Back in April 2022, the Red Hot Chili Peppers released Unlimited Love, their 12th studio effort and, more significantly, their first with John Frusciante, arguably their most fan-beloved guitarist, in more than 15 years.
IF SOME LISTENERS felt like they had waited a lifetime for this reunion album — and it’s quite possible that a few younger ones actually had — they didn’t have to hang on too much longer for the next one.
Rather, here we are just a handful of months later, and the Chilis — which also include singer Anthony Kiedis, bassist Flea and drummer Chad Smith — have now followed up the 17-track, hour-plus Unlimited Love with the similarly 17-track, hour-plus Return of the Dream Canteen (Warner Records). The new record is culled from material recorded during the same sessions as its predecessor, at producer Rick Rubin’s Shangri-La Studios in Malibu, California, with Rubin at the helm. At the time, Frusciante had only recently returned to the band for a second tour of duty. After cementing his legacy with star-making performances on 1989’s Mother’s Milk and 1991’s breakthrough Blood Sugar Sex Magik, he exited the band for the first time in 1992, returning in 1999 for three critically lauded and incredibly successful efforts, including that year’s 15-million-plus-selling Californication.
Given that, this time, the Chili Peppers entered the studio with a clutch of ideas and came out with not one but two new albums — and double albums at that — it can be surmised that Frusciante’s return has borne plenty of fresh creative fruit. As the band has headed out on the road to play the new music and the classics onstage, that renewal has only continued.
“Aside from one or two shows in smaller places, all these shows have been a size that we’ve never done before,” Frusciante says. “We’ve been playing stadiums that are generally between, like, 40 and 60 thousand people a night. It’s a lot of people, and the energy’s very intense. There’s so much happiness being generated from the audience that sometimes it’s overwhelming.”
Nevertheless, Frusciante’s guitar playing has remained rock solid and unshakeable, not to mention mind-bendingly awesome. Now 52 years old, he evidences the same beautifully idiosyncratic playing style — the elastic, slinky rhythm work; the alternately fluid and furious chording; the feedback-drenched, acid-fuzz solo
