RED HOT CHILI PEPPERS' CHAD SMITH Says Playing With JOHN FRUSCIANTE Again Has Been 'Really Fun'

RED HOT CHILI PEPPERS drummer Chad Smith says that "it's been really fun" working again with guitarist John Frusciante.

Frusciante rejoined RED HOT CHILI PEPPERS in December 2019 after the dismissal of Josh Klinghoffer, who had been in the band for 10 years.

Smith discussed RED HOT CHILI PEPPERS' renewed collaboration with Frusciante in a new interview with SiriusXM's Pop Rocks. He said (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET): "He's back in the group, and it's really exciting and fun, and we just kind of picked up where we left off. We've known each other for so long — obviously, 30-plus years — so it's like putting on a nicely well-worn pair of shoes that feel really good, and you get back in there and it's comfortable and a little bit different, but still we're doing our thing. So it's been really fun."

Regarding RED HOT CHILI PEPPERS' plans to release the follow-up to 2016's "The Getaway" album, Chad said: "There's been no hurry, with what's happened over the last year or so. So we've been kind of taking our time, and we have lots of new music, and we're very excited about it, and when it's done, it's done, and we'll put it out, and we'll go play some concerts next year. We look forward to being in front of people again, like everybody wants to be so badly, us included. Not only having new music to play, but also we just wanna play live. And that's such an important part of life's experiences and certainly of being a band. It's really important to us. We were gonna play last summer. But we want it to be safe for everyone and a really good experience for everyone, so we pushed everything off, but we're coming back, and it's gonna be great."

Frusciante originally joined RED HOT CHILI PEPPERS following the death of founding guitarist Hillel Slovak in 1988. This lineup recorded two highly successful albums that brought the group mainstream popularity: "Mother's Milk" and "Blood Sugar Sex Magik". Sadly, Frusciante fell into a deep heroin addiction that caused him to leave the band while touring to support "Blood Sugar Sex Magik". Frusciante rejoined CHILI PEPPERS six years later, playing on 1999 album "Californication", 2002's "By The Way" and 2006's "Stadium Arcadium" before quitting the band again in September 2009.

Last October, Frusciante told the Australian digital radio station Double J that playing with his RHCP bandmates Anthony Kiedis, Flea and Smith once again was like "returning to family. I'm extremely comfortable with those people. It was as if no time had gone by at all when we started playing, pretty much, with a couple of minor exceptions, like how Chad and I gradually got our communication together in a new way. Basically, we're all just as comfortable with each other as we ever were, and it just felt like that right off the bat."

Photo credit: Laura Glass