Things You Should Know About RHCP
June 2006, Blender magazine (USA)
thanks to Caroline for typing it out
click the thumbnail for scans
After nearly 25 years of abusing themselves - not to mention countless tube socks - thses rap-rock pioneers have somehow managed to not die. But it’s not for a lack of trying.
01- Anthony Kiedis was a 12-year old drug mule
Kiedis was born in Grand Rapids, Michigan, on November 1, 1962. His parents split when he was 3, and at age 12 he moved to L.A. to live with his dad, Blackie, a small-time actor… and big-time dope smuggler. One memorable father-son trip found them exchanging seven suitcases of pot for $ 30K in cash. “We were partners in crime,” Kiedis says. “Without his influence, I’d be pushing pencils somewhere.”
02- He also Slept with Cher - in eighth grade
Blackie’s connections made him quite popular on the Hollywood club scene, and young Anthony met dozens of ’70s-rock superstars: Keith Moon, Led Zeppelin, Alice Cooper and… Cher ? “We used to tool around in her little turquoise Ferrari Dino,” Kiedis recalls. One night she was babysitting and the two fell asleep on her bed - but there was no funny business. “We were friends,” he says with a smile.
03- A schoolyard fight brought the band together
Fairfax High, fall 1977: Kiedis, 14, had just enrolled after being kicked out of another district, and had so far made only one friend - “The geekiest guy in the whole school.” When future Chili Peppers bassist Flea - who, unbestknownst to Kiedis, was also pals with the nerd - jokingly put the kid in a headlock, Kiedis intervened. “I said, ‘If you lay another hand on him, it could be the last thing you do today.’ The rest was history.”
04- Even as kids, the Peppers liked to “experiment”
“I tought I was a juvenile delinquent, in my nice surban Midwestern neighborhood,” says drummer Chad Smith. “But those guys would do a fucking gram, smoke two joints, drink a sixpack of beer… and then go to school !”
05- They started as an art project
“Flea, Hillel [Slovak, the band's first guitarist] and I were friends way before we formed a band,” Kiedis says. “We’d go to clubs together, go up to San Fransisco and do drugs together.” But it wasn’t until a pal asked them to perform one song as an “art-funk installation îece” that they started playing together. “It was so electrifying. We all thought, ‘We have to do this again next week.’”
06-They could have been “spigot blister and the chest pimps”
Kiedis and Co. went through several awful names (the La Leyenda Tweakers, Tony Flow and the Miraculously Majestic Masters of Mayhem, the abovementioned Pimps) before finally settling on RHCP. “It’s an American tradition, like Louis Armstrong and the Red Hot Five,” he explains. “There was a time in the ’90s when it seemed childish and fanciful, but today I like it.”
07- Cock socks: like a speedball, without the pesky dying!
The band debuted their infamous socks-on-dicks routine at L.A. strip joint the Kit Kat Club. “The first time you wear a sock onstage, it’s like a drug,” says Kiedis. “Like you’re floating a few feet off the ground, in this vortex of netherworld.” Smith, meanwhile, has a tip for those at home: “The key is to get it around the balls. People don’t realize that.”
08- Never, ever let them order pizza
In the fall of ‘83, the band enlisted Gang of Four guitarist Andy Gill to produce their first album, but hated the “bubblegum pop” sound he was going for. “We were such street-punk little fuckers,” says Kiedis. “One night Flea took a shit in a pizza box and we presented it to Andy in the control room. To his credit, he remained fairly unflappable.”
09- Don’t mess with Anthony’s mama
When the Peppers played Grand Rapids on their first-ever tour, the local newspaper ran a review headlined, “If I Had a Son Like That, I’d Shoot him” - prompting an outraged letter from Kiedis’ mom. “She completely had my back,” Kiedis says. “Moms are the shit.”
10- George Clinton took them fishing in his backyard
As longtime P-Funk fans, the band were thrilled when George Clinton agreed to produce their second record - and even more thrilled when he let them crash at his Detroit estate. “We were all expecting this bigger-than-life funk superhero,” Kiedis says. “Instead he was like, ‘You see that lake out there ? Let’s go catch breakfast!’”
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