Why Rick Rubin initially turned down Red Hot Chili Peppers: “I couldn’t wait to get out of there”
It’s debatable that Rick Rubin might be one of the best unofficial members of Red Hot Chili Peppers. He may not have been there at their inception and might not have even worked on every one of their albums, but whenever you see his name listed in the credits of one of their albums, you know you’re going to be getting something special.
From their glory days as the kings of funk rock to their mellow songs in their older age, Rubin was the one producer who truly “got” the band, but that didn’t stop him from almost bailing on them when he first heard their music.
If you look back on the other producers the band has had throughout its career, it’s usually a better idea on paper than it is in reality. The idea of someone like George Clinton producing a group specialising in funk feels like it should be a no-brainer, but the fact that no one could keep their nose clean behind the desk made the album Freaky Styley sound a bit uneven.
Once production began on The Uplift Mofo Party Plan, the classic sound of their early work started to become a bit more recognisable. Anthony Kiedis hadn’t learned to sing yet, but songs like ‘Me and My Friends’ are, at the very least, fun in the right ways. This was the perfect circumstance for Rubin to meet them, but their habits outside the studio were too much for him.
It’s not out of the question for some musicians to have personal problems when it comes to drugs. At the end of the day, everyone is human, and there are bound to be a few people who use narcotics to help them either cope with nerves or the tragedies back at home.
As soon as Rubin saw Kiedis and Hillel Slovak, he thought they were a trainwreck waiting to happen, telling Another, “I just felt like something was really wrong…I didn’t work with them at that point in time. I felt like someone could. There was a dark, heavy energy that I didn’t understand and a real lack of connection between the people because they weren’t present in themselves, so they couldn’t be there for each other. It felt like a disconnected scene. I couldn’t wait to get out of there”.
Unfortunately, Rubin’s instincts would prove exactly right when Slovak passed away from an overdose following the band getting back home following the tour. After one of their own died, though, Kiedis and Flea realised there was no time for messing around anymore. If they were going to go the distance, they needed to cut out their habits.
Drafting in Chad Smith on drums and John Frusciante on guitar, producer Michael Beinhorn brought out the nastiness in their playing on Mother’s Milk. Compared to their last albums, this felt like they took their pain and grief and channelled it into their songs, featuring some of the heaviest riffs they ever came up with.
That was enough for Rubin, who would end up going into the studio with them for Blood Sugar Sex Magik and eventually work with Kiedis to put out more heartfelt material like ‘Under the Bridge’. Rubin already had a knack for working magic with every band, and he certainly got the Peppers in their most classic period, but it’s a shame that he never got to see what Slovak could pull off.
