Feature LP

Wednesday 2/1/23 9pm ET: Feature LP: Red Hot Chili Peppers – Californication (1999)

Californication is the seventh studio album by the American rock band Red Hot Chili Peppers, released on June 8, 1999, on Warner Bros. Records. It was produced by Rick Rubin. Along with Blood Sugar Sex Magik, Californication is one of the band’s best selling albums.

Californication marked the return of the guitarist John Frusciante, who had previously appeared on Mother’s Milk and Blood Sugar Sex Magik, and shifted the band’s style. The lyrics incorporated the sexual innuendos already associated with the band, but added themes including death, suicide, California, drugs, globalization and travel.

Californication is the Chili Peppers’ most commercially successful studio release internationally, with over fifteen million copies sold worldwide, and more than six million in the United States alone. As of 2002, the album had sold over four million copies in Europe. The record produced several hits for the band, including “Otherside”, “Californication” and the Grammy Award-winning “Scar Tissue”. Californication peaked at number three on the US Billboard 200.

The record marked a significant change in style for the band: Rolling Stone’s Greg Tate noted that “while all previous Chili Peppers projects have been highly spirited, Californication dares to be spiritual and epiphanic”. Another critic, Billboard’s Paul Verna, mentioned that the album brought out “the group’s softer, melodic side”, as opposed to their previous six albums.

  1. “Around the World” 3:58
  2. “Parallel Universe” 4:30
  3. “Scar Tissue” 3:37
  4. “Otherside” 4:15
  5. “Get on Top” 3:18
  6. “Californication” 5:21
  7. “Easily” 3:51
  8. “Porcelain” 2:43
  9. “Emit Remmus” 4:00
  10. “I Like Dirt” 2:37
  11. “This Velvet Glove” 3:45
  12. “Savior” 4:52
  13. “Purple Stain” 4:13
  14. “Right on Time” 1:52
  15. “Road Trippin'” 3:25

Anthony Kiedis – lead vocals, overdubbed backing vocals
John Frusciante – electric guitar, acoustic guitar on “This Velvet Glove” and “Road Trippin'”, backing vocals, keyboards
Flea – bass guitar, acoustic bass guitar on “Road Trippin'”, backing vocals
Chad Smith – drums, percussion
Greg Kurstin – keyboards
Patrick Warren – Chamberlin organ on “Road Trippin'”