Watch Red Hot Chili Peppers cover Nirvana song ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’
Red Hot Chili Peppers unleashed a cover of the Nirvana classic, ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’, during a recent concert.
The group aired the Nevermind track during a benefit concert for the Silverlake Conservatory of Music, an event which marked the first time they’d ever performed ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’. Bizarrely, the Chili’s frontman Anthony Kiedis decided to sing the first verse while his shirt was placed over his face.
In 1991, Red Hot Chili Peppers hit the road with Nirvana, and earlier this year, they reflected upon the experience on The Howard Stern Show. Flea recalled: “I remember just feeling like, you know, they’re good bands, but Nirvana, they were really carrying a heavy magic with them, just this feeling like they are a powerful entity to be respected.”
Later in the conversation, Kiedis also brought up the tour and told the legendary radio host: “You know who was good? Nirvana. When we played with them, they were just good. I mean, that was life-changing.”
Elaborating on what he meant by “just good”, Kiedis stated: “I feel like some of this is a natural thing, like John has a very clear understanding of dynamics, and then for me, that feeling that John (Frusciante) is so beautifully describing, it was just natural, the first time that we ever played. It was just natural to have an energy, to have a passion, and have a live or die aesthetic to everything that we did – but I feel like Nirvana had that naturally as well”.
He added: “They were certainly good at their instruments and songwriting and chemistry and all that, but they also just had a combustibility that came with birth, or came from God or came from the planets or something.”
Meanwhile, the Red Hot Chili Peppers recently released their new album, Return of the Dream Canteen, which is the second record they’ve released in 2022.
Watch their cover of ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’ below.
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