Red Hot Chili Peppers

Returned from the hard drugs and promiscuous affairs, the Chili Peppers are ready to spice the rock-funk scene. After four years of absence, the somewhat outlying Hollywood stars had not been dulled, yet given a freshness of living.

Blue sky, palm trees, masses of tropical flowers. Lapping of water on a small fountain with the song of birds. Welcome to the Beverly Hills Hotel, the den of stars and centre of California. Here, everything is ordered and beautiful, luxury and calm …corrupting the harmony, four helmeted bikers on customised motors trample it all in a cloud of dust. Jump into a Marvel comic, flamboyant super-heroes, hiding under muscles and beautiful figures be necessary for them through changing of personnel and cleaning of disintoxication.

One hour later, the Chili Peppers have finished their first day of their world tour. One sees them gallop in the continuation of loaded photographers of equipment – Flea wearing a plastic shower curtain and some Adidas trousers, John Frusciante little brother of Lord Byron with a black knitted shirt and his hazy tint, Anthony Kiedis the wise haircut gives an air of a kid and Chad Smith, large bronzed athletic look – to rush in their bungalows before at last speaking to the press. One guessed what they could relate to: yes, Dave Navarro, guitarist/ top model, had taken the place of John Frusciante, who came back after a psychological eclipse of seven years. Yes, this summer, they rocked all the festivals, Reading, Woodstock, etc. Yes, they are trusted at last to have released ‘Californication’. And can be. This album brand new does the beautiful acrobatic riffs of a Frusciante on form, Chad Smith and Flea impeccably hold their role of rhythmic background, Kiedis opens his heart in the ballads such as ‘Under the Bridge’ and loses it with a handful of funks. Appointment on 8th June.

Flea and Chad Smith

Rock & Folk: Four years have flown since the previous album. Where have you been since then?
Flea: After finishing ‘One Hot Minute’, we toured for a year. Then, we attempted several returns to compose pieces again but we did not feel the results. We then decided to leave Dave to follow his way. Our ways don’t really follow with him. We did not turn our backs but that conclusion was the only solution. We loafed a year and a half. And then, all of a sudden, I rediscovered John, we put back ourselves together and in the crowd, and wrote and recorded the album during the last nine months.

Rock & Folk: And you have resumed with Rick Rubin as producer.
Chad Smith: For the third time. We feel comfortable with him. He is the producer which we suit, with an enormous talent. He’s a friend, he doesn’t lack humour, he’s a good character. With him its simple, we play rock and he tells us what is worth developing and what he likes. We respect his opinion, especially when we don’t agree.

Rock & Folk: Which gives place to orderly battles?
Chad Smith: Working with him is gratifying, it was very concentrated and very absorbing for the album. I think he was also excited that we had the idea to adjust our feet in the studio.
Flea: Rick prefers us working naturally. He likes our personal input, especially in our jams. He tries to capture that energy and never tries to transform our music to what others think it should be.

Rock & Folk: So you compose mainly by jamming?
Flea: There isn’t a pre-established formula. We never plan, we don’t follow a pattern. Most of our songs come by playing together. We join together, play our instruments and communicate across the genre of rock, a process 100% natural. Besides, we avoid speaking about it together (smiling)

Rock & Folk: Last September you refound your fans after a mini-tour…
Chad Smith: We did a few concerts, tested our new places in the small theatres, an excellent sensation.

Rock & Folk: A return to the good old times with John?
Chad Smith: No, no, it was all normal again among us. Not only were the shows successful but we spent the really good times together. Without the incident in Reno with Flea, it would have been perfect.

Rock & Folk: What incident?
Chad Smith: In Reno, they attempted to stop us before he drove because his driver’s license wasn’t acceptable. Totally ridiculous.
Flea: Damned stupidity of the cops. They thought I used false papers, what a nightmare.

Rock & Folk: Would it have become about in surfing? Explain to us that.
Flea: I see the people surfing near my house in Australia. I started and became addicted. It gives you incredible sensations. I would like to test the waves of Biarritz but someone told me the water was polluted. No other sport keeps me interested than surfing. The first time you succeed at finding a good wave, to get used to all the water passing over your head, its magic.

Rock & Folk: Are you impatient to get back on the scene?
Chad Smith: You would die to get back with the public. I will pass gladly certain aspects of the turns but I no longer hold in place the idea of making noise.

Rock & Folk: Our boss certainly would be delighted to hear a story from one of your notebooks whilst on tour.
Chad Smith: (resigned) We would need to censor a large part. All our stuff is classified X.
Flea: We were in Baltimore and because we didn’t have much money Chad and I shared a room. One night, when coming back to our room, I found a spatula and some toothpaste on a table. Lifting my head I called a whore in her underwear. I mouthed ‘Chad what is this brothel?’and find Chad in the cupboard, getting a snack. We were younger, we profited more from fans. So I called Anthony and John in their room and whispered on the phone ‘ Come on guys, there’s girls waiting for us here’ Thirty seconds later they knocked at the door. The girls started dancing for us and stripping. One of them was endowed with such a large pair of breasts that she used it to recover items.
Chad Smith: (designating his 45 girls) She nabbed on of my shoes.

Rock & Folk: What happened after that then?
Flea: Chad pulled the short straw and spanked the whores with the spatula.
Chad Smith: Isabelle, do you like spankings?
Flea: You can’t trust me too much with my retrospect.
Chad Smith: We had to stop being delirious and spanking as the journalists were consenting.

Rock & Folk: Okay, back to normal. After the socks hiding masculinity and the suits with electric bulbs, what have we to expect now?
Flea: When we were ready would not determine how successful a show is. These times serve to push back far more our limits, to use our bodies to the full extent. In the future, I could see us well going out of these huge festivals into the small clubs and gigs.

Anthony Kiedis and John Frusciante

Rock & Folk: Have you recuperated well after your motorbike accident?
Anthony Kiedis: (showing a fine scar that runs on the bottom of his forearm) I will never feel sensations in my wrist any more and my arm worked much better before. Oh, hi John. Do you want to stay with us?
John Frusciante: I’ve lost something…
Anthony Kiedis: It limits me in certain sexual practises, my wrist can’t move much at all and I cant hold anything in my hand. In the end I will adapt to it.

Rock & Folk: And your hair?
Anthony Kiedis: (angelic) A lorry rolled over. No, John said that he would not rejoin us as long as I had long hair. No, I was held too close to a fan… when getting out of an aeroplane. In reality, I had shaved with a bowl to have this hair.
John Frusciante: The funniest was Flea’s head.
Anthony Kiedis: I lived with Flea then and I had not warned him. The next day when I went down for breakfast, Flea was stupefied. Shocked. He had the impression that we were coming back from college.
John Frusciante: Anthony had the same haircut at school. He resembled one of the old Hollywood actors, it was charming.

Rock & Folk: Is it good to be a new Chili Pepper?
John Frusciante: Fantastic. I was delighted to come back. Before, my future was uncertain, we ignored in which direction to go and now, everything seems finally in place. We tried everything, we came back and henceforth we concentrate our efforts in the right directon. We always respect each other. We finally understand that we have made a perfect combination.

Rock & Folk: Does coming off drugs help you to see more clearly?
John Frusciante: Effectively, Anthony and I have always abused cocaine and heroin. A good theory but it is impossible to take drugs whilst managing a productive life. I’ve found strong spiritual experiences and felt unique feelings. Now, in order to continue these moments of craziness that I crossed on drugs, I must find a means to relive that without taking anything away. I channel these impressions with the bias of my music. Playing guitar is becoming my form of addiction.

Rock & Folk: Speaking about the new songs, are the new lyrics in ‘Californication’ a reference to Courtney Love?
Anthony Kiedis: No, no. I haven’t seen her. I am happy that this question is being asked. It gives me the opportunity to deny to have consecrated ‘Californication’ for her. I used the expression ‘Celebrity Skin’ well before the release of her album.

Rock & Folk: And mentioning Kurt Cobain in the same song.
Anthony Kiedis: When I think about Kurt, his image, his words, the beauty that he brought us in his brief passage here gives me spirit. I don’t think of Courtney at all. Her music and that of mine have nothing in common. Celebrity Skin was a glam group from Hollywood.

Rock & Folk: Hollywood features often in your lyrics…
Anthony Kiedis: It’s a source of romantic inspiration and nostalgia for me. It has all aspects of life, the best next to the most atrocious. California has always inspired me, especially when I arrived here as a child. I see all the happenings in the cinema and film production industries, its amazing the energy around here. I also see all the other ridiculous stuff, it doesn’t bother me, sometimes it makes it even more fun here. My relation with Hollywood is a passionate nature. I live here, all of my friends are here and it’s the place I formed the band.

Rock & Folk: The songs ‘Scar Tissue’ and ‘Around the World’ have a personal mature resonance.
Anthony Kiedis: Those songs were born in much different circumstances. ‘Scar Tissue’ came to me in the precise moment when I heard others to play in this air. It was as if an exterior influx had succeeded in merging the melody and apparent words suddenly in my unconscious mind. ‘Around the World’ was another affair. The verses before the refrain. There I relate my trip experiences, the fact to be member of has group, to live has Moorish extreme life. Roberto Begnini and his film inspired have me equally inspired.

Rock & Folk: What is your opinion on All Saints’ version of ‘Under the Bridge’?
Anthony Kiedis: I have never felt anything for it at all. Of everyone susceptible to our music, the All Saints were never the most exciting in my eyes. I wont critisise them, I hope that they are good fun. I was flattered that someone loved the song so much that they covered it, but in my opinion it would be much better if someone such as Fugazi had done it in their place.

Rock & Folk: Who have been your lifelong heroes?
Anthony Kiedis: Lou Reed, he helped me so much across his different styles of music, his voice, his songs and his group.
John Frusciante: Bowie (written on his T-shirt) , Jimmy Page. Matthew Ashman of Bow Wow Wow is my favourite at the moment.
Anthony Kiedis: Bow Wow Wow have been of great importance to the band both before John first left and now. We mentioned them beforehand in ‘Suck My Kiss’ and they also figure in ‘Right on Time’ this time around.
John Frusciante: It was thanks to me that Anthony got into Bow Wow Wow. I think that we write in the same manner. A lot of our personality is reflected in others, where some other groups erase their relationship with fans and the public. We try to work together, to form a real partnership and to superimpose the textures of our instruments.

Rock & Folk: How did you cope with the overwhelming celebrity culture arising in 1991?
John Frusciante: (laughing) Anthony loved it. I hated it.
Anthony Kiedis: That’s a good summary. I absolutely loved it. It was like that for a long time, even when the band was less well known. The change into the celebrity culture wasn’t brutal, more gradual. I remembered myself of the excitement in the morning, when a car flew past me when I was jogging. He was listening to our music on the radio! I exulted to the idea that a piece so intimate in the eyes of the band suddenly rose from peoples’ cars. I never left my own life for becoming a celebrity. I never wanted to sabotage my life, and I took light from it, to profit in my life.
John Frusciante: I have never had the occasion to make my music understood by a large amount of the population, but to see how people affect my view of the world touches me. If the constant energy is what makes everyone like our music, then…
Anthony Kiedis: Because Captain Beefheart will never be as popular as the Spice Girls doesn’t perturb me at all. In the eyes of others, such as John, who understands Beefheart’s music, it gives significance, makes you see more, especially if the crowds adulate it. When our new album is being released, we consider the others in the world. It’s an experience which feels new and fresh every time you do it

Rock & Folk: Were you asked about writing a song for the film ‘Beavis and Butthead’?
Anthony Kiedis: (laughing. Flea enters at the precise moment) I didn’t realise that they were releasing a new film. The song which we gave them was a B-side.
Flea: No. ‘Love Rollercoaster’ was made specifically for them.
Anthony Kiedis: Yeah, I get confused with ‘Search and Destroy’
John Frusciante: It figured on the ‘Beavis and Butthead Experience’
Flea: We’ve got a clip of the part of the film.

Rock & Folk: Did you sympathise?
Anthony Kiedis: You make me laugh!

Californication

After four years of silence and many overhanging rumours, the Chili Peppers are reformed with the guitarist from the classic ‘Blood Sugar Sex Magik’, John Frusciante. And the album is good. Its very open minded, one of the most popular in the vast myth of RHCP, a sacred dose of electric funk. Just like their first album, it has the groove of Flea, the cries of deranged chickens from the guitar of Frusciante and the funky hammering of Chad Smith’s drums sealing the way back to joyous reunions, you are surprised by Kiedis’ emotional lyrics who has reached the heights of show business with his unusual charm.

‘Parallel Universe’ is one of the new wave tunes, similar in style to U2 or Simple Minds. Vocals very David Lee Roth – ‘I’m a California king’, yell from Kiedis – and a chainsaw slaughtering solo as well, stuffed with sustain.

‘Scar Tissue’ on the other hand is a simplistic ballad, the first single from the album. Flea takes off the song with a corrosive verve and John plays the slide with a certain finesse which reminds you of such as Mick Taylor. The good old dream of a tight formed group flying away in popularity.

‘Otherside’ is a completely different ballad with such mystic atmosphere. The lyrics provide much questioning but offer a jovial insert. Clearly the group has found a new quietude and created serenity.

‘Get On Top’ rings like Hendrix jamming with the Led Zep rhythmic section. Riff ultra funky and hilarious songs, Kiedis excels in his role of fan to the cretins ‘Beavis and Butt-Head’. He’s quite well known as a bit of a film star in the Hollywood movies like Godzilla. A classic RHCP song title ‘Californication’ gives one of the best songs on the album. ‘Star Wars’ is seen, Kurt Cobain features in a magnificent couplet (the fourth). Apart from that, some of the other ideas came from the work of Cream. Chad and Flea don’t play behind Frusciante: they point a Magnum 357 right next to the neck of his guitar.

Talking about some of the other tracks, ‘Easily’ and ‘Porcelain’ come out as slightly weak. The second sounds much like REM: a little animal locked away living on its own accord. Next arises ‘Emit Remmus’ which, like the title suggests, speaks of one summer upside down, damaged, spoiled. Kiedis is in California, his girlfriend in London and the emotion of love, displaced by satellite telephone dissipates over time. The guitar, a distorted Strat, evokes a similarity with Joy Division, Public Image Ltd, Can. Un. ‘This Velvet Glove’ is less intense. The overall mood gives a feeling of possible filler material. Fortunately then ‘Saviour’ rises, Kiedis’ incomparable ode to his favourite guitar hero (The Chili Peppers had had their ninth change of guitarist).

The born again Frusciante is the favourite of all and Kiedis sings this hymn in an appreciative old fashioned manner. ‘Purple Stain’ is a RHCP funk classic. Superb echo on Anthony’s vocals and once again an amazing final solo. ‘Right On Time’ is total delirium: Flea plays a bass piece from the works of Bernard Edwards meanwhile the others recreate Beatle-esque harmonies and the result is a popular rock tune. ‘Road Trippin’ ends the album in beauty with the delicious set of chords which suit Kiedis undeniably in his additional vocals. If the world such as we know it had found out that the music was finished there and then, it would choose to leave and dance in a last hope to screw.

Great Album. 4.5/5