The stars must have been perfectly aligned when Red Hot Chili Pepper’s drummer, Chad Smith, guitarist Jeff Kollman (Cosmosquad) and keyboardist Ed Roth were brought together to help out Glenn Hughes’ latest project. The trio immediately connected in a simple jam session and as quickly as their friendship evolved, so did their music. With the addition of bassist Kevin Chown (Ted Nugent) a band was born. Bombastic Meatbats, a slightly twisted name is beguilingly fitting for their off-the-cuff instrumentals. It’s funk, it’s fusion it all for the love of it, according to Smith.
Their debut album, Meet The Meatbats, released in September on Warrior Records, consists of 10 songs written in a matter of days at Smith’s pool house in Malibu. Since their first live performance in 2007, they’ve mesmerized Japan with a sold out tour and caught the attention of audiences around the U.S. – performing regularly at L.A.’s famed jazz venue, The Baked Potato. With 20 years under his belt as a Chili Pepper, Smith must enjoy shedding his skins as he also recently created the hard rock band Chickenfoot with Van Halen’s Sammy Hagar and Michael Anthony. Along with performances for all three bands and their albums, Smith is currently working on a new CD with Red Hot Chili Peppers. One can only imagine how he finds the time and energy for it all…no less 30 minutes for Glide.
Before we start I have to tell you that my teenage boys are freaking out that I’m interviewing a Red Hot Chili Pepper.
(Laughs) Yeah, that’s okay, that’s cool. Where you from?
New York. You live here too?
In the summertime, we live in Montauk and then we’re in L.A. from October to May. I just flew in last night.
Apparently this band fell into place accidentally…can you tell me the story?
Ed, Jeff and I happen to play with Glenn Hughes from time to time on some of his records. About a year and half ago we were rehearsing with him and he was always late so we would warm up and jam on this kind of stuff. It very organically came about. I said, “Man, we should make some songs and record them…this is pretty good” and so we did. We met up at my house and stuff started to come really quick. It’s a little bit easier instrumentally – you don’t have to worry about writing words or singing. It reminds me of a Thursday night poker game. The guys get together and shoot the shit and there’s no pressure –it’s just fun. That’s what we’re trying to get across—not this serious, fusion-y shit. People think of instrumental music and sometimes they think of a bunch of notes a minute and old guys with no sense of humor and this is like party music to us.
It’s that Thursday night poker game, huh?
Yeah, we all know each other for quite a while now. I started playing with Glenn in 2002 or 2003, so it’s six or seven years. We see each other when we can cuz everybody does different things. But they’re great guys. I don’t want to be in a situation where I’m playing with people and it’s not fun. I’ve got other things to do.
Between Chickenfoot, Red Hot Chili Peppers and this, you’ve definitely got other things to do. How do you manage?
Well, I have a very understanding wife. That’s how I find the time. She knows that if I don’t do it, I’ll just drive her crazy. She’s rolling her eyes at me right now (laughs).
Are you one big happy family when it comes to creating the music?
Yeah, it’s definitely a group effort. It starts from me with the drumbeats to Jeff having guitar ideas, etc. We bounce everything off each other. It’s basically tons of improvising, being in the moment. It’s definitely a good time.
Is it freeing to be playing without lyrics or is more challenging?
A little bit of both, ya know? Worrying about words and telling a story can be – I don’t want to say a bit of a burden – but it’s somebody’s job to sort of take that over when there are no words and Jeff does a really good job with the guitar and so does Ed on the keyboards. The more melodic instruments become the focus, instead of the voice. It’s definitely freeing with a lot of improvising. Playing off each other is different every night.
Does the music inspire the titles or vice versa?
I would say usually the music inspires the title, but in the case of “Pigs Feet” it was different. I wanted a New Orleans shuffle kind-of-thing and we were taking notes out of the air and we just started playing. That title was already on my mind.
Where does the name “Night Sweats” come from?
“Night Sweats” came from my wife being pregnant at the time and that’s the vibe I got. Now my little boy is 7 months old.
To me the band’s name has a heavy metal band feeling to it…
Yeah, not your typical instrumental name. Name’s kooky. Look at Chickenfoot. Where does that come from? Once you put the music with the name it changes everything. Red Hot Chili Peppers could be some Mexican, crazy string band, you know? (laughs)
Speaking of Red Hot Chili Peppers, will it be hard to take a ‘back seat’ after taking center stage with your own band?
No, it feels very natural. I’m really looking forward to it cuz we’ve been off for about two years. I’ve never taken that much time off. We’ve all done different projects so it’ll be fun to go back. It’s like an old shoe – you slip right in there (laughs).
Twenty years is definitely an old shoe…
Yeah and you gotta change your socks once in a while (laughs). So you just take from the other things you do – whatever that may be – and you incorporate them into the music and make it fresh again.
Do you feel drummers are often underrated?
No, not at all. I’ve been a drummer for 40 years and I love it. I don’t have aspirations to be the lead singer. My personality comes out through my instrument, so that’s the most important thing. It’s all good.
You mention many influences on your music, particularly coming from your brother…
Yeah, he’s two years older than me and when I was growing up I listened to all the records he was listening to. He played guitar so we were in a band together early on and a lot of the music was coming from England – The Who, Cream, Deep Purple, Led Zeppelin – that kinda hard, blues-rock explosion. We were junkies for that, we just got totally into it. That really stuck with me because that’s when I was forming musically. I wanted to play like John Bonham, Keith Moon and Ian Pace. And I still love that music today. It was a great, fertile time for rock music — it was definitely very exciting. Later I got into funk and jazz, but for example, this Chickenfoot thing I did, that’s really very natural for me to play that style of music (Led Zeppelin, etc) because that’s what I grew up on. That was our jumping-off platform for everybody who also enjoyed that kinda thing.
Does your brother still play?
Yeah, in the basement (laughs). He’s in music publishing, but he’s not performing. He still loves music. We still hang out and I took him to see Led Zeppelin in England last year.
Music now doesn’t encompass as many big bands as when we were kids, you know?
Yeah, well it was new back then. It started really in the early 50’s so by the 70’s it was still only 20 years into it. That was a fertile time for psychedelic music and performers like Jimmy Hendrix, etc. I mean, nobody ever heard a guy play guitar like that at the time. The English were especially amazing. England is not like America. It’s a very small island onto itself and to have so much of this amazing music coming out of this one place is just wild to me. I think it had to be so exciting to have so many groups in one area – playing off each other, competing. London bands like The Who were pop bands – they played short songs, while bands from the Midlands like Deep Purple jammed more. They were aware of the different kind of scenes back then. I don’t know that we could possibly replicate that now.
It was the birth of all these bands that are now grown up.
Exactly.
So hip-hop’s our baby now…
Hip-hip nation, right?
Exactly. So you’re kicking off your tour in Japan?
That’s the first place we did any real gigs. I want you to know that Chad Smith’s Bombastic Meatbats is just in name only. It’s not really my band at all. We wanted to go to Japan and the promoter felt my name had to be in there because of Red Hot Chili Peppers to help sell tickets and the other guys were pretty cool about it, but it was solely for promoting purposes. We originally booked it about 6 months ago to start in the beginning of October. It sounded good back then, but then I got a call from Rick Rubin to do Kid Rock’s new album, so I had that starting on October 12th plus the Chili Peppers were starting work on our new album on the 12th as well. So I found another drummer to play on the Japan tour. His name is Kenny Aronoff and he’s great. So, it’s Kenny Aronoff’s Bombastic Meatbats. (laughs)
How did that fly with the promoter?
Oh, he was not happy about it. I told him, “I just can’t do this” and he said he would cancel it. But there was no way we wanted to cancel, so he agreed to let Kenny fill in. I felt terrible for the fans and I taped a message for them apologizing and explaining that I wouldn’t be there.
So what’s next?
Gotta be home for my baby. He’s 7 months old and sitting up now. He’s not crawling yet, but soon. I don’t want to miss too much…
You also have another boy, right?
Yes, he’s four.
I’ve got two boys also…
Hey, way to go! Nice work. It’s great, right?
Yeah, they’re both waiting for you to come to New York…
We don’t have a set thing yet, but keep an eye out. We’ll be there. I’ll make sure they see me!
Joanne Schenker lives in New York and is a contributing writer for Glide and AOL Music (Spinner.com) She can be reached at [email protected].
