Product Description
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The Red Hot Chili Peppers' first Warner Bros, Greatest Hits
album spans almost 15 years of rock greatness, Featuring all of
the band's best-loved s, Greatest Hits includes Under
The Bridge, Tissue, Give It Away, Soul To Squeeze, My
Friends, Californication, Otherside, By The Way, Higher Ground,
Suck My Kiss.., plenty of fan favourites plus two brand-new songs
.co.uk
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Greatest Hits attempts to sum up the history of the Red Hot
Chili Peppers, but its focus is firmly in the second half of
their career. Early on, in the late 1980s, the Chili Peppers were
an LA band who played a unique fusion of punk and funk--four
guys, united by a love of partying and playing music. But they
had a problem: although they were developing an underground
following, nobody was buying their albums. Their first three
albums failed to set the charts on fire, though they finally had
a bit of a breakthrough with 1989's Mother's Milk (
/exec/obidos/ASIN/B000078DOI/${0} ). It wasn't enough--their
label, EMI, dropped them.
EMI's A&R department must be kicking themselves now because the
Red Hot Chili Peppers have since gone on to become one of the
most popular bands in the world. Their next album. Blood Sugar
Sex Magik ( /exec/obidos/ASIN/B000002LQR/${0} ), was a massive,
worldwide hit, containing such huge singles as "Give It Away" and
"Under the Bridge". It's follow-up One Hot Minute was frankly a
bit poor, but it hardly stalled their upward trajectory. These
funky punks had matured and they found a whole new audience on
albums such as Californication (
/exec/obidos/ASIN/B00000J7JO/${0} ) and By the Way (
/exec/obidos/ASIN/B000067CPX/${0} ). On them, there's the perfect
marriage of playful innuendo, blistering musicianship (Flea
is--quite rightly--considered one of the finest bassists in rock)
and thoughtful songwriting. Greatest Hits focuses on these later
years of the Chili Peppers' career (only the Stevie Wonder (
/exec/obidos/artist-search/Stevie%20Wonder/${0} ) cover "Higher
Ground" predates Blood Sugar
). It may not please all of their
fans, but it's certainly a great starting point for the casual
listener. --Robert Burrow
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Review
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The success of Red Hot Chili Peppers begins when an unknown
guitarist, John Fruciante, joined the band in 1988. The release
of Mothers Milk helped break the group in America with their
cover of the Stevie Wonder classic "Higher Ground". They soon
became regulars on MTV and in the early 90s, as the underground
moved into the mainstream, the Chili Peppers, like Nirvana, REM
and Sonic Youth, benefited from this shift of music.
After the release of Blood Sugar Sex Magik the Chili Peppers
became one of the worlds biggest bands. The album spawned hits
such as "Give It Away", "Under The Bridge" and "Suck My Kiss".
Their sound was noisy and funky and grungy and to many fans this
album was seen as their high point. Many believe that they have
never been able to recapture that magic. But bands that stay
stagnant and create the same sound album after album only end up
like Oasis.
At the height of their success guitarist John Frusciante left and
Dave Navaro was recruited as replacement. One Hot Minute was the
sound of the band trying to recapture the sound of Blood Sugar
Sex Magic and is seen as a low point in their career. Only "My
Friends" appears from that period and for a while the world
almost forgot about the Chili Peppers.
Then Dave left the band and John returned and in 1999 the band
released Californication. The sound was softer and more melodic,
yet they still retained that sound that made them, well them.
" Tissue", "Otherside" and "Californication" were without
doubt Chili Pepper songs, but taken to a different place. Some
thought they had sold out. But they hadn't sold out, they were
evolving.
When By the Way was released last year the sound of the band had
shifted further away form the bass lines of Flea to the guitar
melodies of John. The album was based on The Smiths and Neu!
instead of Gang of Four and Bad Brains.
The Chili Peppers have become a band famous for strong, anthemic
songs rather than the punk-funk sounds characteristic of their
early sound.
Personally I'm disappointed in the song selection as it favours
Blood Sugar Sex Magic and Californication rather than being a
well-balanced and truly representative sample from their
back-catalogue. But as a hits compilation rather than a
retrospective CD, it does what it says on the tin, and is an
enjoyable listen in spite of the obvious track selections.
Review courtesy of 6 Music --Jack Smith
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