Melbourne 2000
CUZ: The Red Hot Chili Peppers began in the midst of the LA hardcore punk scene of the early to mid 80's. Does Anthony or Flea ever reveal much insight into being the band they were during that period of that time?
John: I don’t think they were part of any kind of hardcore scene; the hardcore punk scene in LA had pretty much peaked like 3 years before the RHCP even got started. I didn’t see them that way and don’t think anyone else saw them that way. To me they were a really original band, who had a much different approach towards to music than anybody else that I knew of. They had a good balance of naivety and of conviction. That’s what appealed to me about them. They (Flea and Anthony) have never really been the sorts to brag about themselves, I was much more in tune with what they meant to the LA scene because I was a fan. They were just human beings, to me they were like stars so I had a pretty good perspective on that without anybody telling me.
CUZ: Well what was that like to move from being a fan of RHCP to then becoming a band member?
John: It was really something to adjust to, it took me about a year to even start. The first year I was in the band I wasn’t acting like myself, I wasn’t living my life to be John Frusciante. I was living my life to be like what I thought a RHCP should be. You can’t approach being a rock star like that, I don’t think a person should approach it by trying to see what their image is like and to be that. I think you can only be yourself, if that ends up becoming an image to the public then it does. But the main thing you gotta do is be true to yourself and dress like yourself and act like yourself and do the things in life that you feel your good at that your meant to be doing and make yourself as good as you can be at them. Once I started doing that everything was on the best course it could be. The first year that I was in the band I was really kind of confused and I didn’t do that. I just ran around and got drunk, picked up girls, that kind of thing.
CUZ: That’s just normal band activity. .
John: Yeah 18 year old activity! I was 18 years old but it doesn’t go anywhere, it doesn’t fit with my personality. My persona is much more at home with one person or playing / practicing my guitar or writing/recording songs or making myself better. Or expanding my understanding of art of different music that’s more the sort of stuff that I’m about.
CUZ: The RHCP have worked with a wide variety of producers like Andy Gil (Gang of 4), Rick Rubin but what was George Clinton (Parliament / Funkadellic) like to work with?
John: He sounds like he made it fun for them (Anthony/Flea) and I think he captured a really good vibe on the album ‘Freaky Styley’ that he produced. I have a pretty good idea of what he was like producing. He would dance around and he’d scream into the talkback mic (in the control room), they had a good time, they partied a lot. He was fun to work with in that way but he was doing a few things at once as well, he was working on his own solo record at the time. We’ve found that for us we need a producer to be like pretty much devote a few months to us. That’s what Rick Rubin does when he works with us, if he’s doing something else it stops at least a couple weeks before we go into the studio. We need to feel we’ve got somebody’s undivided attention.
Cuz: What sort of input does Rick Rubin give to the RHCP? Does he discipline you guys more during the recording process?
John: He doesn’t do any disciplining but that we do ourselves. I love making music and I love writing music and nobody needs to push me to do that. But Rick has a real mellow type of a vibe that he generates when he listens to our music. We know that that’s the only thing going on in the world for him when it’s happening. He’s not the kind of person that gets distracted or comes to the rehearsal studio with something else on his mind or carrying his personal life into the studio. He’s very focused and not a big party guy, he’s a real focused centred person. And that’s why he’s the perfect person for us because we can trust him that way. No matter how off centre any of us are we know that he’s got a clear head about every thing.
CUZ When it comes to covers the RHCP have done a broad range of styles. When you choose a track what criteria do you use?
John: We didn’t cover anything on ‘Californacation’ we didn’t record any for fun, but live we play ‘tid bits’ of things like we play a little bit of ‘London Calling (CLASH) in our show. Some Funkadellic and a lot of George Clinton music comes up from time to time. We have a medley when we play ‘Yurdle The Turtle’ into ‘Cosmic Slop’ and we used to do ‘If you got Funk You Got Style’. Sometimes ‘Red Hot Momma’, we did that with Snoop Doggy Dogg at some awards show in Las Vegas.
Cuz: Did Snoop include the “Luscious Bitch. . ” opening rhyme from the original?
John: No, he just made up his own rap about he was ‘rocking with the RHCP’ and stuff. It meant a lot to me, It was fun. Also used to cover ‘No Head No Backstage Pass’ and ‘Standing On the Verge of Getting it On’.
CUZ: You have a history of doing covers, then along comes the ‘All Saints’ covering ‘Under the Bridge’. What was your reaction to that?
John: I haven’t heard it.