John Frusciante Biography...by Jane
John Frusciante (froo-shon-tay) was born in New York on the 5th March 1970. His parents (Gail Frusciante & John Frusciante Senior) split up when he was six years old and he ended up moving to LA with his mother who later remarried. John would visit his father who lived in Florida during the school holidays. John’s stepfather gave him a guitar for his birthday. John already had some experience with a guitar...as his Italian grandfather had taught him to play old Italian folk songs...By the age of 10, John could play all of Never Mind The Bollocks by the Sex Pistols for which he was very proud of. Music and guitar playing became a large (if not all) part of Johns life..he would practice for hours on end every day. He began going to concerts and experiencing live music (his first was AC/DC). Growing up in LA, he got into LA life that included skating and music...the music led him to getting into local band The Red Hot Chili Peppers.
He would go to all of their concerts and even pay for his friends to go, as he wanted as many people as possible to hear their sound. He wanted everyone to experience the Red Hot Chili Peppers live. He quickly became a hardcore Chili fan and would tell anyone who would listen about them.
RHCP were a local LA band consisting of high school friends Anthony Kiedis (vocals), Michael Balzary aka Flea (bass), Hillel Slovak (guitar) and Jack Irons (drums). John started going to their concerts as often as possible (he was 15) and became their number one fan...especially liking and idolising their guitarist Hillel who had a unique style. Through turning up at all of their shows he got to know Hillel and became known to the rest of the band.
John began to base his guitar style on Hillel and would study him at the concerts and practice to be just like him. RHCP had released three albums. The band was blowing up on the LA circuit and the band were developing there own style of Punk Funk Rock. The boys were all dabbling in all sorts of drugs but it was Hillels heroin addiction that had begun to spiral out of control...this addiction would eventually kill him.
When Hillel was found dead in his apartment by his brother and the band were totally devastated. Hillels death had been a very big wake up call for the band. Drummer Jack, who was closest to Hillel, took his death the worst decided to leave the band, as he could not see any more of his friends go the same way. He later suffered a mental breakdown. Anthony was dealing with his own personal addiction as was Flea. They decided to clean up their act and took some time out to do some serious soul searching and get their heads together.
Two members down, Anthony and Fleahad to find two new band member and recruited/tried out various drummers and guitarists. Flea had maintained contact with John and asked him if he would consider joining the band...John was on the verge of joining Thelonious Monster but chickened out during the audition. Flea and Anthony turned up at the audition that John was at and asked him to really think about joining them. John accepted after a few initiations (which included showing them his erect penis and some other stuff). He already knew all of their songs so there was no problem there. He was also given the nickname Greenie as he was so young and never really been in a band...(In the DVD Funky Monks they also refer to him as The Flower Child) The year that John joined was 1989. Chad Smith would join the band shortly after. They were now ready to go.
John's first album with RHCP was Mothers Milk (1989) which proved to be their launch pad into mainstream charts. Johns second album with RHCP, Blood Sugar Sex Magik (1991) really propelled them into the music world and placed RHCP on the map. They recorded the album in a beautiful house with the great producer Rick Ruben (there is a DVD called Funky Monks that shows their time in the house and I can't recommend this DVD enough!). It all began happening too quickly for John after the album was recorded. He never expected the album to blow up so hugely in the mainstream world. All the fame began to unnerve him and he felt overwhelmed by it all. He was not into the whole “fame hunting” thing. Also, he was dealing with his own little addictions that would also prove to be his downfall. He later admitted to trying heroin right after recording BSSM. He had really enjoyed the recording process in the house and felt slightly "lost" when they were all sent out into the real world of fame.
John had once had a conversation with Hillel about the trappings of fame...they discussed how it was not something that either of them was sure that they would want and that it was a negative aspect of making music.
Also, John’s relationship with Anthony was becoming strained. He thought that Anthony was enjoying the limelight too much, which he was totally against. Anthony was definitely a great showman and loved the crowd adulation...and John could not understand how someone could thrive or enjoy all of the attention...and spending so much time cramped together touring was not helping. Touring was particularly hard for John as he was missing home and his girlfriend, running up huge hotel phone bills wherever they were staying.
It was becoming obvious the rest of the band that John was becoming reclusive and introverted. Flea spoke with him and asked him if he was happy being in the band and John replied that he was only in the band because of his friendship and love for Flea. The others knew it was only a matter of time before John left. He decided to leave the band mid world tour in Japan. He broke the news to them by simply saying "I cant stay in the band any longer" he knew that they wouldn't hold him back...when asked what to tell the fans by a reporter he said "tell them I went mad".
John’s heroin addiction and other personal demons were too much for him and he left the band to spend time on his own. Friends would not see him for weeks and just assume that he was dead. Years later John would talk about this very difficult and dark time in his life...
"I saw death in everything around me. And everything that was beautiful represented everything that was sad, lost and gone. I was very confused. I got it in my head that stardom was something that was bad and evil. If you were a rock star, you were trying to put people on."
Reluctantly the Chilis cancelled the rest of the tour and set about recruiting. They recruited various replacements including Dave Navarro (former Jane’s Addiction guitarist) Anthony was heartbroken at Johns departure...he later spoke about this time...
"During Mothers Milk we had become very close. Best friends..."
Flea was still in contact with John and was instrumental in helping his friend sort out his life and problems...John released two albums in his time out from RHCP. Smile from the Streets you hold, (the second album) proved to be his darkest work yet. When later asked about this album he responded that it was not an album that he was proud of and had even had it deleted from circulation. (I have read somewhere that John is thinking of re releasing this album, due to the amount of rip off copies available to buy. He said that he had been listening to the album recently and had found some light in it again). During his seclusion from the outside world he was still writing new material and creating art (stories and paintings). Flea was eager to see his friend in the band again...happy and clean...it had never been the same since his departure and things were really coming to a stalemate with Dave Navarro. Dave was not used to jamming creatively with the band and preferred to create alone. They made one and only album with Dave, One Hot Minute (which has some good tracks on it but nothing amazing). The music was just not flowing out as it did with John.
There are some videos available to download that reflect John’s mind state during his years out of RHCP’s. You can download them from www.jftab.com. (Stuff – is a mini film that John made with Johnny Depp and Gibby Haynes made to promoted John’s first solo album Niandra LaDes & Usually Just A T Shirt. It was made in John’s house and shows the state of decline that he was going through at that time in his life.)
Flea spoke with Anthony and they both visited to John during his recovery (he had checked himself into rehab) and he was overwhelmed that his two closest friends wanted him back and accepted their offer with tears in his eyes! John had not played much music while he was in recovery and the band started a series of long jam sessions in Flea’s garage to get him back in shape. It was not long before the old Chili magic came back and made a fantastic album. Caifornication was his comeback and RHCP were back at the top. Since Johns return the band has become stronger than ever as a unit...in 2001 he released more solo work... To Record Only Water for 10 Days and a free internet album called Sounds From The Inside (download it from the official site).
John is still creating solo work and in 2004 released Shadows Collide with People (a great album, you can download the demos for this album at the official site)
In 2004 John had been very busy and will be releasing 6 albums in six months...
(The line-up: The Will to Death, Ataxia, DC EP, Inside of Emptiness, Automatic Writing and Curtains and A Sphere in the Heart of Silence.... all available at www.play.com ) as well as touring with RHCP and playing some live dates with Mars Volta...Unfortunately, there was a delay in the artwork (or something!) for the albums so they didn’t quite make the six in six months.
The Red Hot Chili Peppers have had worldwide domination and success with their album By The Way and Greatest Hits and have performed all around the world including last years sell-out concert at Hyde Park (I was there!!) as part of their world tour. They also won an award for releasing the Live at Hyde Park so quickly after it was recorded (2 months I think).
The rest of the John Frusciante and the Red Hot Chili Peppers story hopefully will include more of his great music and inspiration to all his fans. He is constantly writing mini bios on his upcoming releases (posted online at www.johnfrusciante.com) to let his fans know where his mind and music are at. Currently The RHCP's are working on their new album that should be with us in October 2005... (Now pushed back to May 8th 2006) Hopefully this year, (2006) will be as exciting as last year. John was due to perform at Patti Smith’s Meltdown in London but had to cancel due to recording commitments with RHCP. I went to the final day of Meltdown and it was the best! Flea was there and performed a fantastic set. (Actually, everyone who performed that night was amazing.) John was also forced to pull out of a show featuring Damo Suzuki and Jelly Planet in late 2005...so that is twice for me that I have missed out on a John solo experience! At least the RHCPs are on their way to London so I guess I will just have to do with that! 2004's concerts in Hyde Park seem like more than two years ago...Earls Court here I come...! (Earls Court was fantastic....I had a birds eye view of John... fortunately he was on my side of the stage. They played readymade which is one of mt fave tracks for the first time in the UK I think!)
So, here is to 2006’s double album from RHCP and more great solo music. (Ataxia should have their second album out in late 2006)
