An infamous comment on the Red Hot Chilli Peppers made by Nick Cave over twenty-five years ago has been explained by the songwriter.
Cave, 67, released the reason behind his words and the subsequent impact in a post to his Red Hand Files. In his latest issue, the songwriter behind Jubilee Street and Wild God was asked: “We have all heard the famous quote attributed to you regarding the Red Hot Chili Peppers. Could you enlighten us on the truthfulness of that quote?” Cave responded, and says his frequent encounters with Flea have blossomed into a creative partnership, after the bass player for the Red Hot Chilli Peppers wrote a letter online explaining he was hurt by the comments but still loved Cave’s music.
Cave wrote: “About twenty-five years ago, I made an offhand and somewhat uncharitable remark about the Red Hot Chili Peppers. There was no malice intended, it was just the sort of obnoxious thing I would say back then to piss people off. I was a troublemaker, a shit-stirrer, feeling most at ease in the role of a societal irritant. Perhaps it’s an Australian trait among people of my generation, I don’t know, but that comment has followed me around for the last quarter-century.
“On Facebook, Flea expressed how hurt he felt by my remark, but went on to say, in great detail, that he loved my music regardless. He wrote a profoundly generous and open-hearted love letter to Nick Cave. I remember being genuinely moved by his words and thinking what a classy guy Flea was, and feeling on some subterranean level that I was unable to fully grasp at that point in my life, that Flea was a human being of an entirely different calibre, indeed, of a higher order.
“Over the years, I would run into Flea at music festivals where both our bands were performing and see him backstage when we played in Los Angeles. Although we didn’t become close friends, my encounters with him were always pleasant – there was a presence to Flea that felt genuine and oddly affecting.”
Cave has since confirmed he was approached by Flea to work on a song for an upcoming “trumpet” album, though little detail is available. Cave added: “Last week, Flea sent me a song and asked if I’d like to add some vocals. It was for a ‘trumpet record’ that he is making. It is not for me to divulge what the song was, only that it is a song I cherish more than most, with arguably the greatest lyric ever written, a song of such esteem that I would never have dared to sing it had Flea not asked me to.
“I went into the studio on Wednesday and recorded my vocals. The track emerged as a beautiful conversation between Flea’s trumpet and my voice, filled with yearning and love, the song transcending its individual parts and becoming a slowly evolving cosmic dance, in the form of a reconciliation and an apology.”
