Red Hot Chili Peppers
Mother's Milk

THE REVIEW

I want to be honest: I enjoy writing about my favorite records much more than about rubbish (the only one was "The Great Escape Artist" by Jane's Addiction), so, following the advice of my friend Giulio, I'm putting this Chili Peppers LP, dated 1989, on the Homepage for you.

Writing about my favorite work from my favorite band ("Vs" by Pearl Jam) seems to have unleashed hell on earth. Let's see what will happen with my favorite album by my second favorite band. Perhaps it's time to change the term since I've already used "favorite" five times! Even though it perfectly describes the feelings I have toward these songs, and not just towards the woman on the cover, as some of you sly foxes might think...

I want to mention the talents of each member of the classic lineup in their first effort together.

Let's start with Kiedis, the charismatic frontman, who in his Apache-Lithuanian face embodies the traits that the Red Hots have in the collective imagination. This is his first recorded album as a "clean" man (so he says, anyway...). At the time, he knew how to do what he did better than anyone else. Not that it was particularly difficult to shout over funk-rock bases, but extremely long lyrics condensed into very, very short times, like in "Punk Rock Classic," I consider art. Maybe I'm exaggerating a bit...

Flea is the highlight of the album. This is his best work. For someone who plays the bass, like me or the aforementioned friend Giulio, it's always a pleasure to play this album from start to finish, standing next to the stereo, strumming the strings with our calloused thumb! If you appreciate Micheal Balzary, you MUST have "Mother's Milk."

Frusciante. I kind of want to laugh...! Here he was just 18, the same age as me, but he was already capable of creating an incredible and particularly technical work of layering funky and sometimes metal guitars. Disproving the saying "old hens make good broth," since from "Californication" onwards, his style has always made me... repulsed. Can you say that on TV? Ah, it doesn't matter; we're on Debaser. But really, in his second era as a chili pepper, I think he always held back the band, keeping the best for solo albums like "The Empyrean." A glaring example is "By The Way": Flea wanted to make a punk album, and John forced him (the bassist even left the band for a short period) to put out a bad album. But bad, huh! Actually, very bad!

I realize that (maybe) I'm going off-topic. A quick comment on Chad Smith who, apparently, has never shown too much inventiveness in his career. In reality, for a drummer (yeah, I play that too), it's easy to recognize the complexity, the study, the meticulous work this jovial fellow does behind the skins.

The songs are not up for debate. They are all equally strong. Sometimes the rhythm slows down and becomes seductive, like in "Sexy Mexican Maid" or the instrumental "Pretty Little Ditty," the Peppers' first clash with melody. If you want to savor opium-induced madness, I recommend the tracks "Magic Johnson" and "Nobody Weird Like Me." The best one? I say "Stone Cold Bush," perfection in every second of it. In every atom, as Negrita would say! But wait a moment... I need to make a correction: there's one track that isn't "equally strong" as I said before, and it's "Subway To Venus." The only one I always skip, and I know this will cost me some points from some of you.

Then there's the gem "Fire" by Jimi you-know-who, a real classic played here by the four founders, already featured on the "Abbey Road E.P.," the one with the cover showing our four nude guys on the street in the middle of January, with a sock around the foreskin and pubic hair on full display. What a class act.

What else to say? Oh, yes! Today I want to show off and say that on December 10th, I played on stage with... TM STEVENS! It has nothing to do with the review, but the 13th is my birthday, and after all, this country still theoretically guarantees freedom of speech. I'm not modest and proud of it, hahahahah!!! Go ahead, comment. Insults or compliments, do as you please. Thank You!