The Chaotic Elegance of Flea

By way of a foreword to Acid for the Children, a new memoir by Flea, the irrepressible bassist from the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Patti Smith has written a Flea-themed poem. Is it a good poem? Well, it’s by Patti Smith, so in that sense it’s axiomatically good. And if she read it aloud, in her shivering, slowly accelerating, priestly rock-and-roll groan, it would probably sound amazing.

On the page, however, there is imprecision. “Providence assigned him an instrument / that in his hands formed a spectral voice …” I’m not sure —adj., of or like a ghost—is the word I’d use to describe the sound of Flea’s. His bass lines seem to incarnate some principle of human resilience, of slapstick durability. Bounce into jeopardy; twang back into security; repeat. Thick grooves at speed. Even when the Chili Peppers were at their worst, their most oafish and party-time elephantine, there was always Flea, head down over his bass, elbows out, doing something interesting.