After five years in hibernation, the six-time Grammy award winning rock band Red Hot Chili Peppers are back with their fresh hot tracks from their newest and the tenth studio album CD – I’m with You, featuring songs like “Monarchy of Roses, Factory of Faith, and Brendan’s Death Song”.
Warner Music Philippines, the official distributor of the latest RHCP album took the rare opportunity to send a local correspondent, no other than Mr. Rico Blanco himself, to watch RHCP’s kick-off/comeback concert and press conference that was held in Hong Kong.
Last week, I attended a small media gathering where we had the chance to listen to RHCP’s newest album and watch a rare interview with the band members about how their individual lives went during their five-year leave of absence. The band shared that, either individually or collectively, they spent their time making music. Flea, in particular, became preoccupied with going back to school such that he actually enrolled in NYU to take up formal classes in music. Anthony Kiedis, on the other hand, spent more time with his son. It was also in the interview where the band introduced their newest member, Josh Klinghoffer, who replaced John Frusciante as the lead guitarist of the group.
Warner representatives shared with us some of the highlights of Mr. Blanco’s experiences with the band. Among these was the meet and greet where the band literally went berserk in ecstasy after finding out that Blanco is from the Philippines. It was there that he was told a multitude of Filipinos will be flying to Hong Kong just to watch the concert. To his delight, he also discovered that the RHCP members are red hot fans of our very own Pambansang Kamao – Manny Pacquiao. They even asked Blanco if there would be any chance that the Pacman will watch the concert too.
I was fortunate to get a copy of the band’s latest CD, the songs of which I copied to my MP3 player so I can listen to them everywhere I go. The songs are definitely RHCP-sounding but with a different style which is quite cool. One cut in particular that I liked so much is “The Adventure of the Rain Dance Maggie”. I even love the music video version of it that was played at the WMP listening room.
The “Monarchy of Roses”, according to Kiedis and Flea, was inspired by Black Sabbath and 70’s disco music and that the best way to describe the music is “Sabbath-Disco”. On the other hand, the inspiration behind the song “Ethiopia” was when Flea visited Ethiopia and how he enjoyed the country. As usual, it has Flea’s touch of funky bass-play since he co-wrote the song. The CD has fourteen cuts and all are equally great sounding with RHCP’s superb play of poetry in the lyrics and of course Flea’s Funk Bass signature in every song. Personally, I think he is one of the best bass players on the planet.
The “I’m with You” album is produced by Rick Rubin who has been the loyal producer of the band’s previous albums. It was recorded at East West in Los Angeles and Shangri-la in Malibu, California. Watch out for this album because it will storm record bars everywhere soon. Definitely, the Red Hot Chili Peppers are with us again, now.
No comments:
Post a Comment