Heating up

I also remember the Chili Peppers from 10 years ago. They did some good as the first white boys on the block to try their hands at a George Clinton-style fusion of funk, punk, metal, and rap. But when you listened past the novelty of the colorful shtick, you could hear some bad, or at least mediocre, stuff too. Even the band's founding guitarist, Hillel Slovak, seemed to agree when he went off to form his own trio, What Is This, rather than throw down with the Peppers on their homonymous debut in '84. He returned for the George Clinton-produced 1985 disc Freaky Styley and stayed until he OD'd in '88.

Slovak's death signaled the start of a spiritual awakening for the Peppers. Mother's Milk (1989) offered the anti-drug anthem "Knock Me Down" and a powerhouse, Flea-bitten version of Stevie Wonder's "Higher Ground." But the Chili Peppers didn't really reach higher ground artistically or commercially until Kiedis kicked a nasty habit and wrote the crossover hit "Under the Bridge" for 1991's Blood Sugar Sex Magik (Warner Bros.).

"Most of our songs happen by a certain amount of accidental behavior and a certain amount of work," is how Kiedis accounts for "Under the Bridge" from a phone at the Chili Peppers rehearsal studio in LA on the eve of a tour that brings the band to the FleetCenter on February 8 and the Worcester Centrum on the 12th. "Fortunately, we don't place any restrictions on what we're willing to play. If we write something that's honest and that's part of our experience, then we'll play it."

Experience has affected the Chili Peppers in more than one way. Under the musical direction of Flea they've developed one of the fiercest rhythm sections in rock and added some much-needed subtlety to their arsenal. One Hot MinuteJane's Addiction guitarist Dave Navarro on board, the line-up is more versatile then ever, segueing into psychedelic excursions on the intro to "Deep Kick" and even pulling off an almost Beatle-esque pop tune with "Tearjerker."

"If you have a four-man band and you change one of the characters in the play, it's going to be different," explains Kiedis. "There's no formula or guideline that we use to write songs. We just get together and play, and by the time a song is finished all four members have interjected themselves as much as possible. It's a meeting of styles, and on a good day the chemistry works. And one reason we were so lucky to get Dave is that he's not going to come in and try to do what the other guy did. He has his own vibe, his own personality, and he's confident enough to add that."

These days Kiedis and Flea are also confident enough to get serious about issues of tolerance and spirituality. At the heart of Kiedis's new world view are the somewhat generic gushy sentiments of "My Friends": "I love all of you hurt by the cold." But after a decade of his macho "Suck My Kiss" mentality, it's almost refreshing to hear him endorse the family-values platform in "Transcending" ("Fuck the legal greed/Fuck the nothing scene/See the family/In a loving stream") or ponder Eastern religion and philosophy in "Falling into Grace." And Flea doesn't mince any words on his little ditty "Pea" -- "Fuck you asshole/You homophobic redneck dick" is his answer to macho America.

"Flea wrote those lyrics and I think everyone in the band stands behind those sentiments," Kiedis emphasizes. "I think our music has had a lot of powerful, primal, male sexual energy to it, but it was never about being macho. That's just an interpretation that was a little bit off on the part of certain people out there. For us it was always about putting all our energy into playing music and into performing live."

And that, Kiedis agrees, is one element of the Chili Peppers' philosophy that hasn't changed a bit in the past decade.