Red Hot Chili Peppers: I'm With You

There are few people born between the mid eighties and early nineties who don’t have strong memories of the Red Hot Chili Peppers. During the nineties and early 2000s, the band was everywhere. Singles such as “Under the Bridge,” “Otherside,” “Scar Tissue,” and “Californication” topped the charts and never seemed to stop being played on the radio. To many of us, the mere opening chords of any Red Hot Chili Peppers’ single brings back flashbacks of summer camp and elementary school, watching VH1 and TRL and admiring how much the video for “Californication” resembled Nintendo 64 games. Red Hot Chili Peppers’ I’m With You, released this past Tuesday, brings back memories from the 90s but seems unlikely to create many new ones.

I’m With You is the first album since 1995 that RHCP has recorded without its long-time guitarist, John Frusciante, but the most memorable change seems to be not the absence of Frusciante but the addition of bassist Flea’s new piano playing skills and knowledge of music theory. The album has many more jazz and reggae influences than heard in their past work, giving it an entirely different feel from the alternative rock of Californication and Blood Sugar Sex Magik, the band’s two most successful albums to date.

The opening song, “Monarchy of Roses” sounds the most like a traditional Red Hot Chili Peppers song and serves to bring long-time fans into the album. It starts off with the sound of screeching speakers, bringing to mind early 90s grunge, but soon segways into a melody and beat heavy upbeat alternative rock tune that, while not on the same level of any of their older singles, does remain in the listener’s head after the album is over. The next song, “Factory of Faith,” sounds a bit punchier and can get annoying after a few minutes, but it still feels like a Red Hot Chili Peppers song, as does the melodic but not so memorable “Brendan’s Death Song.”

After these three songs, however, the band stops sounding like its old self. Take out Anthony Kiedis’s distinctive voice, and the listener would be hard pressed to determine what band was being played on the speakers. The album’s first single, “The Adventures of Rain Dance Maggie” has cymbals and cow-bells all over the place with a lingering island-style guitar in the background that feels vaguely Caribbean. The song doesn’t really stick out on the album, but maybe it will fare better as a single.

For the most part, the album feels like background music. It feels like the type of music that would play on a bar on a beach at sunset, or quietly on a stereo in an artist’s studio. It is interesting and pretty, but not particularly memorable. For the most part, it is hard to pull individual songs out. There is no “Under The Bridge” on this album, no “Californication” or “Otherside.” It’s not bad, and it’s certainly pleasant to listen to. It’s just not the type of album that kids of today will remember fondly twenty years from now. For now, all the fans can do is keep listening, and when RHCP decides to make another truly spectacular album, tell the band, I’m With You. Grade: B