Chilli Peppers Book Extract

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Cracked Up
By 1985, the Red Hot Chili Peppers were a band in trouble. Their self-titled debut album, released the year before, had been a disaster, and the occasional drug use of singer Anthony Kiedis and guitarist Hillel Slovak was fast becoming a full-time occupation. Then the Peppers met their hero George Clinton, aka Dr Funkenstein, the man behind such hugely influential acts as P-Funk and Parliament. To record their second album, the band’s label and management decided to ship the funky four off to Clinton’s farm in Detroit. As this extract from Jeff Apter’s Fornication: The Red Hot Chili Peppers Story (Omnibus Press 2004) reveals, what they didn’t realise was that the temptations there were just as seductive as they’d been back in Hollywood.

George Clinton had already lived several lives by the time former Chili Pepper Jack Sherman introduced the funk-soul brother to the punk-funk upstarts. He’d been a singer, producer, band leader, hitmaker and manic performer, who’d drawn his inspiration from sources as wildly diverse as funk, soul, Detroit pop, Fifties doo-wop and the acid-drenched rock of the 1960s. And most importantly, Clinton was funky - and freaky - to the bone. His motto was “funk ‘em if they can’t take a joke”, an attitude to which the Chili Peppers could very clearly relate.
But when the Chili Peppers came calling, Clinton was embroiled in legal hassles, brought about by the endless royalty problems created by working with 40 musicians, four labels and three bands over the past three decades. It was 1985 and Clinton’s career needed a kickstart. The rock’n’roll crowd had begun to disregard him, while his re-discovery by generation hip-hop was still several years away. Working with a hot new band such as the Red Hot Chili Peppers offered him the chance to regain both credibility and commercial worth.
Flea recalled meeting with Clinton when he wrote liner notes for the reissued Freaky Styley in 2003. “I was mighty nervous to meet him but no-one ever made me feel more comfortable more quickly - ever. He is the warmest, kindest man in the world.”
Clinton’s manager, Archie Ivy, recalled what the band asked of Clinton. “They said they want to be funky. We really taught them how to be funky. They lived [for a time] with George. He said, ‘Look boys, you got the funk, but because you’re white, you’re gonna make it to the top before we do’. Give credit, not [just] to George Clinton, but to Parliament/Funkadelic.”
Bassist and funkfather spent some quality time together, prior to the sessions, which were to take place first at the studio located on the Detroit farm where Clinton lived and then at Detroit’s United Sound.
Though it seemed like an idyllic set-up, Clinton didn’t actually own the studio or the farm where the band would work before heading into United Sound, where John Lee Hooker, Aretha Franklin and Jackie Wilson had recorded. In yet another classic case of a great talent being screwed over by the music biz, it’s most likely that Clinton was living on the farm - which was located in Rochester, just outside Detroit - thanks only to the good graces of Armen Boladian, who owned Westbound Records, the label which had released all the early Funkadelic albums and who would be given such credits as “Supervisor” on these albums. According to Richard Kortvelesy, a reliable source when it comes to Detroit music history, it seemed that Boladian owned the property. Boladian let Clinton live there, rent-free, in exchange for unpaid royalties on Clinton songs that he had published through his Bridgeport Publishing.
Clinton used the farm-based studio primarily for recording demos and basic album tracks. He may have been known universally for his good-time-all-the-time music, but things were pretty tough for George Clinton when he connected with The Red Hot Chili Peppers.
The band, meanwhile, needed some new tunes. This time around they wanted to go into the studio much better prepared. With Slovak now officially a Chili Pepper, Kiedis and Flea shifted camp to Mexico - with a Fostex 4-track recorder in tow - in order to work up some songs, many of which had been co-written with guitarist Jack Sherman prior to his sacking (in rehearsals that, once again, Kiedis failed to attend). Once settled south of the border, the pair struck up a sweet deal with a waiter at a nearby restaurant. In exchange for the Peppers’ weed, he would provide free flan and coffee every night. The change in scenery clearly worked, because while in Mexico the pair committed to tape the bare bones of such future Freaky Styley songs as ‘American Ghost Dance’ and ‘Catholic School Girls Rule’.
Sweetly stoned and chuffed with their new tunes, Kiedis and Flea convened with Slovak and Martinez back in Hollywood, at a rehearsal space called Far Out, which they shared with their punk heroes The Circle Jerks. Slovak, Flea and Martinez cut out one night to play an instrumental gig under the moniker Stale Bastard, but the bulk of their time was spent shaping the songs for Freaky Styley, Slovak reworking Sherman’s guitar parts.
By spring, band and gear were on the road headed for Clinton-land. It was agreed that they would stay on the farm while in pre-production, which to the Peppers must have seemed like the funk motherland.
“George Clinton is amazing,” Kiedis gushed. “He’s the ultimate hard-core funk creator in the world, ever. If anybody ever wanted to ask you what was the greatest funk/metal ever, it would be Parliament/Funkadelic. Their music is so great that I don’t think people are even capable of understanding how great it is.”
Flea was just as enthused. “George Clinton is a beautiful person,” sighed the now shaven-headed bassman. “He’s like a very warm man, good to be around. He’s very inspirational; he’s like an exploding cosmic love bomb that explodes in all directions.”

Pre-production for the album took place on Clinton’s farm and at a studio called Detroit On Parade, which was operated by a Clinton buddy named Navarro, a local character who Flea remembers as not being the “kind of guy you’d ever want to fuck with”. The Peppers’ stay on Clinton’s property, however, was brief. Flea recalls that “maybe [Kiedis] smashed George’s snowmobile or something”, so not long after sessions began they were shipped off to what Flea described as “some condo type of thing”, located in Bloomfield Hills, an upscale Detroit suburb.
Cliff Martinez, however, has vivid memories of the time spent on the Funkadelic farm. “It was a kick. We had our instruments set up in George’s living room. Every day we’d wander out in our bathrobes and play and George would talk about arrangements.” The walls in Clinton’s house were adorned with gigantic Pedro Bell paintings (the artist behind many Clinton album covers); stuffed animals were scattered everywhere. And pot was virtually on tap. As As band manager Lindy Goetz recalls, “It was a wild time.”
Those wild times continued when the sessions shifted to United Sound. Clinton wasn’t a punctual man: the band would front after lunch, but their producer wouldn’t roll in until early evening. Sessions would continue until early morning, when the band would head back to their condo and crash. This nocturnal lifestyle continued for the three months of recording.
But it wasn’t as if the band were prisoners of Bloomfield Hills. Occasionally they’d adjourn to such downtown spots as Lili’s 21. It was there that a very wasted bunch of Peppers would heckle local bands and behave in the wayward, reckless manner befitting snotty Californian punks. Kiedis and Slovak had sniffed out the local cocaine dealers and would load up on the cheap local product (“mass quantities” of the stuff, according to Kiedis). “Under the influence of said substance,” Kiedis said, “we would sometimes be miserable and we would sometimes dance and be absurd.”
Martinez - who remembers Detroit as “crack central, the only place where Pyrex beakers are sold next to boxes of Q-tips in gas stations” - fondly recalled one night of major indulgence. “Flea and Hillel cooked up a load of freebase from powdered coke and we lit it and inhaled it,” he told me. “That was my one big drug experience. It was the first time in my life that I felt euphoric with drugs - everything was right with my life and the planet and the band. But the next day my shit turned snow white. I thought that was God’s way of telling me, ‘You can’t do a lot of this, Cliff’.”*
According to one Detroit clubber, “These guys were just out of control. When other bands dropped in from out of town, the only thing they wanted to do was get up and jam. But the Peppers [thought] they were a big deal because they were from LA, because they were recording out in the sticks with George Clinton - [but] who was George Clinton in 1985, man?”
In the liner notes for the album’s 2003 reissue, Flea had a different take on their nocturnal adventures. “One night when we were there [in Detroit] we went to a rock club and a band was playing but when they went off stage, before they could return for their encore, we ran up and grabbed their shit and started rockin’. That was fun.”
Kiedis’ recollections of the night are different yet again. He remembers asking the band if they could jam, but was rejected. “‘We’d rather not have you messing with our sensitive equipment’,” he was informed. The Peppers did anyway, pulling off what Kiedis described as “the rockingest tunes that little club ever witnessed. We tore the place to pieces”. The next day Detroit papers had dubbed their set “the guerrilla warfare gig”.
On the same night, a wildly stoned Slovak - wearing a shiny new suit - bounced around the dance floor, “like a crazy freak”, according to Flea. He was immediately christened The Skinny Sweaty Man In The Green Suit, a nickname that would stick.

Clinton’s preferred working method in the studio was gentle bullying, speaking to the band members through their headphones in his low, rumbling voice. One time he stressed that Flea needed to put “more muscle” into his bass playing. If anyone else had asked the bassman to do that it could have been disastrous, but Flea sucked up his pride and played just that little bit harder, as instructed. “[Clinton’s voice] was the greatest sounding thing I ever heard,” Flea observed upon Freaky Styley’s 2003 re-release. “We’d be out there rocking and his voice would come in, ‘Yeeeah git it... come on now! Dig deep’ and so forth.”
The atmosphere in the studio was far more positive than the mood during the recording of their debut long-player. There were no turds in pizza boxes or “homo” acoustic guitars this time around - just a lot of weed being smoked and good times for all. “We had fun in the studio,” Martinez stated. “George told us not to be intimidated. There was a controlled party atmosphere in the studio, with people sitting around, ready to do handclaps. I remember smoking a pile of pot and - this is awful to say - but I discovered that drugs could be a tool. I played much better, with that particular type of music, when I was stoned. I felt I played so much better than on the first record, in part because of this loose, party-type atmosphere.”
It wasn’t as though their wild nightlife was impeding on the album’s progress; in fact, it seemed the party just keep going when the band adjourned to the studio. Their new songs were evolving well under the watchful eyes (and ears) of Dr Funkenstein, despite the fact that Clinton - unlike Andy Gill - hadn’t checked out the band’s live act before recording with them. But he was fast becoming a Chili Peppers convert. He also steered the band in the direction of a pair of covers that would become standout tracks from Freaky Styley and establish a tradition for the band, who would go on to put their own spin on classics from Jimi Hendrix, The Stooges, Bob Dylan and The Ramones, even Bachman Turner Overdrive.
One of the covers came from Sylvester Stewart (aka Sly Stone) who, like George Clinton, was a maverick. Despite operating on the fringes of the mainstream, Stone made a huge impact on the hippie and post-hippie era culture. Having shifted from his native Texas to San Francisco in the Fifties, Stone was raised on the heavenly sounds of gospel, before studying the trumpet and then cutting a local hit, ‘Long Time Away’, at the ripe old age of 16. He was a DJ and then a record producer when he hooked up with a female trumpeter, Cynthia Robinson. Together they formed the legendary Sly & The Family Stone. By the time of their second album, 1968’s Dance To The Music, the band’s rock/pop/soul hybrid was drawing attention from both sides of America’s racial divide - and when fused with the Stone’s wild racial and sexual mix, the combination was pretty damned explosive. They broke out all over with an incendiary set at the 1969 Woodstock festival. Their leader’s canonisation was complete when Miles Davis named Jimi Hendrix and Stone as his favourite musicians, even though drug problems, arrests, stints in rehab and a reputation as “no show Sly” damaged his legend during the latter part of his career. Stone had even guested on Funkadelic’s Electric Spanking Of War Babies album in 1981, long after his star had faded.
For Freaky Styley, the Chili Peppers chose to cover ‘If You Want Me To Stay’, a Top 10 R&B hit from the band’s 1973 album, Fresh, which turned out to be the Stone’s final charting track. Kiedis was a fan of the song, in part because he recalled that a teammate from his junior high school football team used to sing the chorus in huddles. But the links with the music of Sly Stone were stronger than that. Kiedis could see in Sly Stone some of his own inconsistencies as a human being.
“Sly Stone is a perfect example of someone who had a very powerful message in his music that he didn’t necessarily live by himself,” said the man who would soon be harming his already questionable rep with a song called ‘Party On Your Pussy’. “[But] I like to believe there’s hope for anybody,” Kiedis continued. “He’s another one of my all-time favourites. And I don’t think that it’s ever too late for anybody to bounce back. I love him ‘til the day he dies, just because he’s written some of the most beautiful music ever and he played it with such conviction.”
With an approving Clinton looking on, the Peppers delivered a perfectly serviceable reworking of a great song. Once Kiedis opened his mouth to sing it was clear that he was no Sly Stone, but with the Horny Horns - Fred Wesley, Maceo Parker and Benny Cowan - at his back, the Peppers couldn’t miss. Some spicy, funky guitar fills from Slovak and a chorus of deep harmonies helped bring the song on home. It was one of Freaky Styley’s best moments, a natural high.
The second cover on Freaky Styley was the band’s take on The Meter’s ‘Africa’, a standout from their 1974 Rejuvenation album, which they renamed ‘Hollywood’. The Meters were a big favourite of George Clinton, who pushed the Peppers in the direction of ‘Africa’. His voice can be heard rumbling around somewhere in the midst of the track.
Fronted by Art Neville and formed in 1967, The Meters pumped out lean, juicy R&B that was as earthy and nourishing as a plate of gumbo; they defined New Orleans funk. But they were a band with a split personality, because they were equally well known as one of New Orleans’ finest backing bands. They worked on albums by Dr John, Paul McCartney & Wings, Robert Palmer and Labelle, as well as opening for The Rolling Stones on their 1975 American and 1976 European tours.
What the Chili Peppers attempted to do with their take on ‘Africa’ (aka ‘Hollywood’) was lay claim to some deep funk roots. But hearing a shirtless, bronzed white LA dude such as Kiedis tossing out lines about “going back to the brotherland” was a bit hard to swallow. Fortunately, Clinton’s good melodic sense saved the song from becoming a white-boy’s notion of what funk should sound like, as he added layers of vocals from himself, studio hand Mike “Clip” Payne and others, as well as enticing some more swinging brass from the Horny Horns.
In a strange twist, the Peppers’ own song, the rumbling ‘Jungleman’, which opened the album, accidentally borrowed a Meters song title. Flea insists there was no collective consciousness at work. “I swear to God that we had never heard the Meters’ song when we wrote ‘Jungleman’. It was just a wild co-incidence.”
The song itself showed that despite Kiedis’ inability to find his own singing voice, he could still deliver an amusingly dumbed-down rap: “I’m a jungle man / I’m a jungle man,” he chants, “I get all the bush I can”. And the band proved that they could recognise a serviceable groove when they uncovered one, while Hillel Slovak got one of many chances on the record to cut loose with some supernova stringwork. “Hillel was very Hendrix influenced,” Martinez recalled, “and he was an open-minded guy. Jack [Sherman] could do a lot of different styles, whereas Hillel could be both a cerebral player and a bit Neanderthal.”
Slovak’s return to the Peppers had also improved inter-band life, according to Martinez. “Things moved much smoother with Hillel in the band. He was able to live and breathe and create without being called a fag, unlike Jack.”
But you had to wonder whether Clinton and those around the band were truly confident of the quality of their songcraft. ‘Africa’ and ‘If You Want Me To Stay’, the record’s pair of wisely-selected covers, were placed amongst the album’s first four tracks. It wasn’t exactly a vote of confidence: the band were leading with aces, but they weren’t their aces.
What is beyond dispute is the fact that Freaky Styley was certainly a far more testosterone-powered record than their debut. Kiedis, in particular, had his sexual mojo working during the tracks ‘Sex Rap’, ‘Lovin’ And Touchin’” and the malicious ‘Blackeyed Blonde’. As for the track ‘Battleship’, it was actually better known as ‘Blowjob Park’ and had been in the band’s live set as early as January 1985. Its watered-down title was the first but not last time that the band would have to modify a song name to please the legal department at EMI. Not that it mattered greatly; it was little more than a manic throwaway, a chance for the band to rock hard and bellow a borderline homophobic chant of “blowjob park” until their lungs started to bleed.
Then there was ‘Catholic School Girls Rule’, a blatantly X-rated meditation on the dangerous lure of teenagers in school uniforms. Such lines as “In the class she’s taking notes/Just how deep deep is my throat” must have appealed to actor/director Dick Rude, who offered to direct a video for the track. The clip turned out exactly as you would expect, with plenty of flesh, swearing, blasphemy - and simulated blowjobs in cubicles from willing “actresses”. Kiedis even got the chance to play a “ghetto Jesus” character, dragging his cross while running his discerning eyes over some seriously nubile school-agers. He looked like one happy rock dude.

Excerpted from Fornication: The Red Hot Chili Peppers Story (Omnibus Press 2004). Jeff Apter is the former Music Editor of Australian Rolling Stone and the author of Tomorrow Never Knows: The Silverchair Story.