There is something very special about July 2022 for me. It commemorates the 20th anniversary of my first trip to The British Aisles with People 2 People where I would take tour buses with people singing Grease (1978) songs and watching Austin Powers and the Spy Who Shagged Me (1999) on a loop. Of course, there were many scenic beauties that are worth remembering, but it was my first moments as a teenager, and something that has remained dear to me as the decades have worn on. I’ve only been back to Europe once, and I could only wish to have had tour guides to motivate me through the streets of London again. It was fun, but I’ve clearly become a boring traveler in the time since.
Among the things guiding me through the trip was a collection of CDs that I kept in a purple case. Pop them in a Walkman and look out the window at everything, the hours were sometimes meandering but I would say they were worth it. Among them is an album that I have thought about often since for a variety of reasons, starting with that it came out the day after my 13th birthday, meaning it was omnipresent whenever I’d enter an HMV and see the TV playing the music video for “The Zephyr Song.” In fact, one of the first images I saw upon waking up the first day after arriving was Anthony Kiedis performing live, humping a microphone stand. I was in England, and yet culturally I seemed to be back in Southern California.
The Red Hot Chili Peppers’ “By the Way” has always been this beguiling album in my collection. I remember listening to the titular lead single on the radio and feeling like I was witnessing a revolution, where the calm choruses paved way for this free-formed verse of madness. What did any of it mean? The aggressiveness was attractive (and still is) and I wondered what the rest of the album would sound like. The truth is that I didn’t hate the record, but it was one of a handful of records that convinced me that every album was only half-good, meaning the back half was usually filler and not to be taken seriously. I was bored by the time I reached “Venice Queen.” I wasn’t musically complex at the time and wanted more “Can’t Stop” and less “Dosed.” I couldn’t explain it, even as I listened a handful of times throughout those bus rides, committing them to memory. I just didn’t care.
The main reason I find this perspective interesting is because, along with Weezer’s “Maladroit,” it was my first exposure to a band in 2002 that I’d grow to like but felt myself immediately disconnected. I know the common expression is that you always love the first thing you hear by an artist, but that couldn’t be less true for RHCP. I would come to really like “Stadium Arcadium” upon release and I’m one of those who believe in the voodoo of “Blood Sugar Sex Magic” and “Californication.” They are a genuinely impressive band when they’re in top form, grooving between a crackling drum hook, a hallucinatory guitar solo, and Flea’s bass-line runs. Oh, how I love a good Flea bass-line run. As someone who used to play, there was something immortal about his solos.
Relistening to “By the Way” for the first time in years, especially after enjoying those other records, I realized my major concern was in part that it just isn’t a funky record. I had no comparison to go off of in 2002, but it makes sense when considering that the songs that stood out were the upbeat ones, where the bridge had the guitar drop out long enough for Flea to get a decent melody going. To be honest, nothing on “By the Way” ever allows Flea to do anything substantial. Even the most bass-driven song, “Throw Away Your Television,” feels more like an excuse for John Frusciante to show off these psychedelic guitar loops than give us a band that is working in harmony. Other songs like “On Mercury” bothers me for how they jump from flamenco guitars to surfy choruses. This record is all over the place. Anyone calling it a b-sides compilation after “Californication” would have my vote.
Reading up on the album, I realize that I wasn’t the only one who was concerned with Frusciante taking initiative on every track, where it was clearly him showing off. As much as I love a good guitar riff from him, ad nauseum it is tedious and boring for me. This is a boastful album that cannot settle on anything for long enough. Flea tended to agree with this notion and considered leaving the band when he believed that Frusciante was taking too much of the lead. I’m not mad at anyone in this event as I believe bands need to experiment to stay fresh, but it makes sense as to why this record has never fully clicked with me as either album on either side has.
This isn’t to say that I dislike the record. As much as the concept of it still gives me nostalgia for that summer, very little of the music builds on that emotion. I think I more appreciated it because it was omnipresent, where I’d be at a restaurant and suddenly the “Can’t Stop” video came on and we’d all be laughing. There are things to like about the album, and they are evident in the opening parts of the record.
As mentioned, “By the Way” as a song is still among my favorite RHCP tracks just for how nutso it gets quickly. I love how it balances energies while reflecting Frusciante’s experimentation in adequate doses. Nothing is overbearing and this is the clear work of masters who may be talking nonsense, but do so with such control that you just admire it. Even the opening riff and entrance of the bass have this beautiful touch to them. I love it as an opening melody building to the escapist verses. The harmonies are nice and the eventual breakdown with scat singing is just so cool. Nothing on this record, even the enjoyable “Can’t Stop,” matches the power of “By the Way.” I hate that this is the opener just because it puts so much pressure on the rest of the record to match it, which it fails miserably.
“Universally Speaking” maybe has good will because it was the second song and I still had optimism about the record. While it embodies a shift into lighter melodies and a doo-wop aesthetic, I still enjoy how Kiedis vocally navigates the verses, contrasting the instrumentation with his bopping around. Sometimes I get it mixed up with “The Zephyr Song,” if just because they have the same aura for me. Still, there is something to affectionate Kiedis that I think works in places but as a whole grows tedious (as evident on their new album “Unlimited Love”). Again, these are really good songs in hindsight, but the whiplash between tracks one and two definitely is too much for a teenager wanting something raucous.
Now the greatest surprise of all when revisiting this record was “This is the Place.” In some respect, it’s a darker “Under the Bridge” just because of how Kiedis frames the narration. It’s maybe the most successful because it feels sincere, leading to something personal as well as being absent of total novelty. The choruses are electric and the songwriting is astounding for how he manages to use structure to dive into increasingly dark themes, finding lines like “can I pet your wolverine” being more than jokes as he navigates further into desperation, psychoanalyzing himself through music. It’s maybe a tad cryptic, but definitely among the most enjoyable obscure cuts they’ve ever released. The choruses are so damn amazing. If the record had skidded by on this energy, maybe I’d love it more.
To be honest, the conflict emerges by “Dosed” and in hindsight, I realize that this is where my skepticism of the record started. Where “Universally Speaking” at least had a poppy hook, this is downbeat to its fullest. I know that I just praised the previous track for embracing a darker tone, but there’s something to the melancholy mixed with the pitch of Kiedis’ voice with the backup harmonies that felt way too try-hard for me. I should be overwhelmed with emotion hearing a chorus like:
Way upon the mountain where she diedAll I ever wanted was your lifeDeep inside the canyon I can't hideAll I ever wanted was your life
but I’m just taken out of it because this is where the rest of the album tends to stall out. It embodies everything that bothers me about the record. It’s Frusicante’s overwhelming presence, where the drums and bass don’t really get a standout moment even when they’re emphasized. These are designed as songs that aren’t funky but more harkening back to the 60s psychedelia and free love. It’s all feel-good energy and experimenting as tie-dye colors wave across the screen. There are moments where I’m genuinely impressed with Frusciante, but at the same time, nothing here feels like a concrete RHCP song, just the self-parody that everyone has given them flack for since the turn of the millennium.
A major conflict from here is how little of the record has any permanence with me. I only listened to it two days ago and the remaining tracks aren’t capable of standing out on names alone. While “The Zephyr Song” and “Can’t Stop” redeem this album for a little longer, it quickly meanders into more of the same, where everything feels a tad isolating. I don’t know that songs like “On Mercury” are able to have any permanence despite their upbeat production because I don’t fully buy into Kiedis’ sincerity whether it be deep and painful emotion or just the goofy nonsense that made me buy the record in the first place. You can call this a “mature” record, but it definitely doesn’t sound like a whole lot has been honed. “Stadium Arcadium” is a mature record. This is just filler.
I recognize that my needs don’t match the wants of “By the Way.” There is nothing wrong with the band mellowing, finding this peaceful harmony after two decades of tumultuous drama. This is by no means a boring or lazy record, but it does feel like a misstep in regards to making something greater. It’s an album that feels designed for Frusciante especially, who wants to let out every impulse he has and make music that he thinks is great. Given that he’s had his own prolific solo career, it makes sense that he’d bring that energy here. He definitely is talented and rips a nice one several times, but that is not what I come to this band for. I want this unique form of harmony that is unlike any other band. I don’t want to feel like “Throw Away Your Television” is a fight between the guitar and bass as one does goofy sci-fi madness. Sure, the harmonies are nice, but what are they doing to make the song excel?
Looking back 20 years later, I would happily say that this is a three-star album even if I personally believe that it contributed to my belief that most albums are overlong. A lot of it won’t stick with me and I’ll just go back to “Blood Sugar Sex Magic.” Maybe it’s just the result of the band settling down, but I just want interesting, fervent energy. “Stadium Arcadium” at times reached that while improving on the mellower attitudes of this record. I think it helps if the lead single wasn’t so different from everything else here, if it didn’t harken back to “Californication” so nakedly that it makes me disappointed that it’s not. I still like the songs that work here, but I’m ultimately still tossed up over the rest, thinking “Oh yeah, I heard this song” when I reach the back half.
I think on some level it’s a miracle that I ended up liking RHCP as much as I did after this. Maybe it’s just the luck of excessive radio play on KROQ or that I had people willing to convert me. With that said, I don’t know that I’d consider them amazing if I had stopped here. I wouldn’t have known what made Flea so incredible nor been able to appreciate Frusciante’s contribution to the band, which was itself supposed to be complementary. As the bassist would quickly claim, “By the Way” doesn’t feel complementary. It’s a band in transition, and that’s totally fine. They’re still doing good work, but it’s far from something I find accessible, where even songs like “Cabron” or “On Mercury” that have ideas going for them never fully reach a potential I love.
To be honest, there were more formative albums that I listened to on that trip (including New Found Glory’s “Sticks and Stones,” Jimmy Eat World’s “Jimmy Eat World,” Gorillaz’s “G-Sides,” and Green Day’s “Shenanigans”), but “By the Way” has stood next to Weezer’s “Maladroit” as records I did everything in my power to enjoy on that U.K. trip and just could never bring myself to do. I felt dumb for not loving them despite seeing good reviews in The Los Angeles Times. I think it was the belief that I needed to change how I perceived music to enjoy it. Maybe some of my animosity toward “By the Way” is a result of that, but I just can’t get myself to care even when there are things I like about the band further down the line. It’s a frustrating feeling to have, but that’s how it goes sometimes.
As a teenager, it was quite an introduction to what many consider a formative time in my life, especially on a trip that hasn’t been outmatched by anything I’ve done since. I’m happy to have done it and to have those hours on a bus, looking out the window and trying to make sense of everything. I don’t know what I was supposed to learn from Kiedis humping a microphone stand, but it’s definitely there, giving me another enigmatic image to toil over. Still, it’s been 20 years and it’s amazing how things have changed, for better or worse. Even if I want to go back to that time and wander around, I’m in a better place now. Maybe I’d appreciate it all more if it happened today. Who’s to say? Still, every time I hear the guitars of “By the Way” start up, you best believe I’m cranking it up like it’s 2002 all over again.
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