RHCP’s drummer, Chad Smith, was interviewed by Lindsay Parker for the Volume West show on Sirius XM in Los Angeles.

Chad used to promote on the program (in 2018?), so he knew the presenter well and there’s a lot of chit chat between them throughout the show. Chad talks about many things including working with Ozzy and Elton John (Elton took royalties for the RHCP’s Sick Love song that he played piano on, and so did Bernie Taupin although he had nothing to do with it at all. They didn’t discuss charges; Elton played and then they got a letter a few days later asking for half the royalties!)

Chad actually returned to talk about his new art show in Austin, Texas, and there’s a lengthy discussion of how it was made made (including knives, DNA and getting oiled up in Vegas…!).

There are a few mentions of RHCP which might answer a couple of questions kicking around right now (although again, nothing on why Josh is no longer in the band).

Background Summary:

The band were working together at the end of 2018, but the process was literally stopped by the Wolsey fire in the Malibu area as the house where they were based was in the fire path. [A certain guitarist told me he didn’t know if his guitars had been destroyed as there was no knowledge on the fate of the house they were working in as nobody could access that area]. Progress did not really resume then because of the physical damage and aftermath in Malibu; e.g. Anthony had to move out of his home for an extended period and went to his other property in Hawaii for a while.

 

What RHCP Material was already recorded:

Presenter talking about Chad, having to put stuff [presenting the show] on hold ostensibly because the band were working on the new album. Then she starts to comment on the Wolsey fire:

Presenter: Then you had to put that on hold because of what was going on with the Wolsey fires; something happened where you couldn’t get to your HG, or whatever…

Chad: Our HQ?

Presenter: I don’t know! Your bunker, your jam… your monkey style house that you…

Chad: That’s what we had. We had a HQ.

Presenter: And you couldn’t get to it because the road as burned out or something…

[Talking about when; November 2018]

New RHP Album

Presenter: So where is the next RHCP album now? Did you start over? Are you picking up? What can you tell us because I thought it was supposed to come out last year. I think even though you are busy with other stuff, I think people are hoping for a new record in 2020

Chad: Yeah, I think so.

Presenter: You think so?

Chad: Yeah. I don’t know. I think so.

Presenter: Are you working on it now? I know there’s certain things you can’t talk about.

Chad: Yes [I can’t talk about some things]

Presenter: Tell me what you can say.

Chad: That we’re excited.. [lots of mumbling and laughter]

Presenter: It’s just us, Chad… [joking].

Chad: We’ve had some changes, and we’re really excited about it. With respect to people on our band [some mumbling], I’m looking forward to writing new music. We’re going to start working on it very soon. Flea’s like on honeymoon and riding elephants in Thailand … so when he comes back, we’ll start up again

Presenter: So is the stuff you were doing before the fires happened, is any of that going to make it into the record.

Chad: I don’t know. We’ll just.. have to…

[Mumbling again] Goes on to talk a bit about Bottlerock being announced.

Chad: That might be the first real gig.

 

Pyramid Show/ Documentary

Chad and Lindsey started talking about the show RHCP did at the pyramids in Cairo, Egypt last year. Note: This is paraphrased/shortened as there was a lot of chat and mumbling especially at the beginning of this section when the two were joking about Chad standing on top of a pyramid playing his drums!

Presenter: You literally played on a pyramid in like Egypt

Chad: No! Like in close proximity

Presenter: I want to envisage you standing right on top, bouncing drum sticks…

Chad: Bouncing drum sticks..

Presenter: Proximity is still pretty bad ass!

Chad: Nobody has done it since the Grateful Dead…  We filmed it, did the whole thing. I think it’s coming out in… one of the Ms…March or May…

 

Many thanks to Sister Witch for all of her help with this, and especially to Midnight_Slump on Reddit for posting the clip and the download. Much appreciated! 

Discussion on Reddit with clip 

Download of whole interview