Various Artists - MusiCares Tribute to Brian Wilson, Hollywood Palladium, Hollywood, CA, 2-11-2005

As I mentioned in my last post, Brian Wilson of the Beach Boys died a few days ago as I write this, on June 11, 2025. He's such an important musical figure that I considered it a must to post something in his memory. I did a little Internet browsing, and came across mentions of this tribute concert. However, I could only find a few songs from it, far from the whole thing. But luckily I've recently been getting some assistance from Fabio from Rio, who is a big Brian Wilson / Beach Boys fan. It turned out he had the DVD of this. He then figured out how to convert it to audio format, and sent it to me. So here you are. Earlier today, I posted an album that pays tribute to Brian Wilson created by Fabio, but two tribute albums is better than one.

MusiCares is a non-profit charity that is connected to the organization that runs the yearly Grammy music awards. Since 1991, they've been giving out a yearly award, MusiCares Person of the Year. They have a benefit concert celebrate the music of that person. It takes place in the same town and week as the Grammy awards, so lots of music stars are there to perform on stage or at least attend. The money raised from the benefit concert (and other activities) goes to an organization that helps struggling musicians, for instance those who are having medical trouble or drug addiction and can't afford treatment.

It seems that bootlegs of these yearly MusiCares concerts are basically non-existent. The audiences are relatively small and are mostly made up of music industry insiders who aren't likely to secretly tape record the show and then share that with the public. However, a handful of the concerts have been officially released on DVD. These are generally rare and already out of print. But I've managed to find most of them, concerts for: Paul Simon, James Taylor, Neil Young, Paul McCartney, and Bruce Springsteen (plus this one). I plan on posting all of those here eventually. I know of two more that exist: Barbra Streisand and Carole King. I'm not that interested in the Streisand one, but I'd be very interested in the King one, if anyone has that. (Or, heck, if anyone has any of the other concerts not on DVD!)

For this album, I don't feel I need to explain what happened in the concert, because I found not one, but two, articles that give good summaries. Here they are (with the second one from Rolling Stone): 

MusiCares Celebrates Brian Wilson As Person Of The Year | RECORDINGACADEMY.com 

Musicians Serenade Brian Wilson at MusiCares Gala 

I do want to mention though that I'm very disappointed this isn't the complete concert. Almost complete, but a couple of songs are missing, at least. One song that got left off the DVD, and thus left off this album, is a performance by Neil Young of the Beach Boys classic "In My Room." It seems to be the one and only time Young ever publicly performed this song, so it's a real loss. Another one that wasn't included is a duet between India.Arie and Brian Wilson on the even greater classic "God Only Knows." If anyone has either or both of those, please let me know so I can add them in.

Thanks again to Fabio from Rio. I looked everywhere and couldn't find this, so I was very pleasantly surprised to find he had it. After he sent it to me, I broke the audio into mp3s. So I think it's a safe bet that this is the first time this full concert is being shared in an audio format. 

This album is an hour and nine minutes long. 

01 talk (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
02 I Get Around (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
03 talk (Richie Sambora)
04 City Blues (Richie Sambora)
05 Sail On, Sailor (Jamie Cullum)
06 talk (Barenaked Ladies)
07 Brian Wilson - 'Til I Die (Barenaked Ladies)
08 talk (John Legend)
09 I Just Wasn't Made for These Times (John Legend)
10 talk (Backstreet Boys)
11 When I Grow Up [To Be a Man] (Backstreet Boys)
12 talk (Shelby Lynne)
13 Surfer Girl (Shelby Lynne)
14 talk (Michael McDonald & Billy Preston)
15 Don't Worry Baby (Michael McDonald & Billy Preston)
16 Surf's Up [Instrumental Version] (Jeff Beck)
17 Surfin' U.S.A. (Jeff Beck)
18 talk (Earth, Wind & Fire)
19 Don't Talk [Put Your Head on My Shoulder] (Earth, Wind & Fire)
20 talk (Darlene Love)
21 Wouldn't It Be Nice (Darlene Love)
22 Pet Sounds [Instrumental] (Brian Wilson Band)
23 talk (Neil Portnow & Brian Wilson)
24 Our Prayer - Heroes and Villains (Brian Wilson)
25 Good Vibrations (Brian Wilson)
26 Fun, Fun, Fun (Brian Wilson)
27 Love and Mercy (Brian Wilson)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/gzQuD2sf

alternate: 

https://bestfile.io/en/6nJGwuHSdbQCB1H/file

The cover photo is from this exact concert. That's India.Arie with Brian Wilson. 

Various Artists - FireAid, Intuit Dome, Inglewood, CA, and Kia Forum, Inglewood, CA, 1-30-2025

Here's something surprisingly timely from me. I mostly post music from decades ago, but as I write this in early 2025, this concert took place only three days ago! It's a big concert - five hours long - with lots of big name artists.

I like posting big rock festivals and benefit concerts, because I've noticed they tend to get overlooked. But I tend not to post many from the 2000s because I don't like many of the musical acts on the bills. However, I looked at the list of performers here and I liked most of them, and could at least tolerate the rest. If you frequently come to this blog, your musical tastes are probably pretty similar to mine. You might want to give this a listen even if you don't like some of the acts. I think it's better than the vast majority of these kinds of concerts.

The concert was a surprisingly fast response to a series of fires that burned parts of the Los Angeles region earlier that same month. Millions were raised that would go to a charity to help the victims of the fires. There are lots of natural disasters that don't result in big benefit concerts. But this disaster hit very close to home for many famous musicians and or the people they know. For instance, Billy Crystal, one of the presenters here, lost his house to one of the fires, and Stevie Nicks came very close to losing hers. So it's not surprising that so many artists wanted to take part in a benefit concert.

Before I say anything else, note that the crisis caused by the fires is very much still ongoing, and donations are still being accepted. If you want to donate, here's the link:

Homepage - FireAid

I'm posting this because the entire concert has been put out there for free all over the place, including on literally at least ten TV streaming services, Tik Tok, YouTube, and more. So I'm just helping to spread it. If you want to watch it instead of just listen, YouTube is an easy way to find it. (That said, I wouldn't at all be surprised if this gets taken down due to some copyright issue or another, so grab it fast!)

The Wall Street Journal put out an interesting article before the concert took place that explained how it came to be. It's a worthwhile read:

Archive Buttons | Free Paywall Remover

I'll spare the details, since you can read about everything there. But I want to note that famous musical acts were falling over each other to take part, so many were turned down. The ones that were included generally were ones who lived in Los Angeles or otherwise had close ties to the area. 

Also note that the concert was rather strange in that it actually two place in two different venues on the same night. This is similar to what happened with Live Aid in 1985, except that consisted of concerts in North America and Europe, whereas this was two concerts both in the two of Inglewood. The thinking was that one of the concerts was mainly for pop music and the other for rock music. While there was down time between acts in one concert, they would show a set from the other concert, keeping both audiences entertained almost all the time. I thought about splitting this into two album, one for each venue. But I ultimately decided on making one big one, with all the songs in the order they occurred.

Now, let's get to the music. I found high quality videos of each set at a bootleg sharing site, then I converted them to audio and broke them into mp3s. The videos were already almost entirely free of the frequent begging for money typical of these types of concerts. I kept nearly everything. However, there were some sequences highlighting the fires and the resulting homelessness that I cut out, mostly because those were videos meant to be seen, not just heard. But I did keep speeches by Billy Crystal and Jimmy Kimmel talking about the fires.

As I mentioned above, I liked most of the musical acts. The vast majority of them have been featured in albums I've posted at this blog already. The ones who haven't are: Anderson Paak, Dawes, Gracie Abrams, Tate McRae, Jelly Roll, Nirvana, Katy Perry, Olivia Rodrigo, Peso Pluma, Billie Eilish, and Lady Gaga. Some of those were merely okay, but a lot of them only played a song or two, and often did a cover of a famous song, so it didn't matter much. There was only one musical act I couldn't stand, and that was Lil Baby. Gawwwd, the Autotune on that is sooo awful! So that was the only act I didn't include.

I mentioned Nirvana above. It's hard to imagine Nirvana without Kurt Cobain, who died long ago. The set here featured the three surviving members, Dave Grohl, Krist Novoselic, and Pat Smear. To fill Cobain's shoes as lead vocalist, different female singers sang each of the four songs performed: St. Vincent, Kim Gordon, Joan Jett, and Violet Grohl (the last being the daughter of Dave Grohl). 

Generally speaking, the sound quality was excellent. But I noticed the lead vocals seems quite low during the Nirvana set, as well as the subsequent Red Hot Chili Peppers set. An analysis of those songs in an audio editing program confirmed that. So I boosted the vocals relative to the instruments for just those two sets, using the UVR5 audio editing program.

One other problem was that there often were abrupt sonic transitions between each set. So I would carefully look at the last song of one set and the first song of the next one. If it didn't sound smooth, I made some edits until it did. Typically, I'd merge audience applause together so it just sounds like lots of cheering until the next act got started.

This album is five hours long exactly. The actual concert was more like six hours long, but there was some dead air between sets, plus the video presentations about the fires that I cut out, as well as the Lil Baby set I couldn't stand.

001 Last Night on Earth (Green Day & Billie Eilish)
002 talk (Green Day)
003 Still Breathing (Green Day)
004 When I Come Around (Green Day)
005 talk (Billy Crystal)
006 Hand in My Pocket (Alanis Morissette)
007 talk (Alanis Morissette)
008 Thank U (Alanis Morissette)
009 talk (Anderson Paak)
010 Put Me Thru (Anderson Paak with Sheila E.)
011 talk (Anderson Paak)
012 Come Down (Anderson Paak with Sheila E.)
013 Still D.R.E. (Dr. Dre & Anderson Paak with Sheila E.)
014 talk (Anderson Paak)
015 California Love (Dr. Dre & Anderson Paak with Sheila E.)
016 talk by Alanis Morissette (Joni Mitchell)
017 Both Sides Now (Joni Mitchell)
018 talk (Dawes)
019 Time Spent in Los Angeles (Dawes)
020 talk (Stephen Stills with Dawes)
021 For What It's Worth (Stephen Stills with Mike Campbell & Dawes)
022 talk (Graham Nash with Stephen Stills & Dawes)
023 Teach Your Children (Graham Nash with Stephen Stills & Dawes)
024 talk (Pink)
025 What about Us (Pink)
026 talk (Pink)
027 Me and Bobby McGee (Pink)
028 talk (Pink)
029 Babe, I'm Gonna Leave You (Pink)
030 talk by Samuel L. Jackson (Rod Stewart)
031 Forever Young (Rod Stewart)
032 talk (Rod Stewart)
033 Maggie May (Rod Stewart)
034 talk (Rod Stewart)
035 People Get Ready (Rod Stewart)
036 talk by Pink (John Mayer)
037 Neon (John Mayer)
038 Gravity (John Mayer)
039 Free Fallin' (John Mayer)
040 That's the Way of the World (Earth, Wind & Fire)
041 Shining Star (Earth, Wind & Fire)
042 September (Earth, Wind & Fire)
043 talk by Graham Nash (Black Crowes)
044 Remedy (Black Crowes)
045 talk (Black Crowes)
046 Have You Ever Seen the Rain (John Fogerty with the Black Crowes)
047 talk (Black Crowes)
048 Going to California (Black Crowes with Slash)
049 talk by Philip Bailey (Gracie Abrams)
050 I Love You, I'm Sorry (Gracie Abrams)
051 talk (Gracie Abrams)
052 A Long December (Gracie Abrams)
053 talk by John Meyer (No Doubt)
054 Just a Girl (No Doubt)
055 Don't Speak (No Doubt)
056 Spiderwebs (No Doubt)
057 talk (Tate McRae)
058 You Broke Me First (Tate McRae)
059 talk (Tate McRae)
060 Don't Dream It's Over (Tate McRae)
061 I Am Not Okay (Jelly Roll)
062 talk (Jelly Roll)
063 Hollywood Nights (Jelly Roll with Travis Barker)
064 talk by Gwen Stefani (Stevie Nicks)
065 Stand Back (Stevie Nicks)
066 talk (Stevie Nicks)
067 Landslide (Stevie Nicks)
068 talk (Stevie Nicks)
069 Edge of Seventeen (Stevie Nicks)
070 talk (Stevie Nicks)
071 talk by Jelly Roll (Katy Perry)
072 Rise (Katy Perry)
073 Roar (Katy Perry)
074 talk (Katy Perry)
075 California Gurls (Katy Perry)
076 Breed (Nirvana & St. Vincent)
077 School (Nirvana & Kim Gordon)
078 talk (Nirvana)
079 Territorial Pissings (Nirvana & Joan Jett)
080 talk (Nirvana)
081 All Apologies (Nirvana & Violet Grohl)
082 talk by Stevie Nicks (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
083 Dani California (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
084 Californication (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
085 talk (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
086 Black Summer (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
087 Under the Bridge (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
088 talk (Olivia Rodrigo)
089 Drivers License (Olivia Rodrigo)
090 talk (Olivia Rodrigo)
091 Deja Vu (Olivia Rodrigo)
092 talk by Olivia Rodrigo (Sting)
093 Message in a Bottle (Sting)
094 Driven to Tears (Sting)
095 Fragile (Sting)
096 talk by Lil Baby (Peso Pluma)
097 La Bebe (Peso Pluma)
098 talk by Sting (Billie Eilish with Finneas)
099 talk (Billie Eilish with Finneas)
100 Wildflower (Billie Eilish with Finneas)
101 The Greatest (Billie Eilish with Finneas)
102 talk (Billie Eilish with Finneas)
103 Birds of a Feather (Billie Eilish with Finneas)
104 talk (Billie Eilish with Finneas)
105 talk (Stevie Wonder)
106 Love's in Need of Love Today (Stevie Wonder)
107 Superstition (Stevie Wonder with Sting)
108 Higher Ground (Stevie Wonder & Sting)
109 talk (Jimmy Kimmel)
110 Shallow (Lady Gaga)
111 talk (Lady Gaga)
112 Always Remember Us This Way (Lady Gaga)
113 talk (Lady Gaga)
114 Time Is a Healer (Lady Gaga)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/ZQXR1WV7

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/1MTEuDFXIW31ySS/file

I had hundreds of photos to choose from for the cover art. Unfortunately, there was no big encore with lots of famous people on stage together. So I decided to go with a photo of the stage and a bit of the audience, with John Mayer playing guitar and looking quite small on the huge stage. Then I added a huge version of the FireAid logo to the top half of the image.

Woodstock '94, Winston Farm, Saugerties, NY, 8-12-1994 to 8-14-1994 - Day 3, Part 16: Red Hot Chili Peppers

The 16th album from Day Three of the Woodstock '94 Festival is a set by the band Red Hot Chili Peppers.

First off, I have to say check out the album cover for this one. I love the giant light bulb head costumes. It so happens I found a Yahoo News article that extensively talked about the costumes, so I'll post some key quotes from that.

Dave Navarro, who had just joined the band as lead guitarist, later recalled, "I think it's no surprise that it was very uncomfortable in that. See, we were at a rehearsal, and [the band's lead singer] Anthony [Kiedis] had this concept: 'What if we had light bulbs on our heads?' 'Yeah, that’s cool. Like, we used to do the flame hats. This is much simpler. There’s no flames!' And, it was totally Spinal Tap. Like, he drew it on a napkin or on a piece of paper, and we handed it to these guys, and none of us saw the actual prop until we were ten minutes away from going onstage, in front of a festival audience, cameras, satellite productions. And, we put these things on, and they each were about 60 pounds. And they didn’t stay on your head straight, you know? And then, in addition to that, I had to walk out and debut with these guys. I’d been in the band for about five minutes."

The band's drummer Chad Smith later recalled, "Dude, that wasn’t well thought out, was it? It was so Spinal Tap. We're standing in the dark, and we're each trying to get our [light bulbs] on, like, 'How’s yours look?' And, 'Mine won’t light up!' And, you know, we had these jumpsuits — we looked like baked potatoes with these big light bulbs. It wasn’t bad for me, because I sat there. I’m not moving around, you know? I'm just sitting. It wasn’t that bad. But, you guys... I'm just laughing the whole time. It was a moment. It was a real moment."

Navarro further recalled, "I look back on that moment as a highlight, just in the sense that it was so outrageous and so funny. And they do look pretty cool in the pictures. I’m sure it was a neat thing. But like, in terms of just total ability to perform in those things, it was very difficult, and I think that there’s a reason why we only did one song in those. ... What I will tell you, an added layer of weirdness for me personally that day was that my previous [Jane’s Addiction] bandmate Perry Farrell, they took the stage as Porno for Pyros right before us; I parted ways with Jane’s Addiction and they went on to do Porno for Pyros. And we were playing, I think we were closing the stage we were at and they went on before us, and I hadn’t seen [Jane’s drummer] Stephen [Perkins] or Perry for years prior to that... It was just like an added element of, you know, crazy slices of life bouncing around in my brain, while I'm about to do probably the biggest show I've ever done, with a lot of eyes on me, waiting for me to either f*ck it up or pull it off. I think I landed somewhere in the middle, but it was great, overall, in terms of experiences as one of the better ones of my life, for sure."

As mentioned in the quotes, the band only had the costumes on for the first song. However, later in their set, they changed clothes again. All of them dressed up in clothes similar to what Jimi Hendrix wore in the 1969 Woodstock Festival.

The band broke into the mainstream with their 1991 album "Blood Sugar Sex Magik," which sold eight million copies in the U.S. alone, and 13 million worldwide. However, they had trouble following it up. They wouldn't release their next album, "One Hot Minute," until late 1995. At the time of this festival, they were going in and out of the studio recording that album. They played three songs from it: "Aeroplane," "Pea," and "Warped."

This album is an hour and 12 minutes long.

01 talk (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
02 Grand Puppy Du Plenty [Instrumental] (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
03 Give It Away (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
04 talk (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
05 Suck My Kiss (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
06 talk (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
07 Warped (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
08 Stone Cold Bush (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
09 talk (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
10 If You Have to Ask (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
11 Organic Anti-Beat Box Band (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
12 talk (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
13 Aeroplane (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
14 Blood Sugar Sex Magic (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
15 Pea (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
16 My Lovely Man (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
17 Higher Ground (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
18 talk (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
19 Under the Bridge (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
20 Me and My Friends (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
21 talk (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
22 Power of Equality (Red Hot Chili Peppers)

https://www.upload.ee/files/16770759/VA-WODSTCK94_8-14-1994_16RdHtChliPpprs_atse.zip.html

Alternate link:

https://pixeldrain.com/u/J6vMdkVG

The cover photo is my favorite photo from the festival: three of the four members of this band dressed up as human light bulbs. Anyway, yes, this photo is from this exact concert.

The Red Hot Chili Peppers - Austin City Limits Festival, Zilker Park, Austin, TX, 10-9-2022

A video of this concert that took place just two weeks ago popped up for me on YouTube yesterday. It was professionally filmed and recorded, I guess in connection with the "Austin City Limits" TV show. I found a higher quality version elsewhere, then concerted that to individual mp3 files.

The Red Hot Chili Peppers are having a late career renaissance. With lead guitarist John Frusciante back in the band for the third time, they've put out two albums of 75 minutes of music apiece in 2022! Admittedly, both albums are too bloated (a common problem with the band). But if you cut them down to normal album length of about 45 minutes each, you'd have two very solid albums. Furthermore, if you watch the YouTube video of this concert, it's hard to believe a couple of the band members are 60 years old already. They bounce around with the energy even most 20 year olds don't possess. May they keep going forever.

This is an excellent concert, with great sound quality. There are no problems to fix. The one surprise for me is that they played so few new songs, considering they have dozens of new songs. There are three songs from the "Unlimited Love" album released in early 2022 ("Aquatic Mouth Dance," "The Heavy Wing," and "Black Summer") and just one, "Eddie," from the "Return of the Dream Canteen" album, which came out a few days after this concert. There's also a cover of the Ramones song "I Remember You."

This concert is an hour and 22 minutes long. I trimmed some dead air moments between songs, especially before the encore, where I cut out about two minutes of cheering.

01 Intro Jam [Instrumental] (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
02 Can't Stop (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
03 Drum Solo [Instrumental] (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
04 Dani California (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
05 talk (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
06 Scar Tissue (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
07 talk (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
08 Aquatic Mouth Dance (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
09 talk (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
10 I Remember You (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
11 Snow [Hey Oh] (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
12 Pea (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
13 talk (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
14 Eddie (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
15 talk (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
16 London Calling - Right on Time (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
17 Soul to Squeeze (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
18 talk (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
19 The Heavy Wing (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
20 Black Summer (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
21 John and Flea Jam [Instrumental] (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
22 Californication (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
23 Give It Away (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
24 talk (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
25 By the Way (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
26 talk (Red Hot Chili Peppers)

https://www.upload.ee/files/16088828/TREDHCHILP2022b_AustinCtyLimitsFestivlAustnTX__10-9-2022_atse.zip.html

The cover photo is taken from this exact concert, I'm happy to say.

The Red Hot Chili Peppers - Mercy Mercy - Non-Album Tracks (2006-2007)

In 2006, the Red Hot Chili Peppers released the album "Stadium Arcadium." Even though it's a double album, in my opinion it's solid all the way through and one of the best albums they ever did. Yet even with that double album, they still had lots of leftover songs, and they released many of them as B-sides in 2006 and into 2007. This album is mostly a collection of those B-sides.

Again, it's just my opinion, but I think even these B-sides are quite good. I have certain standards. I'm not going to include absolutely everything just to be completist. I only want the songs I'll actually enjoy listening to. But in this case, I've included all the B-sides because I like them all. (That's in sharp contrast to the B-sides to their next album, "I'm with You," which I feel aren't nearly as good.)

There are only two songs here that aren't B-sides. One is a surprisingly faithful version of the Beach Boys' classic hit "I Get Around." That performance actually comes from 2005, so I should have included it on the band's previous stray tracks collection. But I only discovered it recently, and I figure 2005 is close enough for horseshoes. ;)

The other non-B-side is also the only song that remains officially unreleased. It's an acoustic version of the Bee Gees hit "How Deep Is Your Love." In concert, guitarist John Frusciante often had a solo spot in which he played acoustic covers that were very different from the usual Red Hot Chili Peppers fare, such as versions of songs by Simon and Garfunkel or Cat Stevens. Generally speaking, I haven't included those, because I usually don't think they fit in well with the rest of the band's output. But in this case, I think an acoustic version of the Bee Gees song is interesting, different, and very well performed. It's mostly Frusciante, but if you listen carefully there are some drums and backing vocals.

Sadly, this is the last of my planned stray tracks albums for the band, unless more material emerges. For their next album, "I'm with You," they released an entire album's worth of outtakes as a collection of singles. Combined, the collection is known as "I'm Beside You." But, as I mentioned above, I simply don't think they're very good, so I'm not going to bother with those. Other than that, there's a surprising lack of stray tracks. For instance, their next album, "The Getaway," had four singles released, but none of them had any B-sides. And the band has had almost no songs on soundtracks, other various artist compilations, and the like.

By the way, the band did compose 20 to 30 new songs for "The Getaway" album, only to scrap them all and start anew when they picked a new producer to work with. So there probably are a ton of songs sitting in the vaults. But none of them have leaked to the public yet.

01 Million Miles of Water (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
02 Whatever We Want (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
03 Lately (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
04 I Get Around (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
05 A Certain Someone (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
06 Mercy Mercy (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
07 Lyon 6.6.06 [Instrumental] (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
08 Funny Face (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
09 I'll Be Your Domino (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
10 Permutation [Instrumental] (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
11 Joe (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
12 Save This Lady (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
13 How Deep Is Your Love (Red Hot Chili Peppers)

https://www.upload.ee/files/15259318/TRedHChilP_2006-2007_MrcyMrcy_atse.zip.html

For the album cover, I used a photo of the band in concert in 2006.

The Red Hot Chili Peppers - Save the Population - Non-Album Tracks (2003-2005)

Here's the next of my Red Hot Chili Peppers stray tracks collections. I think it's a particularly strong one.

The first song here, "Save the Population," was released on their "Greatest Hits" album in 2003, and was a minor hit. As I explained with my last post on this band, around 2002, they recorded enough material for a new album. However, all but four of the 16 songs from those recording sessions have remained unreleased and even unbootlegged. (The four are "Save the Population," "Fortune Faded," "Bicycle Song," and "Runaway." The first one is here, and the other three are on my previous stray tracks album for them.) One band member has said that he hopes this lost album will be released someday.

What's remarkable is that even if you take away all but the four released songs from that lost album, the band had enough material for two more albums in this time period! My last stray tracks album I posted for them mostly comes from 2002, and this one mostly comes from 2003 and 2004. The majority of the songs here are originals. I think the only ones that aren't are "Havana Affair," "I Just Want to Have Something to Do," "Black Cross," and "Brandy (You're a Fine Girl)."

Also, the vast majority of songs here are live recordings. But one of those live tracks is from a B-side, and four others are from two different live albums. So there are only two songs that are officially unreleased. Both of them sound as good as the rest.

I made a rather severe edit for the song "Tuesday Night in Berlin." The original version is 14 minutes long. I cut that down to a "mere" nine minutes, because I thought the original had some meandering parts that went on too long.

The band played a large number of cover songs in these years. However, the vast majority of these would either just be guitarist John Frusciante playing solo and/or only doing a snippet of a minute or less. I didn't include any of those.  I did include the few instances when they played a cover song all the way through as a band.

I end this album with "Under the Bridge." Of course, that's one of their best known songs, from 1991. The reason I put that here is because this is a semi-acoustic version with great sound quality. It's different enough from their usual version that I figure it's worth hearing.

01 Save the Population (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
02 Tuesday Night in Berlin [Edit] (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
03 Bunker Hill (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
04 Havana Affair (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
05 I Just Want to Have Something to Do (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
06 Brandy [You're a Fine Girl] (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
07 Rolling Sly Stone (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
08 Leverage of Space (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
09 Black Cross (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
10 Mini-Epic [Kill For Your Country] (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
11 Under the Bridge [Acoustic Band Version] (Red Hot Chili Peppers)

https://www.upload.ee/files/15259287/TRedHChilP_2003-2005_SvePoplation_atse.zip.html

For the album cover, I Googled the band's name and "Save the Population," and found that someone else, howdoyoudoaninternet, had made a cover for an imagined album of that title. It looks fine to me, and it saves me from having to make one, so that's what I have here. I brightened it up some.

Red Hot Chili Peppers - Fortune Faded - Non-Album Tracks (2002-2003)

A couple of days ago, the Red Hot Chili Peppers announced that their lead guitarist Josh Klinghoffer left the band and will be replaced by John Fruiscante. It's the second time Fruiscante has rejoined the band. I consider this very good news. Klinghoffer was good, but Fruiscante was a key songwriter for the band's best albums, including "Blood Sugar Sex Magik," "Californication," and "Stadium Arcadium." In celebration of that, I'm posting more from the band.

In 2002, the band released the album "By the Way," which was followed by "Stadium Arcadium" in 2006. In my opinion, they definitely should have released an album in between, in 2003 or 2004. Actually, the band planned to release an album around then, and recorded more than enough material. They recorded at least 16 new songs, but guitarist Fruiscante vetoed putting them out as a new album, saying that his style and musical tastes had changed, and he wanted the band to go in a different direction. Apparently, only four of those songs have been released. "Fortune Faded" and "Save the Population" came out as part of a new "Greatest Hits" album, and "Bicycle Song" and "Runaway" were released as bonus tracks for the 2002 album "By the Way." The rest apparently remain in the vaults and even the song titles aren't known. One band member said a few years ago that he hopes the "lost album" will be released someday.

However, despite the fact that I don't have the vast majority of those songs, there are many more songs from that time period that are publicly available. In fact, there are so many that I'm posting this album of songs mostly from 2002 (only two of them are from 2003), and later I'll post another album of songs from 2003 to 2004. (That one includes "Save the Population," in case you're wondering why it's not here.)

Every single song on this album has been officially released. There's "Fortune Faded" from the "Greatest Hits" album plus the two bonus tracks mentioned above. All the rest are B-sides for "By the Way" singles, plus a B-side to a "Fortune Faded" single.

Personally, I think the band was in a very good creative phase at this time, so these are a pretty solid bunch of songs. A lot of them were good enough to go on an album like "By the Way," and it was probably just quirky opinions of this or that band member that caused some of the strong songs to come out as B-sides and the like instead.

01 Fortune Faded (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
02 Runaway (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
03 Bicycle Song (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
04 Time (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
05 Nothing to Lose [Edit] (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
06 Someone (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
07 Out of Range (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
08 Body of Water (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
09 Rivers of Avalon (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
10 Eskimo (Red Hot Chili Peppers)

https://www.upload.ee/files/15259271/TRedHChilP_2002-2003_FortneFded_atse.zip.html

For the cover art, my first instinct was to use the cover to the "Fortune Faded" single. But it turns out it's a terrible cover, with just the band name and song title printed on a solid white background. Instead, I found a concert poster from 2003 that I really liked. I squished it vertically some so more of the artwork would fit, and I added the words "Fortune Faded" at the bottom.

The Red Hot Chili Peppers - What Is Soul - Non-Album Tracks (1998-2001)

In 1998, the Red Hot Chili Peppers got their lead guitarist John Frusciante back. He was a key figure in terms of songwriting, and his return helped revitalize the band. They came out with the "Californication" album, which is one of their best and was a huge seller. This album deals with stray tracks that are mostly associated with that album.

Three of the songs are unreleased outtakes from the recording sessions for that album. They include a reggae version of the title song. It's not as good, in my opinion, but it's interesting nonetheless. Three more songs are bonus tracks from the album. Another two songs are B-sides related to the album. A live track from 2001 follows after that.

Finally, there's a solo instrumental by Frusicante. Frusicante put out a lot of solo material over the years, but I've put very little of it on these stray tracks collections. That's because the songs from them are their own thing and don't sound like the Red Hot Chili Peppers to me. But this song does, I think, largely because it's an instrumental, so I've included it.

To be honest, the songs here are good, not great. Usually, one can understand why these songs didn't make the "Californication" album. But that's one of the band's best albums, if not their very good, so even the leftover songs are pretty good. 

This album is 40 minutes long.

UPDATE: On January 4, 2023, I updated the mp3 download file. I added "Pinhead," a live cover of a song by the Ramones.

01 Californication [Reggae Version] (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
02 Sugar Sugar (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
03 Trouble in the Pub (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
04 Quixoticelixer (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
05 Fat Dance (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
06 Over Funk (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
07 Gong Li (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
08 How Strong (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
09 Pinhead (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
09 What Is Soul (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
10 Murderers [Instrumental] (John Frusciante)

https://www.upload.ee/files/15853024/TRedHChilP_1998-2001_WhtIsSoul_atse.zip.html

The cover art photo is of the band playing at a Tibetan benefit concert in 1998.

The Red Hot Chili Peppers - Love Rollercoaster - Non-Album Tracks (1991-1997)

I've already posted one album of Red Hot Chili Peppers stray tracks. Here's the second.

Except for the first two songs, which were released in 1994 but actually were recorded in 1991, this covers the Dave Navarro era of the band, which lasted from 1993 to 1998. Guitarist John Frusciante was a very key member of the band, since he was a major songwriter as well as lead guitarist. He left the band in 1992 and was replaced by Navarro, who previously played in Jane's Addiction. Frusiante rejoined the band in time for the 1999 album "Californication."

As a result of these personnel shifts, the Dave Navarro years have been mostly left behind by the band in the years since. They put out the album "One Hot Minute" during this era, but they've pretty much ignored playing the songs from that album in concert, except for a couple of the hits.

The songs on this album have also fallen down that black hole. But I think this makes for a good listen just the same. "Love Rollercoaster," a cover of a song by the Ohio Players, was a minor hit. A few of the other songs here are covers too, such as "Waiting Room" by Fugazi, "I Found Out" by John Lennon, and "I Wanna Be Your Dog" by Iggy Pop and the Stooges. The first two songs are originals from the "Out in L.A." album, which was a surprisingly bad album of leftovers except for these two songs. Most of the rest are original bonus tracks or B-sides.

Three of the songs are officially unreleased, but I think the sound quality for those are still good.

I've added a bonus track. It's just a bonus track because it's not a "real" track. Instead, it's the exact hit version of "Under the Bridge" from 1991, except it's stripped down to just the lead vocals and the acoustic guitar. This is possible due to multritrack versions of this song being made public, allowing one to pick and choose which parts of the song to include or remove. I really like this "unplugged" version.

01 Blues for Meister (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
02 What It Is (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
03 Bob (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
04 Melancholy Mechanics (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
05 I Found Out (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
06 Let's Make Evil (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
07 Stretch You Out (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
08 I Wanna Be Your Dog (Red Hot Chili Peppers with Iggy Pop)
09 Love Rollercoaster (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
10 Waiting Room (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
11 Circle of the Noose (Red Hot Chili Peppers)

Under the Bridge [Acoustic Mix] (Red Hot Chili Peppers)

https://www.upload.ee/files/16701027/TREDHTCHLIPPPRS1991-1997_LovRollrcostr_atse.zip.html

The cover art is based on a publicity photo from 1995. I've added the text from a promotional single of "Love Rollercoaster," with the tettering meant to rise and fall like a rollercoaster.

The Red Hot Chili Peppers - Soul to Squeeze - Non-Album Tracks (1987-1991)

I was not impressed by the first few albums by the Red Hot Chili Peppers. Admittedly, they were working on an interesting mixture of funk, rap, and rock, but I like songs with melodies. By their own later admissions, they didn't really know how to write good, proper songs until guitarist John Frusciante joined the band in time from the 1989 album "Mother's Milk." That's pretty much where my interest in the band begins.

So this stray tracks album reflects that. I only have one song here from before Frusciante joined the band, and that's kind of an anomaly, because it's a cover of the 1965 Bob Dylan song "Subterranean Homesick Blues," thus getting around their songwriting issues from their early years. The version here is a slowed down and unreleased one that I like much better than the better one they put on album in 1987. And by the way, their radically different cover of this song is further proof that Dylan pretty much invented the rap genre all the way back in 1965! ;)

The band really made me sit up and take notice with their 1991 hit song "Under the Bridge." Not only is it a great song, it showed to me that the band had depth and wasn't just a bunch of party funksters. It's an acoustic-based song. But I've included here what I think is the only completely acoustic version of it, recorded with just lead singer Anthony Keidis and Frusciante in 1991. This version is unreleased, done (I think) for a Dutch TV station.

Most of the rest of the songs here are B-sides or bonus tracks (with the exception of "Cosmic Slop," an unreleased cover of a Parliament-Funkadelic song). Jimi Hendrix clearly is a big influence on the band, because they play three Hendrix covers here ("Crosstown Traffic," "Little Miss Lover," and "Castles Made of Sand."). I believe the rest of the songs are originals, except for a cover of "Search and Destroy," originally done by the Stooges.

You may be surprised to find the hit song "Soul to Squeeze" included here. I was, because I thought that song was from 1993, which is beyond the reach of this album. (I wanted it to end when Frusciante left the band for the first time in mid-1992.) It certainly was all over the radio in 1993. But it turns out it was an obscure B-side in 1991. Then, in 1993, it was put on the soundtrack to the "Coneheads" movie, becoming a belated hit. And that was a lucky thing for the band, because they didn't know how to cope with the departure of Frusciante, so they didn't release any more truly new music until 1995.

I'll deal with that next stage of their career in the next stray tracks album for them.

01 Subterranean Homesick Blues [Slow Version] (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
02 Knock Me Down [Long Version] (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
03 Crosstown Traffic (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
04 Millionaires Against Hunger (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
05 Show Me Your Soul (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
06 Cosmic Slop (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
07 Search and Destroy (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
08 Little Miss Lover (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
09 Castles Made of Sand (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
10 Sikamikanico (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
11 Under the Bridge [Acoustic Duo Version] (Red Hot Chili Peppers)
12 Soul to Squeeze (Red Hot Chili Peppers)

https://www.upload.ee/files/15259269/TRedHChilP_1987-1991_SoultoSquze_atse.zip.html

The cover art is simply the cover to a "Soul to Squeeze" EP, but with the word "EP" removed from the bottom of it.