“Eighteen-year-old John Frusciante breaks a string on his orange Ibanez guitar, and I’ve never seen anyone change a string faster in my life - like he was part of a pit crew! He just didn’t want to miss out on the jam, the energy in the room was so exciting.” “Everything was fast and hard back then, like James Brown on speed,” laughs Smith. He remembers Kiedis rolling his eyes at his unfashionable long hair and Guns N’ Roses wanna-be bandana, as if this might be the fastest thumbs-down ever. Later that same year, Smith came in for his audition, to replace original drummer Jack Irons. To replace Slovak, a teenage Frusciante joined the group, which he already looked up to as superstars.“Him joining the Chili Peppers was like me joining Led Zeppelin or something,” jokes Smith. ASSOCIATED PRESSĪn early test of the band’s strength came in 1988 when original guitarist Hillel Slovak died of a drug overdose. We never lost that spirit where we thought we were winning the whole time,” he says.īruno Mars performs with the Chili Peppers at the halftime show of the 2014 Super Bowl. club staple known for its fusion of funk and punk - and, yes, hip-hop - recruiting George Clinton of Parliament-Funkadelic to produce sophomore album “Freaky Styley.” From the earliest days, Kiedis says he realized that the band was “a beautiful vehicle to care for and to be a part of. From day one, I was like, ‘All right, this is what I’ll be doing for the rest of my life.’ We were too full of piss and vinegar to be told that we weren’t completely successful within weeks of starting. Let me write some funky-ass grooves for you.’” “‘It was the greatest thing I’ve ever seen in my life, and I can do this - I’m gonna be a rapper.’ And I was like, ‘Great. “He came home just literally shaking with excitement over the show,” says Flea. When he and Kiedis were just out of high school, the singer went to see Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five. We were never against trying anything, and that still goes.”įlea points to a seminal moment in the band’s pre-history. We came out of a world that was inspired by punk and funk and mayhem, but we also were listening to jazz every day, Hank Williams every day, Black Flag or whatever. “Let’s never shut the door on a particular musical vibe because it doesn’t fit under our category - we’ve never had that. “There’s an unspoken, unwritten law of Red Hot Chili Peppers where anything goes, anything is welcome,” Kiedis says. And that still exists, but in a slightly more resolved way.”Įventually, they pushed each other creatively, fusing Flea’s background in jazz with Kiedis’ love for punk-rock. There was a healthy spirit of brotherly ‘I’ll kick your ass’ competition. It was like, here’s this guy who’s as much of a misfit as myself - let’s see what kind of shenanigans we can get into. It wasn’t like, ‘Hey, you want to go play basketball?’ It was like, ‘If you write on my desk, I’ll get suspended from school,’ and so we just started writing on each other’s desks, seeing if we could get each other in trouble. We were kindred spirits, bonded by this desire to break free of everything that we saw as constricting: every rule that didn’t make sense, every hypocrisy, every injustice,” says Flea.Īdds Kiedis: “Our friendship was actually born out of several confrontations. It’s a heady, and long, way from when Flea and Kiedis first met at age 15 at Los Angeles’ Fairfax High School in the late 1970s, where they were “immediately in love and at war. You have to do something to entertain these people” - the nosebleeds above the nosebleeds - “and make it a great show. “I went to the Super Bowl and I’m looking around SoFi Stadium, like, ‘Fuck, we’ve sold this thing out? People are gonna be way the fuck up there.’ It’s more than just going into an arena and getting some cool lights and off you go. Still, fulfilling their ballpark-sized destiny in America feels different. “In Europe, we’ve been doing shows that big for a long time,” Smith notes. The Chili Peppers are not cowed by size at this late date, having been top of the bill at plenty of festivals. This summer, the band will pull off its first U.S. The occasion arrives as singer Kiedis, bassist Flea and drummer Chad Smith have reunited with off-again, on-again guitarist John Frusciante for a new Rick Rubin-produced album, “ Unlimited Love,” set for release on April 1. To be recognized and be a part of the physical fabric of those sidewalks means a lot to me.” I’ve walked over every one of those stars - every sidewalk, every crack, every one of them. He remembers being 15 with Kiedis, running around Hollywood in the wee hours of the night, “doing stupid little crimes, hustling for food. Similarly, Flea recalls being a “Hollywood street kid… playing kazoo and beating on a trash can lid with a hat out to get money” when he was just 11 years old.
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