Soundcheck: John Frusciante

Most rock stars have “lost weekends”. But sometime Red Hot Chili Pepper and disturbed songwriting genius John Frusciante has “lost years”.

At the height of the Red Hot Chili Peppers’ early ’90s success, their freaked-out axe/man made like Syd Barrett; he quit the band, swore off music and dedicated his life entirely to “tripping his head out” by painting time away.

Frusciante may have been gone but he was not forgotten. His rococo riffing was preserved on a 1994 solo album of head music with its soul torn inside out. A mass of jump-cut, vari-speed tunings and backward-masked guitar melodies, Niandra LaDes And Usually Just A T-Shirt sounds as if it is being simultaneously recorded and erased as you listen to it. Songs like “Blood On My Neck From Success” and “Skin Blues” left no doubt that they were the work of a tormented soul. Returning to the Chili Pepper fold for 1999’s Californication, John began writing new songs while on tour.

Looking decidedly out of place in a spartan London hotel room, the groomed but feral guitarist has a bas-relief of scar tissue gracing his fore-arms like a manacle of psychic armour. he is wearing a pair of gleaming black brogues given to him by his friend, actor, director and recent Warp records signing Vincent Gallo, who has just shot a video for “Going Inside”, a track taken off Frusciante’s comeback album. “I pulled myself together and gathered up all the spirits that make me what I am,” he explains.

Recorded at home with guitar, synth and drum machine, the zen-like To Record Only Water For Ten Days is literally a love letter to the restless spirits that reside inside him. “Spirits get inside of things that decay because what decays is what is nought”, he says. “And wherever there is nought is where spirits are, because that’s the only place they can go.”

Anyone doubting the existence of Frusciante’s ethereal entities is directed to the sleeve of the Peppers’ BloodSugarSexMagik. In one photo, a flat-faced figure floats among the band. While recording Niandra LaDes, he claims he literally “ceased to exist”, as the music poured out of him. It’s no stretch to assume there was a certain amount of chemical assitance involved in realising his enchanced perception of reality. “Yeah, drugs definitely had a lot to do with it,” he says. “But I haven’t taken drugs for three years. I understood things for myself but I couldn’t tell anybody else when I was on drugs. That’s the limitation.”

So does he consider himself a rebel against reality? “Yeah, I supposed you could say that,” he sniggers. “That’s a good description. That fight has always been important to me. I’m giving it back to the spiritual world.”

To Record Only Water For Ten Days is out now on WEA.

— Chris Campion

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