on 16 Nov, 2008 |
April 2004, Guitar (UK)
Thanks to Mike Turner, for typing it out
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Happiest when at home with his music, these days Red Hot Chili Peppers’ guitarist John Frusciante prefers to lead a quiet life. But with the release of his fourth solo album and with 200,000 tickets for the band’s UK dates selling in just four hours, Jenny Knight reckons he’s in for anything but.
Settled on a bed in a darkened room at the Chateau Marmont on Sunset Strip, John Frusciante – a man who is supposed to detest interviews – is in genial, if sleepy form. The bare-chested young buck who first emerged bursting with energy, fresh ideas and awesome talent when he joined the Red Hot Chili Peppers in 1988 at the age of just 17 has matured into a mellow, reflective sort. And he’s managed it despite still living in the midst of the celeb-crazed LA music industry – a world that considers his one-time replacement Dave Navarro baring all on an MTV reality series about his marriage to a former Baywatch babe a perfectly normal thing to do.
As the story goes, after suffering from touring burnout and sickened by his own youthful ego-tripping, in 1992 Frusciante decided to rethink his life. He quit the band at the height of its success, even attempting to break his arm so that he couldn’t be talked out of his decision. Then, alone in his self-imposed isolation he decided to quit playing altogether.
These days it’s clear that Frusciante is living and breathing music more than ever. He has become an incredibly prolific artist, often rehearsing by day with the Chili Peppers – who gratefully welcomed him back into the fold clean and vital in 1999 – and then recording his own music by night.
‘When I practice at home, I usually just play along with other people’s records; I’ve done it since I was a little kid,’ he says. ‘The guitar players who I really get something out of are people like Sterling Morrison and Lou Reed with Velvet Underground, the guys in Fugazi, Matthew Ashman from Bow Wow Wow and Keith Levene from Public Image – people who used interesting chords and textures. It’s a constant learning experience for me. It’s not enough for me to just know how to play something – it’s extra important for me to understand why the person chose the notes they did, and to listen to it in relationship to the other instruments going on.’
On record, Frusciante’s own playing has been getting ever-sparser, more emotive and more considered. Clearly, he no longer has anything to prove.
‘When I was younger it was always about learning things with a lot of notes, for some reason,’ he remembers with a frown, ‘ but for the last five years or so it’s been the space that somebody creates with their playing or the stylistic concepts behind the playing that I’m most interested in.
‘Will Sergeant of Echo & The Bunnymen is a perfect example of what I’m talking about. I was giving guitar lessons recently to this kid, and at the last lesson I gave him a copy of Heaven Up Here and Crocodiles, because to me both of them are just masterpieces of guitar playing.
‘I can teach,’ he adds with regret, ‘but it just seems like I’m too busy with doing other things… and I really feel a student should have a teacher who’s there all the time.’
Although less ‘lo-fi’ than Frusciante’s previous solo releases, Shadows Collide With People is still an insightful, intimate affair, co-performed with local musician Josh Klinghoffer, and guests Chad Smith and Flea from the Chilis and Mars Volta’s Omar Rodriguez. As well as a distinctly vintage vibe, many of the songs have an almost beatific, hymn-like feel, especially when intercut with choral outburst on a song like the searing Omission.
But it is Frusciante’s singing voice – a stark contrast to his soft, meandering speaking voice – that really grabs the attention. True, his resonant backing vocals could be heard all over the Chili Peppers’ last release By The Way, but here he proves himself to be a far stronger, more versatile vocalist than we could ever have imagined. The other main surprise is the electronic influence on the album, most notably on the instrumentals, which are filled with phonetically high frequencies, distortion and Mellotron feedback.
“As well as experimental music like Pita, Fennesz and Ekkehard Ehlers, I was listening to a lot of early electronic music,’ he explains. ‘In particular Fad Gadget, John Foxx’s Metamatic, Depeche Mode’s Violator, The Human League’s Reproduction…’ Frusciante grins. ‘And also The Smiths, The Beatles, The Durutti Column, Slade…’
