Guest Post by: Mason

Date and Place: January 22, 2007, at the RBC Center in Raleigh, NC

After releasing the most successful album in the band’s history, Stadium Arcadium, there should be no doubt that the Red Hot Chili Peppers will spend a lot of time touring around the world to support the album. Singles keep jumping off the double-album- their biggest and most mixed bag of funk, alternative pop, and grunge-y rock- leaving plenty of material to be performed live.

This is why it was somewhat a surprise to me that not that many songs came from Stadium. This is kind of a good thing. The album, though it has its moments of greatness, has many forgettable tracks, and doesn’t really deserve the double-LP status. It creates a problem, too, since there’s room for them to bring out some of their oldies.

But there are many areas they don’t want to venture: the strange Dave Navarro album One Hot Minute, any rap-inflicted tune (singer Anthony Keidis has been trying to emphasize his singing nowadays), and any album that precedes John Frusciante, which unfortunately excludes the great Uplift Mofo Party Plan and Freaky Styley.

They did, however, come up with some surprises. They unleash the great funk-rockers, “Power of Equality” and “Blood Sugar Sex Magik”, two underrated tracks from their 1991 multi-platinum album that shares the latter’s title. Also performed is “Nobody Weird Like Me”, the one track that actually comes close to anything Stooges, one of the band’s greatest influences. The Chili Peppers said that they change the set-list for each performance, so it’d be interesting to see what appeared at other performances.

The rest of the show was typical play-the-hits affairs: from By The Way, “Can’t Stop” (a personal favorite of mine, which opened the show), “Throw Away Your Television”, and the title track were played; from Californication, “Scar Tissue” and the title song; and from Stadium, “Dani California”, “Snow ((Hey Oh))”, “Charlie”, and “21st Century”. Surprisingly, some of the other recent singles, like “Tell Me Baby”, “Desecration Smile”, and “Hump De Bump” didn’t make the cut (the last one listed there is a personal disappointment to me, it’s my favorite cut). Naturally, “Under The Bridge” and “Give It Away” were the encore.

Easily the band’s greatest gift is their musical abilities. Their combination of Rap, Funk, and Classic and Alternative Rock, has made an unavoidable influence on Modern Rock. Flea, arguably the most talented member, showed why so many bassists follow in his footsteps. His solos were the highlights of the concert. He can switch without effort between Funk and Rock, and can play with melody and speed. John Frusciante is a one of a kind guitarist, but his talent is about 85% riff, and 15% solos.

When he improvised on stage, it didn’t matter of which kind of songs he was jumping off, he’d do the same thing: crank the whammy bar, stomp on his wah-wah pedal, and create a lot of noise. This was strange, because he showed a lot of strength in this department on the albums.

Chad Smith isn’t the greatest drummer in the world, but he excels at creating rhythms. His jams were very good, proving that he’s an ideal Chili Pepper drummer. Anthony Keidis was his usual self, dancing around the stage like a Native American hip-hop star, showing energy most people his age (44) don’t have. The band’s saving grace is their energy, and this energy kept the show interesting.

The show was, in the end, an enjoyable night. Red Hot Chili Peppers will be in existence for twenty-five years in 2008, and they’ve accomplished quite a bit: nine albums (so far), survived drug abuse, and gone through more guitarists and drummers than anyone else, except maybe for Deep Purple. They’re in a comfortable groove, right now, which resulted in an exciting show with only a few surprises.

Artistically, the Chli Peppers are on a slight decline ("Stadium Arcadium" is a step down from "By The Way", which was a step down from "Californication"), but that could change on their next album. Hopefully it won’t be another four years until it’s released. They are one of the greatest rock bands, and this show proved that, even if it wasn’t mind-blowing.

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