YMMV / Red Hot Chili Peppers

• Anvilicious: The video for "Behind The Sun". The song is something about a talking dolphin, the sun and the beach and is a pleasant, easygoing tune. While most of the video is just as pleasant (an Animated Music Video using paintings to depict a bunch of dolphins playing around), it suddenly gets a Cruel Twist Ending when the dolphins are killed by hunters (the footage of which is taken from a controversial British advertisement from the Whale & Dolphin Conservation Society). Did they have to use such a nice song to hammer through a message about dolphin poaching?
• Award Snub: When the Chilis were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2012, the H.O.F. committee decided that only artists who had performed on more than one RHCP album were eligible, since the band had quite a revolving-door routine. This meant that guitarists Jack Sherman and Dave Navarro, who had performed on the first and sixth album respectively, were not eligible. However, Jack Irons (a founding member who had only drummed on the third album) and Josh Klinghoffer (the current guitarist who had only released one album with the Chilis at that point) were inducted. This created a lot of tension with fans of the debut album and One Hot Minute.
  • Anthony tried to somewhat justify these omissions. He said that Jack Irons was the founding drummer, after all, and the demo versions in which he is featured were included on the remastered edition of the debut album, making him technically present on two albums. He also claimed that they were going to release a new album with Klinghoffer, soon (and the Chilis did release an album filled with songs recorded during the I'm With You sessions in 2013, called I'm Beside You). He also maintained that Dave Navarro had reconciled with his signature band Jane's Addiction and that they, too, might be inducted into the Hall of Fame one day (which came to pass in 2016). Guess Jack Sherman is just outta luck.
    • This justification was not completely Anthony's decision since the band is not the one to choose which members get inducted but, rather the Hall of Fame's decision. The H.O.F. decided only current members and members who have been on multiple albums would be inucted, which Navarro said that it was unfair to him and Sherman. Chad Smith, however, mentioned both members in his speech.
• Black Sheep Hit: Sort of with "Under the Bridge" and "Californication". While they're easily the two main contenders for the status as their absolute Signature Song, they're not exactly in their classic Funk Rock style, though very recognizable.
• Breakup Breakout: Although RHCP later became massively successful musicians, early member Jack Sherman went on to play on Bob Dylan's Knocked Out Loaded, a much bigger success than RHCP's work at the time.
• Broken Base: Opinions are split as to which was the best line-up and album, as well as whether the band can be as successful without Frusciante.
  • Despite lots of fans rejoicing when Frusciante coming back in 2019, there are a lot of fans who see Josh's firing as a bad mark on the band (with the exception of Smith, who Josh works with still). It gets slightly worse when it was mentioned that John and Flea were creating music together...while Josh was still in the group.
• Covered Up: "Higher Ground", "Fire", "Subterranean Homesick Blues", Ohio Players' "Love Rollercoaster", and "They're Red Hot", to name a few.
• Epic Riff: Many, especially "Give it Away", "Scar Tissue" & "By The Way" to name a few. Double points if the riff is a bass riff.
• Fandom Rivalry: With Faith No More (and, to a slightly lesser extent, Mr. Bungle) - Anthony Kiedis and both bands' lead singer, Mike Patton, really don't like each other, and it all stems from an incredibly petty dispute that resulted in both sides acting like dicks (Kiedis had Mr. Bungle forcibly pulled off of multiple festival bills, while Patton played a series of mean-spirited, insulting RHCP covers with Mr. Bungle where the band members pretended to shoot up and mocked Hillel Slovak's death).
• Fanon Discontinuity: Many fans declared this after One Hot Minute and Stadium Arcadium took the band in different directions. Also, their self-titled debut has been consigned to the Old Shame bin even by the band.
  • It has to be said that the only reason for the first album being in that situation is that there was so much Executive Meddling on it from both the guitarist they hired and the producer, and had the band been able to do it with their original members it would have been thought of more highly. They don't disown it, they were just disappointed in the way it turned out and prefer the demos, which do feature the original members.
• Friendly Fandoms: Fans of RHCP and Death Note are on relatively good terms. Many RHCP fans who were not really into anime became interested in the series after finding out their favorite band providing two songs for Death Note: The Last Name live action movie in 2006 ("Snow (Hey Oh)" and "Dani California"). Likewise, Death Note fans who like RHCP's songs in the live action movie became interested to find out more in the band's discography.
• Growing the Beard: Arguably done this several times, with Blood Sugar Sex Magik being the most remarkable of them.
  • Blood Sugar Sex Magik marks a heavy development for the band. After dealing with Hillel Slovak's death (there are even some tracks dedicated to him), this album marks the debut of Frusciante's signature guitar style and showcases Kiedis' Vocal Evolution, having him rap less and sing much more, with songs in general showing a much larger range than the previous albums.
  • Californication served the band well after the failure of One Hot Minute. Frusciante's first return to the band, as well as Kiedis swearing off of drugs for good, marked another sound change for the better. Kiedis' lyrical abilities improved once again, and even the music proved to be a severe evolution and improvement from BSSM, even if it's not up to par with it, something OHM failed to do. The band remained on this style of composition until Frusciante left again after Stadium Arcadium.
• Hilarious in Hindsight:
  • "Californication" had an Animated Music Video made to resemble a video game for the then-new PlayStation 2. Four years later was MTV's Video Mods, a show dedicated to music videos created with game mods of then-popular video games.
    • Speaking of "Californication", the lyric, "Alderaan's not far away, it's Californication", becomes this when Flea makes an appearance on Obi-Wan Kenobi in which he spends a significant amount of his screen time on Alderaan.
  • Hell, only a year after the music video first released, Grand Theft Auto III came out on the PlayStation 2 (with Grand Theft Auto: Vice City and Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas releasing in the years after), and is probably as close as one can get to an actual video game based on the music video.
• Late Export for You: Their first two albums weren't released in the UK until 1990, when they were simultaneously released on CD and Vinyl. Before this, some of the songs came out in the UK on The Abbey Road EP as well as b-sides on some of the Mother's Milk singles.
• Memetic Mutation:
  • Chad Smith's resemblance to Will Ferrell.
  • The Scatting section from "Around the World".
• Nightmare Fuel:
  • While the music video for "True Men Don't Kill Coyotes" is, for the most part, a pretty fun ride, the body paint sequence is absolutely terrifying. Just look at Anthony's FACE.◊
  • The German Expressionism-inspired video for "Otherside."
• Older Than They Think:
  • For some reason, the younger fans of the Chili Peppers seem to constantly forget that the band formed in 1983, and are thus always amazed that "old folks" in their late 40s and early 50s know who the band is and are fans themselves.
  • "Baby Appeal" was written whilst Hillel Slovak and Jack Irons were still in the group and played live on a few occasions. This is often overlooked as it did not appear on their demo tape (having been written afterwards), instead being recorded for their first LP with Jack Sherman and Cliff Martinez.
  • According to the book Fornication, Anthony started writing "Knock Me Down" during the period he was briefly fired from the band in 1986. It didn't get turned into a song The Uplift Mofo Party Plan, but he revisited it for Mother's Milk.
  • Even though the band's cover of Fire was released in 1987, they already had the live arrangement down whilst Slovak and Irons were originally in the band in 1983, and played it many times over the subsequent years.
• Once Original, Now Common: Flea's slap bass style has been copied by a lot of hard rock bassists.
• Refrain from Assuming: Some of the songs aren't named after the chorus, e.g. "Dani California.” One would assume the song is titled "California Rest In Peace.”
  • It's a running joke among fans that newbies will call Under The Bridge "Take Me to the Place I Love" or "City Of Angels.” When "Love Rollercoaster" was a single, people would often call it "Rollercoaster Of Love".
• Sampled Up: The album track "Pretty Little Ditty" off Mother's Milk was later sampled by the Nu Metal band Crazy Town for their lone 2000 hit, "Butterfly".
• Sequel Displacement: Only in their fourth album, Mother's Milk, the band managed to score a hit with "Higher Ground". And of course, true superstardom only reached following a label change and Blood Sugar Sex Magik.
• Signature Song: "Give It Away", "Scar Tissue", "Otherside", "Californication", "Dani California", "Snow (Hey Oh)", "By the Way", and "Can't Stop" are all excellent and widely beloved singles, but the one song that propelled them to stardom and is still their most timeless and recognisable tune after all these years is “Under the Bridge”.
• Suspiciously Similar Song: Many fans have noted the striking similarity between "Dani California" and Tom Petty's song "Mary Jane's Last Dance." Petty noted this when asked on the matter but chose not to take legal action, stating that there are enough Frivolous Lawsuits in America and that "pretty much all songs sound similar".
  • The distortion-heavy intro and bridge of "Around the World" have been compared to "Breadfan" by Welsh trio Budgie (which was Covered Up by Metallica).
• Sweet Dreams Fuel:
  • "The Zephyr Song". Unlike most other RHCP songs, it's not about sex, drug abuse, breaking up, or bereavement. It's simply an ode to innocent love and a spirit of adventure making it one of, if not the lightest song from the band.
  • The positively blissful "Pretty Little Ditty". The name says it all.
• Tough Act to Follow: Let's be honest, this is what happened with One Hot Minute. With the success of Blood Sugar Sex Magik, John leaving the band afterwards due to how fame hit him hard, and the Troubled Production stemming with Dave's style compared to the other Peppers and Anthony relapsing, it ain't a surprise on how the album's reception was. And any album after Californication became this, although By the Way is a close second.
• They Changed It, Now It Sucks!: The Red Hot Chili Peppers have got to be one of the most striking examples in music. A lineup change in this band, particularly at guitar, usually turned a few fans away from that period of the band's history.
  • Let's review: —the early to late-1980's (Jack Sherman, Hillel Slovak); —the late 1980's/early 1990's (John Frusciante, first time around); —the mid-1990's (Dave Navarro; the band's uncontested lowest point since going mainstream); —late 1990's to 2009 (John Frusciante, second time around); —the early to late-2010s (Josh Klinghoffer); Frusciante's third go with the band inevitably reignited the debate.
  • The fact that at some point around Californication they changed from a funk-rock band that occasionally did some alternative ballads to an alternative band that occasionally does funk-rock doesn't help with this.
• Ugly Cute: The chola girls in the "Aeroplane" video, to a certain extent. Their sequin bodysuits, heavy makeup and constant gum-popping celebrates both their feminine curves and urban L.A. aesthetic.
• Vindicated by History: The closing track on the band's first album, the dark and melancholic "Grand Pappy Du Plenty", is commonly regarded as an important milestone in their career. At the time, it was so drastically different from anything else that it wasn't really noticed. Since then it became clear the band were inspired for it for the commonly regarded fan favorite "Venice Queen", its popularity has gone up considerably.
  • Many fans viewed By the Way as a complete sellout in its day. Since the band returned to their funkier sound for Stadium Arcadium, a lot of fans went back to By The Way and found it was far better than they expected.
  • Fans have began to warm up to One Hot Minute, realising that the album does contain many genuinely good songs and recognize the fact that not only did Navarro help the band mature and develop their sound to the point that it's easy to spot his influence on later albums, but that there is the very real possibility that the Chili Peppers wouldn't exist today without him. The One Hot Minute era was a very stressful time for everyone involved and the band considers it a low point in their career, it is very likely that the Chili Peppers would have split up had Dave not stepped in at the right moment. The reputation of One Hot Minute also is better appreciated and less blamed due to the fact it was considered a Tough Act to Follow with Blood Sugar Sex Magik and especially when Californication dropped when the band reunited with John.

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