Red Hot Chili Peppers frontman Anthony Kiedis discussed turning down playing with the Dave Matthews Band in a new interview with Steve Black. Black told Kiedis that Red Hot Chili Peppers’ music being so unique widened the possibilities of who they could play with, and that they’re the type of band that could play with everyone from Metallica to the Dave Matthews Band. Alternative Nation transcribed Kiedis’ comments.
Kiedis responded, “(Laughs) It does make sense, although we turned down the invitation to play with Dave Matthews.”
Black responded, “Thank you for that, by the way.”
Kiedis said, “Yeah, nothing personal, but that’s one we turned down. Metallica we have played with, in Detroit. We can play with anybody, but we can also play anything. We never set ourselves up in a box of we are this kind of a band, we just are whatever we feel like being, from the very beginning. That was an accident, again, it wasn’t like some great mastermind plan that we set out with.
Flea coming from a jazz household, Hillel coming from a rock and roll household, I came from a household where my father played everything from Sex Pistols to Led Zeppelin to Blondie and Devo, and all these things. Our influences and inspirations were anything goes, and we’re never afraid to be as soft as possible, or as hard as possible, or a little bit jazz inspired, or whatever. So as life went on, anything could happen. We would write a song with any particular flavor, and that was a good thing, we never went, ‘Oh, this isn’t hard enough.’ The possibilities are endless.”