Red Hot Chili Peppers - Stadium Arcadium
NME.COM feature on Red Hot Chili Peppers - Stadium Arcadium album including album review, artwork, tracks, listen now, tour dates, discography and more.
Album Review
Release date: 05 May 2006
Red Hot Chili Peppers: Stadium Arcadium
No more socks on cocks, but have they lost their partying edge?
Side-project, fan-friendly, jazz-rock: all hyphenated horrors seemingly designed solely to strike fear in the heart of any music fan. But above all of these is perhaps the double-album. From The Beatles’ ‘White Album’ to The Smashing Pumpkins’ ‘Melon Collie And The Infinite Sadness’, the double-album has always been the scourge of the over-productive band. Whether it’s the...
- Apr 28, 2006
Tracklisting click track to read more
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Red Hot Chili Peppers - Stadium Arcadium: Wikipedia Album Entry
Stadium Arcadium is the ninth studio album by alternative rock band Red Hot Chili Peppers, released on May 9, 2006 via Warner Bros. Records. It sold 442,000 copies in the U.S. in the first week and debuted at number one on the Billboard 200. The album spawned five hit singles: "Dani California", "Snow ((Hey Oh))", "Desecration Smile", "Hump De Bump", and "Tell Me Baby". According to the band's frontman Anthony Kiedis, Stadium Arcadium was originally scheduled to be a trilogy of albums each released six months apart, but was eventually condensed into a double album.
Stadium Arcadium was critically praised for integrating musical styles from several aspects of the band's career. The album gained the band seven Grammy Award nominations in 2007 including an award for Best Rock Album. It was the most nominations that the band had garnered in their 25-year career. Kiedis attributed the album's success to less abrasive dynamics within the band, saying that the band's "chemistry when it comes to writing is better than ever. There was always a struggle to dominate lyrically. But we are now confident enough in who we are, so everybody feels more comfortable contributing more and more valuable, quality stuff."
After the release of their previous album, By the Way, the Red Hot Chili Peppers embarked on a world tour, which lasted from July 2002 to a mid-June 2004 date at London's Hyde Park. The band later appeared at the 2004 Democratic National Convention and at Rock am Ring to tie up their tour in support of By the Way. The band then settled down to begin recording their next album in September 2004 with producer Rick Rubin, with whom they had recorded four albums previously.
The formation and recording of Stadium Arcadium took place at "The Mansion," the former home of Harry Houdini where the Chili Peppers had recorded their 1991 breakthrough Blood Sugar Sex Magik. Given the house's reputation for being "haunted," guitarist John Frusciante recalled that he felt "there were beings of higher intelligence controlling what I was doing, and I didn’t know how to talk about it or explain it...it was very clear to me that the music was coming from somewhere other than me. However, Kiedis noted that during the recording process of the album "everybody was in a good mood. There was very little tension, very little anxiety, very little weirdness going on and every day we showed up to this funky room in the Valley, and everyone felt more comfortable than ever bringing in their ideas." The band originally wanted to create an "old-fashioned Meet the Beatles-like record," and to keep the number of songs down to about 13, to make "a small, digestible piece of art." They ended up writing 38 new songs with Rubin, recording them all.
The musical style of the album combines many aspects of music from throughout the band's career, with many fans and critics welcoming the return of the band's signature funk sound after its significant absence from By the Way. It is also noted that John's playing style had changed from his signature 'less is more' style, inspired by punk and new wave guitarists to a more flashy approach, drawing influence from guitarists such as Eddie Van Halen and Steve Vai. While he received moderate acclaim before Stadium Arcadium, this change in style gained him far more recognition than before. John also began utilizing layering in his guitar playing, which is something he had not done before (many layered guitar parts appeared on Mother's Milk, but this was mostly because of the insistence of the producer, although it was against John's will) and also used a modular synthesizer on many songs after doing so on his 2004 album Shadows Collide with People. While John was pleased to have used the modular synthesizer on the album, he admitted that when the band began rehearsing for the tour, it was very frustrating because many of the songs sounded very empty without it. This meant the band had to rework many of the songs in order to perform them live.
Kiedis recalled that the band "wanted to [release all 38 songs] on three separate discs that [would] be released in installments...something about those songs made us really like each one. However, by the time we planned to release the third installment in two years, we’ll be writing new music." This was the impetus for the band to pare those songs down to 28, a process Kiedis described as "heartwrenching." All of the 10 unused songs have been released in some form or another (see section on B-sides below). He explained the reasoning behind the decision to name the album "Stadium Arcadium" by saying that it had more "variety and verve compared to its predecessors [and] we each have things we do best and it’s all in there. Everybody played their part and expressed their creativity to the max."
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Red Hot Chili Peppers - Stadium Arcadium Lyrics
Red Hot Chili Peppers - Dani California Lyrics
Gettin' born in the state of Mississippi
Poppa was a copper and her momma was a hippie
In Alabama she was swinging hammer
Price you gotta pay when you break the panorama
Red Hot Chili Peppers - Tell Me Baby Lyrics
They come from every state to find
Some dreams were meant to be declined
Tell the man what did you have in mind
What have you come to do?
Red Hot Chili Peppers - Hard To Concentrate Lyrics
Hustle, bustle and so much muscle
Cells about to separate, oh
And I find it hard to concentrate
Red Hot Chili Peppers - 21st Century Lyrics
All the creatures on the beaches
Making waves in a motion picture
Won't you keep this in between us?
Search and seizure wake up Venus
Red Hot Chili Peppers - She Looks To Me Lyrics
Looks to me like heaven sent
No lullaby kid, no five percent
Anyway you want to cut that cake
She's dyin' from the likes of abandonment
Red Hot Chili Peppers - Readymade Lyrics
Readymade, readymade
Steady as the rhythm rolls
Readymade, readymade
And this is how the story goes
Red Hot Chili Peppers - If Lyrics
And if I had a clue
I'd know exactly what to do
If I were the wiser of the two
Red Hot Chili Peppers - Make You Feel Better Lyrics
She's the one she's the only one
She's got ripped back light gonna make me come
I say when I smile I'm a really smile
I got dreams so wide like a country mile
Red Hot Chili Peppers - Animal Bar Lyrics
Never 21 when everyone's a sailor
Coming up strong at the animal bar
Ever loving mug of Mr. Norman Mailer
Turn another page at the animal bar
Red Hot Chili Peppers - So Much I Lyrics
Next stop on the KLM
A two lips and a sturdy stem
A funny thing always happens when
I get a heavy jam
Red Hot Chili Peppers - Storm In A Teacup Lyrics
Oh, good God, Heaven Almighty, Heaven's to murder Troy
We've got a cataclysmic situation developing
Someone get down here now
Red Hot Chili Peppers - We Believe Lyrics
The curtain is open a head to put dope in
Now we will come clean it the future we've seen it
No, no, I know, I said, no no
Red Hot Chili Peppers - Turn It Again Lyrics
Some of us get a little and some a lot
We've got to make due with what ever we got
We get it hot we cool it down and then we pass it around
Red Hot Chili Peppers - Desecration Smile Lyrics
All alone not by myself
Another girl bad for my health
I've seen it all through someone else
And I
Red Hot Chili Peppers - Hey Lyrics
Won't somebody come along
And teach me how to keep it alive to survive?
Come along and show me something
That I never knew in your eyes take away the tourniquet
Red Hot Chili Peppers - Snow (hey Oh) Lyrics
Come to decide that the things that I tried
Were in my life just to get high on
When I sit alone come get a little known
But I need more than myself this time
Red Hot Chili Peppers - Charlie Lyrics
Hu
All aboard stitch in time
Get yours, I got mine
Red Hot Chili Peppers - Stadium Arcadium Lyrics
Bells around St. Petersburg
When I saw you
I hope I get what you deserve
And this is where I find
Red Hot Chili Peppers - Hump De Bump Lyrics
Forty detectives this week
Forty detectives strong
Takin' a stroll down Love Street
Strollin' is that so wrong
Red Hot Chili Peppers - She's Only 18 Lyrics
She's only 18, don't like the Rolling Stones
She took a short cut to being fully grown
She's got that mood ring, a little sister rose
A smell of Springsteen, a pair of pantyhose
Red Hot Chili Peppers - Slow Cheetah Lyrics
Waking up dead, inside of my head
Would never, never do, there is no med
No medicine to take
Red Hot Chili Peppers - Torture Me Lyrics
Because I'm happy to be sad
I want it all, I want it bad
Oh, oh, it's what I know
Red Hot Chili Peppers - Strip My Mind Lyrics
Oh yeah, oh oh yeah
Arthur J. did indicated
The boulevard would never be
Red Hot Chili Peppers - Especially In Michigan Lyrics
Life is my friend, rake it up to take it in
Wrap me in your cinnamon
Especially in Michigan
Well I could be your friend
Red Hot Chili Peppers - Warlocks Lyrics
Warlocks in Wonderland
I've gotta megatropolis in my hand
And a subterranean marching band
Makin' noise for the boys in the Vatican
Red Hot Chili Peppers - C'mon Girl Lyrics
Everything inside of me
Is burning up for you to see
And if we should get into it
A two way kind of syndicate, hold me
Red Hot Chili Peppers - Wet Sand Lyrics
My shadow side, so amplified
Keeps coming back dissatisfied
Elementary son but it's so
Red Hot Chili Peppers - Death Of A Martian Lyrics
Bear paws and rascal power watching us in your garage
Big girl, you ate the neighbor, the nova is over
Wake up and play, [Incomprehensible]
Make room for Clara's bare feet, the love of a Martian
