Sofia Wenborn's (SW) interview with Anthony Kiedis (AK) from the Red Hot Chili Peppers (April 21). Aired on Close Up April 23.
Sofia Wenborn: [Pre interview chat about flying
in late last night]
Anthony Kiedis: I ended up going on You Tube last
night and looking for something that wasn't on there which I
thought was interesting because I thought everything including your
actual birth would've been on You Tube but some things aren't! Two
bands that I looked for, there wasn't a remnant of!
SW: What were you looking for?
AK: One was called Anthym which was the earliest
kernel of my high school musical scenario, a band that Flea
actually played in.. and it became a band called What Is This. And
there was nothing to be found on Anthym or What Is This.
SW: Do they still exist?
AK: They don't. What Is This became 11. There
probably is something on 11 but I wasn't looking for that. And then
I found this crazy old interview with Flea and myself clearly under
the influence of something other than sunshine and it was from the
first month of 1986 and we were just little freaky puppies much
different from today's interview.. so different yeah. You know the
expression.. piss and vinegar.
SW: No, tell me.
AK: Come on, you must know. That's what kids are
made of when they just don't know any better ... you guys don't
have that?
SW: No
AK: Yeah piss is something different over here.
Piss is beer.
Yeah piss and vinegar is when anything is possible and you're just
full of yourself.
SW: Youth is wasted on the young...
AK: Youth is whatever you want it to be. I don't
think it's wasted on anybody .. I mean I can't agree with that.
SW: You're an hour away from performing
(Saturday night concert in Auckland)... What usually happens
now?
AK: An hour and a half. First I have to eat a few
hours before lest I throw up in my mouth while on stage .. it's a
horrible thing and it happens sometimes even when I eat three hours
before but it's such a physical exertion experience.. the singing
.. the singing and the dancing and the jumping and the crashing
about. You really have to digest your food before you get out
there. So it starts with eating. Before that it starts with
hydrating. Like the more water you can drink in a day the better.
Your voice is going to hold up for a 2 hour show. Getting some
sunlight during the day is very important& let it get inside
your eyeballs so you feel all right and then listening to John DJ
warm up his guitar is a really nice centring experience. And then I
start eating some weird things like ginkgo and ginseng and maybe
some Tribulis. About an hour before I start drinking some Yerba
Mate. You know what that is? It's a South American coffee
product& a mild stimulant. It's like caffeine, sort of.
SW: No coffee for you any more?
AK: No I love the taste of coffee. You have good
coffee right here in New Zealand& a nice cup you make. So
yeah, of course, then we do a little soul circle right before we go
on stage where we get prissy and hold hands and try to find the
light as a single unit and either say something funny or
profound or say nothing at all.
SW: That probably never used to happen did
it?
AK: We've been soul circling for a long time. It's
also changed over the years. It started off, we'd get into the soul
circle and we'd slap each other across the face with a pretty
good-strength slap which was kind of an ode to the Mongolian
warriors you know. Before battle they'd get slapped and they'd get
steel brushed on their naked bodies just to invigorate their senses
before battle. And I do I make weird sounds you know, put my voice
in a good spot.
SW: What's on the rider this evening?
AK: Well you know, we were talking about that
because spoiled rotten celebrities are always getting busted for
these outlandish rider requests. So who were we talking about that?
Flea actually got written up once for having a meditation room.
They thought that was crazy, yeah crazy. He just likes a quiet room
where he can go and sit and get away from everybody who's trying to
get a little piece of him right after we come off stage.
There's nothing really weird in our fridge. We have organic fruit
and veges. We have water and tea and we do have a couple of small
bizarre requests .. some albino midgets from Tasmania&
but that's becoming more and more common these days (laughs).
SW: Yes, well we have those on the shop shelf
here. That's nothing fancy.
AK: Ours being Siamese twins makes them a lot
harder to find& but yeah no rider. Food and drink and yeah
that's it. We travel with our own stuff.. stuff we like.
SW: You've been doing this a long time. Is it
still fun or another day at work?
AK: It's like anything. Some days it's so fun you
can't even believe it. How is it possible for it to be so much fun?
And some days it's just not, you know. Some days it's like 'I had a
bad show I couldn't hear myself, I couldn't feel the energy flowing
through me, I was in a fight with someone in my band it just didn't
feel right'. But those are in the minority. It's still magical. I
still look forward to it... actually I'm homesick. I can't lie am
homesick.
SW: Homesick for L.A.?
AK: For home, my home, my bed, my dogs, my
porch.
SW: Your own pillow.
AK: Yes my own pillow. But I'm looking forward to
the next round of activity I know. We're going to finish touring in
a few months and take some time off and everyone's going to run off
and do their own thing for a while but in the back of my mind I'm
really looking forward to the moment that we reconvene and start
the really beautiful and most pure part of the process. Just being
in a room playing music writing some ideas down and basically
creating songs out of thin air.
SW: When John came back in 1998, it all seemed
to click back into place. There really does seem to be a magical
chemistry between you all?
AK: I'm very aware of the chemistry. It's
something you can't take for granted. I'm very thankful for it and
I recognise the power of its reality in all of our lives. Some
people don't and it's a mistake not to because people throw away
god-given special chemistry that's very rare, very hard to find.
It's easy to find examples of because there were people who were
great you know like the Ramones or Led Zep or so many other bands
that just couldn't have been that incredible without all elements
of the chemistry involved.
SW: You all seem to have quite strong creative
personalities too& that must be blessing and a curse
sometimes?
AK: Well yeah it's a pain in the ass, but I don't
think it would be possible if we didn't all have our own bizarre
idiosyncrasies of having to say what we have to say. We do find a
way to make it blend.
SW: You've put each other through a lot over
the years. Does it surprise you that you're still together?
AK: I love the fact that we're still together but
it doesn't really surprise me either. It wouldn't surprise me if we
broke up either. I kind of look at it like 'anything is possible
and I'm never really surprised by changes that happen along the
way'. Like I said, I feel like the best is yet to come in some
respects.
SW: What's the difference between doing an
album on drugs and doing it clean?
AK: It has been a really, really long time since
I've tried to write a record when i was under the influence. It was
never my speciality. Writing music always happened for me in
periods when I wasn't under the influence of mind-altering
substance. I don't even know how to compare the two. I do my best
work when I'm not under the influence and that's always been like
that for me. So it's not like I have bodies of work to compare to
each other.
SW: You do seem to communicate better these
days?
AK: Is that what they're saying?
SW: Well it sounds like you talk about your
feelings more .
AK: Well I don't know. We definitely address weird
feelings quicker than we used to which is good but not always
pleasant or well spoken. It can still be ugly or messy or fiery but
the bouts and the spats and the battles and misunderstandings&
well the lifespan is very short these days. If someone's feeling
messed up over something, it doesn't usually go more than a day or
two without us dealing with it one way or another. Not necessarily
with great style and grace but we do address it because we just
don't need to go round feeling like shit.
SW: Do you worry when you release a new album?
Do you worry about new young bands or where there's left for you to
go?
AK: No I don't worry about new young bands. The
bounty of life is infinite and so is music and so are
opportunities. So what somebody else is doing would never have any
bearing on what we're doing you know. I wish there were more good
new bands that would light a fire and offer a little friendly
competition that would be welcomed. We don't worry so much about
how it's going to be received or anything like that& we've been
doing it too long. I think we know when we've done something that's
good and worthy of being released and we just work on it until we
feel it's something good. That's all we can do and so far we have
had pretty good luck.
SW: Do you have any favourite groupie
stories?
AK: Well my dynamic with the groupie is this.
Before I was able to have them I wanted them, and the moment that I
actually had them I was no longer attracted to them so it's a catch
22 situation. Once the chase or the challenge was removed, it
didn't seem that interesting.
We did have a crazy quirky girl in our very last show in Sydney who
did some sort of jump off the balcony once the show was finished
and hurt herself pretty bad. She picked herself up and ended up
sneaking into the hallway where our dressing room was and quietly
came and sat down next to me while I was having dinner after the
show. She was clearly shaken up and started getting out camera
phones and I was like 'put away your phone. What's going on with
you? What are you doing here? And she explained her story and I
said 'hey ..you gotta go you know. I'm glad you were able to sneak
in but you gotta go now."
SW: Away from all that, do you still have your
property in Kaipara?
AK: I don't have it any more and the people who
have it now have invited me to come and I don't really know them. I
kinda miss it. It was a beautiful spot I'll always have the memory
of my experiences there and the harbour and the beautiful little
family that used to live on my property.
