Red Hot Chili Peppers to the World Stage
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The Californication album signalled the welcome return of the Red Hot Chili Peppers to the world stage. Paul Tingen discusses the recording with the album’s engineer, Jim Scott. he ‘Californication’ of the world is in full swing. Of course, it’s been going on for decades, mainly via The trouble began when their guitarist John Frusciante Tthe influence of the likes of Hollywood and Disney- descended into a journey of drug-induced self-destruc- land. But recently there’s been a major accessory to the tion. Four years later several near miracles have global takeover, in the form of the latest album from the happened. Frusciante is off drugs, has a new set of rejuvenated Red Hot Chili Peppers. It’s their most suc- teeth, some skin grafts on his arms and clearly still cessful album yet, topping the hit parades all over the knows how to play the guitar. He has also joined singer world and turning platinum in Australia, New Zealand, Anthony Kiedis, bassist Flea and drummer Chad Smith Canada, Japan and the USA, and gold in almost all to resurrect the Chili Peppers, and together they have European countries. created an engaging album. Most of the tracks have a Apparently the title came out of a visit by singer high-energy rock vibe, but they’re interspersed with Anthony Kiedis to Borneo. He was surprised to see the many touching ballads, of which Scar Tissue became a local culture saturated with images from the US, and Cal- monster hit. ifornia in particular, whether it was Coca-Cola, Marlboro, Californication’s engineer Jim Scott has an impressive- and Hollywood movies, or T-shirts, posters, CDs and ly long list of credits to his name, including Natalie cassettes from Californian bands (including the Red Hot Merchant, Lucinda Williams, Counting Crows, Tom Petty, Chili Peppers themselves). Californication is therefore a Neil Young, Rolling Stones, Finn Brothers, Robbie wonderfully appropriate and prescient title. There’s also Robertson, Sting, Santana, Seal, and Jewel. Scott was the sleazy double entendre there, fitting for a band who responsible for capturing the sound and energy of the are famous for hitting the stage virtually naked with each Chili Peppers onto tape. He has done a remarkable job, band member’s member sheathed in a gym sock! resulting in a hard-hitting and gritty sounding album. It’s Genuine worldwide fame found the band in 1991 when also an album that largely in mono, and without reverb, the Blood Sugar Sex Magik album lifted them onto the but more on that later… international stage. It was also their first collaboration PT: Jim, could you take the story of recording Califor- with the legendary Rick Rubin, founder of the rock and nication from the beginning? rap label Def Jam Records in the mid ‘80s, and now JS: After the return of John Frusciante there was a long head of American Recordings. Rick came on board again period of song writing and time for the band to re- for Californication, an album that many suspected would acquaint themselves with their songs. The band never happen. rehearsed most of the 1998 summer in Flea’s garage, 26 and when they came to the recording studio they were played so well, and because of the way I miked them, the very well prepared, and in extremely good shape. They overall sound was dry and punchy. Everything was clear actually started work with another recording engineer, and loud. but after a week in the studio they felt things weren’t PT: How did you mic up the drums? happening. As luck would have it, I happened to be JS: To get that tight ‘up front’ sound you have to put the working in an adjacent studio in Ocean Way (now Cello mics really close to the drums – the room sound did not Recording) in Los Angeles. I’ve worked with Rick Rubin come into it. On some records all you want is the room before, so he asked me to step in. sound, and you get that great Led Zeppelin drum sound, After I took over, Rick and the but Rick prefers things to sound Peppers became happy with the really loud and right in your face. He sound, but all I really did was capture doesn’t want the mic 30 feet away if the sound of the band in the room. “Don’t turn each it can be just one foot away. On the first day we recorded maybe The microphone setup was a basic three or four tracks, the next day twice session into a rock’n’roll approach that I learnt in as many, and the next day another The Record Plant in the ‘80s, nothing four or five. In all, we recorded 30 recording too fancy. I used a Neumann U47 on songs in about a week, which is a lot. the kick, putting it right inside. There It was a lot of tape and a lot of per- school, it’s more were two Sennheiser 421 mics on formances, but they were playing the toms, two Neumann U87 mics as great, so all we had to do was get it important to get overheads, and a Shure SM57 on the down. hi-hat. The snare was picked up by PT: Can you give us more detail two SM57s – one above and one about the setup in the recording the ideas down underneath – plus a Neumann KM84 studio, and what you recorded? on top, which gave me a good- Where they all in one room, for while they’re hot” mic/bad-mic setup. The three snare example? mics all ended up on one track. The JS: We recorded all four of them at SM57 underneath the snare gave me the same time, which basically amounts to the sound of more of the rattle. the album. There weren’t many overdubs. John did some We had a second set of drums in the room which guitar overdubs on maybe two or three songs (the slide were tuned completely differently, kind of mismatched guitar on Scar Tissue is overdubbed, for example), but in and oversized. We used it on the track Porcelain. It had today’s world of overdubs that’s not a lot. We also over- more rattle on the snare drum, a fluffier sound on the dubbed some AC/DC-type piano power chords during kick, plus a sizzle cymbal. I used leftover microphones for the mix, but it is not like there’s layers and layers of that kit. I think there was an SM57 on the snare, an Elec- overdubs. The sound of the record is what happened trovoice RE20 on the kick, and two RCA77 ribbon micro- during that first week of recording, and those ‘live’ phones as a general drum balance. I also had a pair of drums, bass and guitar went on every song. Neumann M50 mics in the room for ambience on both We set up in Studio Two at Cello Recording, which is a drum kits. Although they went to tape, I didn’t use them rectangular, medium-sized room. The drums were on a in the mix. riser in the middle of the room, and there was one large iso-booth where we put John and Flea’s amplifiers – just Waxing lyrical: Jim Scott (sporting the white shirt) in the studio to keep them out of the drum room. We built a little doghouse around the bass speakers, to protect them from leakage from the guitar amp – but in my experience leakage is not an issue as long as you make at least some attempt to achieve separation. There was also a small, separate vocal booth, where Anthony sang. Flea, John and Chad were about 10 feet away from each other in a circle, and Anthony was just a few feet away in this iso-booth, separated by glass. They could see each other all the time. There were no baffles around the drums, so they were just sounding out loud in the room. I set up two room microphones, but I didn’t end up using them. The sound of the drums on the album is pretty close, and that’s from only using the close mics. Chad has good sounding drums, and you can hear the dynamics and the details in his grooves, so it was just a matter of getting that on tape. The same with Flea, who has great bass technique, and even when he plays fast you can still hear all the notes. Because they all PT: Did any of the vocals recorded during that first week make it to the mix? JS: We probably retained some of the ‘live’ vocals, but Anthony went back and redid most things. In many cases this was because of changes to the lyrics. We recorded his vocal overdubs in the small iso-booth as well. He came in every day BLACK BUTTA 2 around three o’clock to get ready for the vocal overdubs, which normally started at wicked sequel- four. He had his vocal teacher down every day, and took his time to warm up. The dope beatz, hip dedication of Anthony and the band to get this record the best they could was hop and awesome. Anthony sang about three or four songs every day, and then we would R & B......... spend time picking and choosing the best pieces. He sang great – I think it’s the CD AUDIO best he’s ever sung. $149.95 The vocal overdubs took about two weeks.