BLACK VINYL

Following up the multi-platinum Blood Sugar Sex Magik proved to be a difficult task for the Red Hot Chili Peppers. After guitarist John Frusciante left, his first two replacements, Arik Marshall and Jesse Tobias, each served very brief tenures. In 1993, two years after Blood Sugar, former Jane's Addiction guitarist Dave Navarro joined up, but it was still another two years before One Hot Minute appeared, due to various personal problems. Navarro's metallic guitar shredding should have added some weight to the Chili Peppers' punk-inflected heavy guitar funk, but instead tended to make it plodding. By emphasizing the metal, the funk is gradually phased out of the blend, as is melody; the grinding chant of "Warped" is hardly as twisted as anything on Freaky Styley, or even "Give It Away." Similarly, the ballads "My Friends" and "Transcending" are blatant attempts to hold onto the mainstream audience gained by "Under the Bridge," but the melodies are weak and the lyrics are even more feeble. Musically, One Hot Minute is as ambitious as Blood Sugar Sex Magik, but is even more unfocused. Coupled with the sense that the Chili Peppers are taking their music far too seriously, One Hot Minute provides the fewest thrills of any the group's albums.

A1        Warped    
A2        Aeroplane    
A3        Deep Kick
A4        My Friends
A5        Coffee Shop    
A6        Pea   
A7        One Big Mob
B1        Walkabout
B2        Tearjerker
B3        One Hot Minute
B4        Falling Into Grace
B5        Shallow Be Thy Game    
B6        Transcending