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Ooh! Ooh! Me! Me! I want to write my first review of The Red Hot Chili Peppers' METEORIC Stadium Arcadium.
First let me preface that I was born in the 80's so I was not hip to the original sound of The Red Hots. That being said once thing album hit me I learned the entire album on guitar and went out and bought their earlier albums. Does that say something about this album?
BTW this is me and a humble cover of "Slow Cheetah" and "Torture Me." One of these days I will put up videos of the entire album which takes about 2 hours. http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=leLCpWjYE24
Without 'Further' ado, let me tell you how it all began.
A friend of a friend of mine whom I did not know too well at the time (we hung out a couple of times always with good tunes) invited me to a festival. When it comes to road trippin' to a festi, somehow my car is always the one that gets vvolunteered. Shows u how much i love these things...
...so in preparation for this adventure my spider senses were tingling. I felt it was time to 'turn the page' with a fresh start musically so I wandered over to the local public library perusing the meager music collection available for borrow. Pretty much bare bones except for one hidden gem that neatly ambushed me as I gently spun the CD rack.
What is this? The Red Hit Chili Peppers in my towns local library? And the album Stadium Arcadium that I've never even heard about before.
Well let me tell you that I grew up watching music videos on MTV in the 80's and even though I did not have any albums by the Chili Peppers, I always like listening and watching their videos for Soul to Squeeze Under the Bridge and one of my favorite videos ever "Aeroplane. " I also like video games and arcades and what the heck not only will this double album fill a good chunk of time on the road but the font of the letters the title and the artwork were really drawing me in. Let's just say that I may have judged this album by its cover. I like the cut of its jib so I literally checked it out for 2 weeks.
Now...any driver worth their weight in salt will have an excellent range of good music to make the ride enjoyable for their passenger whoever they might be. Driver and Disc Jockey might as well be interchangeable professions.
So...that's why I wanted to give Stadium Arcadium a little test drive the week before. You know, make sure it was presentable to these backwater country folk in the mountains. Music might as well be paint. And let me tell you that when you step outside the vehicle after a long trip you might as well be painted with the colors of the music you have been listening to. With our tents chairs sleeping bags cooler full of provisions and of course Max Clover the Siberian Husky taking up the entire back seat (he was my festival friend's dog who could not take care of him anymore so I rescued him) we had no more room left for shields nor armor should the natives become agitated by the sonic booms coming from my stock stereo.
Oddly enough, I had a difficult time homing in on the music during those first few days. Fir whatever reason my memory could not draw a bead on recognizing the songs. Maybe I was not driving long enough to catch more than just fragments of lyrics drums guitars and wait, I thought I heard a trumpet in there somewhere...it might also have been the fact that it's a double album. For some reason the lyrics 'Like a Kane and Able' did jump out at me. Whatever the reason I initially had a difficult time wrapping my mind around it. Which is strange because there's nothing out of the ordinary in terms of instrumentation. RHCP are basically a power trio with a vocalist, like like Led Zeppelin or Queen or Ozzy Osborne or Van Halen. And the album was mixed on the hotter side of the peak.
Well long story short the three of us (Max ' s masters and the dog...Max Clover with his head out the window) listened to the entire album Stadium Arcadium for like 8 hours on our way to the festival (alternating Jupiter and Mars). I let my buddy drive and I had my head out the window just like my (new dog) with the stereo blasting. It was an incredible feeling, that feeling like we were running on adrenaline, the vanguard racing towards the edge of the earth.
This album Stadium Arcadium by the late and very talented band of musicians The Red Hot Chili Peppers is deep. If you are a guitar player like me, and want to analyze Mr. John Frusciante' s style you are in for a rainbow plethora of different techniques. Power chords (5ths), single note lines, double stops, arpeggios, tritones, fingerpicking, 7th chords, 9th chords, hammer ons, 6ths, double picking, use of the blues scale, right handed hammer ons (tapping), pedal tones, counterpoint, and chock full of bending. We are talking Skittles baby, taste the rainbow of techniques. I am always amazed by the rapid pace of the guitar part in "Snow (hey oh)" with a half time back beat on the guitar. This is not easy to play smooth for an extended duration. John must have some incredible stamina to be able to sustain that kind of tempo for the entire song. "Give me your wrist..."
And Fleas bass lines are so funky. These guys truly understand the art of counterpoint. I love "Charlie" and "Turn It Again" in particular. I'm not a drummer but I do know that everyone's parts fit well together, with Chad Smith solid on the skins. No one seems to ever overplay, and the songs are so imaginative so different emtionally. Those Chili Peppers are team players in it for the music: The Song.
Like I said this was the first album I ever bought (for all of my relatives too; makes a great Christmas present) but since first hearing this in the spring if 2009 I did buy The first few albums including Freaky Stylee Mother's Milk and of course Blood Sugar Sex Magik. Anybody can learn how to play an instrument. Hell, you don't even need to be able to hear if you learn just the mechanical finger movements. This album 'Stadium Arcadium' proves that The Red Hot Chili Peppers, Flea, John Frusciante, Anthony Kiedis, and Chad Smith are more than just players, they are musicians. The Red Hot Chili Peppers are Jedi Knights. They have opened up and spilled their guts "My heart is hurting when I share..." but they have used their ears to create music for the song. There's no question that this album was written with a more mature and experienced point of view "Slow down the road to my back 40..." so if you're skull was not obliterated and heart shattered into a million pieces when this meteor of an album finally hit you like it did to me, I just pulled out my iPod plugged in my guitar and ran through it 2 hours yesterday first time in a couple of months) I urge you to go back and meditate on these songs. Stadium Arcadium is IMHO a masterpiece if the likes seldom seen or heard by musicians in the last 20 years.
So go and may the force be with you and pick up another fellow 'musician' Guitar Slash's Apocalyptic Love featuring Miles Kennedy and the Conspirators (2012). Another album masterpiece and favorite of mine: Joy!
Thank you,
Steve
P.S. oh and 'Kentucky' if you happen to be reading this please do give Anthony a call ;)
P.P.S. There is no doubt in my mind that Mr. Frusciante will rejoin the Red Hots again sometime in (hopefully near) future when the time is right. If I helped create the music of Jupiter and Mars I think I too would bust the knob off while it was stuck on '10.'
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