Flea’s new line of basses will target beginners. His goal was to produce a high-end bass for a lowend price. The finished products, at $399 for short-scale basses and $499 for long-scale, feels remarkably like a Fender Jazz. Though made in China and Korea, each bass will be set up by a member of Flea’s team here—an unusual step for a bass in this price range. “If they don’t feel like butter, if their intonation isn’t perfect, if they don’t play great, they’re not going to the stores. We’ll set up every one and make it perfect.” Get ready for the green-on-pink Punk bass, the blue-on-orange Water bass, the orange-on-yellow Sunny bass, and the black-on-white Wild One—due out in February. “I’m not looking to make a bunch of money here; that’s not the motive. The motive is to fill a void.” A void that leads back to a 1999 basketball game, and inevitably to the first gig he ever played.
FILLING A VOID
Flea is a hardcore Lakers’ fan—the kind who actually writes online poetry to Kobe Bryant, okay? So it took a lot to grab his attention at an NBA game. It took a teacher from his old high school inviting him back to talk to students. He agreed, and was shocked. When Flea attended L.A.’s Fairfax High School in the late ’70s—he was known as Michael Balzary then—it had a great music program. Pick an instrument, you got it … with lessons. He picked trumpet. And it saved him.
“I was on the street getting in trouble. I was breaking into houses. I was into drugs. I was a disaster.” Music kept him in school. He played in marching band, orchestra, school productions. “It gave me that sense of pride. I’d go home and work on my music. I loved it.” When he returned, the program had been reduced to a volunteer music teacher and a couple of acoustic guitars. “I was like, God, I had such a good time here. Music gave me a reason not to be complete delinquent.”
A crazy idea popped in his head. He called some friends and offered a quarter-million dollars, basically asking: Can we fill this void? “I was lucky enough to have the money to do it,” he says.
Flea’s non-profit Silverlake Music Conservatory, in Silverlake, California, opened in 2001. More than 600 students now attend, and many get free instruments and free lessons. They play in ensembles, orchestra, funk groups, choirs, and more. “This has nothing to do with celebrity or rock stardom,” he says. “We deal with fundamentals of music and technique and music theory.”
But occasionally, some 12-year-old kid walks in with a bass and gets Flea as an instructor. That led to his next crazy idea: Could we make a quality bass for under $400? He kept seeing students with basses that wouldn’t stay in tune, with warped necks and action so bad even he had a hard time playing them. “I’m like, it’s just not right,” he says. “These basses are like toys.” He enlisted Dave Lee, guitar tech for Red Hot Chili Peppers guitarist John Frusciante, and the duo went to work. Lee drew up hundreds of designs— for necks, bodies, headstocks, pickguards, you name it. “He kept coming to me with models and models,” says Flea. “We worked until it felt good. You can’t describe what makes something feel good; it just feels good. And to me, ours feels the best.”
But there are undeniable influences: Narrow neck? Think Jazz Bass. Body? Jazz Bass. Elephantear tuners? Jazz Bass. “The thing is, when Leo Fender designed the Jazz, he made the coolestlooking bass that’s ever been. I didn’t want to deviate too far from his design.”
Leo Fender, however, isn’t the only ghost inside the new Fleabass. There is another—a dear friend, and Flea can often be found visiting his grave.
BUTTERFLY EFFECT
You might expect someone who’s won seven Grammies and sold more than 50 million albums to be stand-offish. But this is a man who greets you at the door. Who insists you listen to Squarepusher and plays air-guitar beside you. And who walks you to your car. Flea is also excited to show you his latest gift—from legendary artist Damien Hirst, who’s sold a single piece of art for a record-shattering 50 million English pounds. Flea lifts a ’64 Jazz Bass covered front, back, and behind the neck with real butterfly wings under laminate. “Damien Hirst is rad—he’s an imaginative artist, and he’s going to design a bass for us. I’m telling you, they’re going to blow people’s minds. They’re going to be magical-looking.” Flea is also cooking up a “Hippie” bass and a double-neck.
Each Fleabass—available in full or e size— features one passive soapbar pickup, a solid alder body, and a solid-maple neck with rosewood fingerboard. Each headstock bears FLEABASS in his own handwriting, plus doodles he affixes to autographs: his “Dios mio” (“My God”) face, and a gap-toothed, Cheshire Cat grin (like his own). That accounts for Leo Fender, and himself. He’s about to explain the third major influence on his Fleabass.
STAYING CONNECTED
It’s almost class time. Since September, Flea has been studying music composition, theory, and jazz trumpet at USC. “It makes me grow,” he says. “I’ve always used my body, my heart, and my emotion to create music. This gives me a new way to think about it, a greater reservoir of ideas to draw from.” That will no doubt help when he mixes his solo CD—Helen Burns, named after a character in Jane Eyre, and due out next year. On it, he plays bass, trumpet, piano, synthesizer, Mellotron, percussion, and drum machine. It’s mostly instrumental but a few guests join him, including Patti Smith (an influential singer in his life), a choir from his music school, and the son of his homeroom teacher in junior high. Flea is a man who likes to stay connected, and few are as connected to him as the man who wrote “One Way Woman,” which Flea is now singing on the couch.
“That’s an original by Anthym,” he says—the first band he ever joined. A high school friend asked if he’d be willing to learn bass, and Flea said sure. “Two weeks later I was standing on stage at Gazarri’s, rocking out.” That experience— and that friend—changed his life.
“I always think about him in everything I do. When I started playing, I wanted to be as cool as he was.” Flea is talking about Hillel Slovak, the original Chili Peppers guitarist who died at age 27 of a drug overdose, and whose gravesite Flea often visits. “He was a real artist; his sense of what was cool is a huge sense of what I think is cool. So without a doubt he directly influenced the making of this bass.” It’s time to go, but Flea doesn’t want to put down his all-orange prototype. “I’ll be playing nothing but these as soon as we get them in,” he says.
Look for Flea to have the blue-and-orange model—his favorite—onstage when the Chili Peppers resume touring, probably next year. “That’s the one I’ll be playing,” he says. “But I’ll have one of every color. I know a guy in the company.”