Rolling Stone Article with interview clips

rolling stone pre-show ritual

Rolling stone is running an article about the band’s pre-show warm ups which has a short interview with each member of the band. You can read the article here

Video transcripts:

QUESTION: What’s your ritual?
Anthony Kiedis: The physicality of our shows is such there’s no way you’re going to make that happen without preparation and because I sing loud for two hours during a show I have to spend a lot of time getting my voice together with the right food, with the right warm ups and then I have to run or stretch or do push-ups or wrestle Flea or something to get my blood flowing. You can’t go from zero to 100 miles per hour without preparing. So I have to eat three hours before so I have protein in my blood stream but so that I won’t vomit all over the microphone because if I eat right before I play, I’m not keeping it down. It’s too intense; it’s like paying an entire basketball game, or something, while you’re singing or playing instruments. And there’s also a certain headspace that you have to get into, which we all kind of gravitate into one room about fifteen minutes before we go on and we listen to some music together. It could be anything; it could be funkadelic, it could be Patty Smith, it could be anything but we kinda get together and get on the same wavelength. And Josh is incessantly warming up and Flea is incessantly warming up and Chad shows up in his jumpsuit and starts tapping the sticks. And everyone has to have their bones and their tissues and their thoughts warm and stimulate and together for us to take the stage and get off on the right foot. You know, we can’t do it cold or show up late. It literally takes hours to get ready. And sometimes you’re more ready than others and sometimes there’s nerves and sometimes something bad happens right before you go on but you have to be able to deal with all of that and put it aside. You could be sick, you could be hurt, you could be upset, you could be in a fight with your girlfriend, maybe you didn’t sleep, whatever, you have to get it together for that moment.

Flea: We all have different things that we do. I mean I have a real specific ritual. I warm up playing bass for like an hour. I stretch, I run around the arena you know to get my blood flowing, I meditate, I pray. I’m pretty intense about it.

Chad Smith: I don’t have a real… umm. I think Flea and Anthony have a real, it’s 6.45 I’m gonna do this, at 7.30 I’m going do that and then I’m going to [mimes playing bass]. Yeah, I’m kinda like, I don’t like to get to the show too early; those guys will show up early like four hours before the gig … [mumbling]. Whatever works. For me I like to get there about an hour and a half before, and I like to watch some of the band before and I like to have a look at the crowd and hang…(?) and look around a bit. And I get something to eat and I just warm up and we’re lucky and fortunate to have instruments backstage to get the blood flowing. I think the best way to perform is to be relaxed. I want to be excited to play. I don’t really get nervous because if I was nervous I wouldn’t know what I was going to be doing. I’m excited but I want to be relaxed because when you’re relaxed you play best (?). And just connect with the other guys. So just hang out, talk, listen to music. Whatever. I don’t have a [makes chopping gesture with hand] thing.

Josh Klinghoffer: I don’t have that much of a ritual. I ..umm… I warm up my voice now because I see the difference when I do and when I don’t so I try to do that. What else? I try to play as much as I can. Play guitar throughout the day. Warm up my voice, try no longer to entertain guests coz that takes more out of me than playing three shows. Especially at this early stage of a tour as you have friends come, family come to the shows and they want to spend time with you and they don’t necessarily understand what you have to go do; expel the physical and the psychological energy… Our crew and everyone who works with this band, is such a great person who has such much positivity thing that they bring to it and everyone does such an amazing job, that in a show, at a show that it’s hard not just to feel joy.

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