Red Hot Chili Peppers - Magpies On Fire / Victorian Machinery (2012) (6,5/10)

Only a month after the first vinyl single debuting the release of a total of nine releases from the “I’m With You” sessions, the legendary RED HOT CHILI PEPPERS are already back with two brand new songs. In my humble opinion, the band though can’t catch up with the two energizing tracks they’ve released only a couple of weeks ago.

“Magpies on Fire” has not much fire inside and comes along as a rather faceless radio Rock track that could have also been recorded during the “Californication” sessions. The vocals sound rather ordinary, the rhythm section is not powerful at all, and the track also lacks of a gripping chorus or something else that might awake a minimum of attention. The only intriguing aspect about this song is the solid guitar play by the young and talented Josh Klinghoffer but even he doesn’t sound too unique on here and his style reminds me a little bit too much of his mentor and predecessor John Frusciante who quit the band about three years ago for the second time to focus on his solo career. 

The second song entitled “Victorian Machinery” is though clearly better. The rhythm section comes along as the backbone of this song and is indeed much more present than in the first one. Especially bassist Flea shows once again why he is considered as one of the best contemporary musicians on his instrument. The discordant and quite experimental guitar tones form the heart of the song. The slightly discordant vocals also sound much more diversified and emotional than in the first song and could be described as the track’s soul. The song includes a few (and at first try) unpredictable changes and varies from soft to harder parts. The song sounds like the bastard of a heavier and progressive track from the heavily underrated “One Hot Minute” release and a more laid back song coming from the “Stadium Arcadium” sessions. This mixture works rather well even though the concept gets a little bit repetitive towards the end and would have needed a few more fresh ideas to get a better rating.

In the end, we have a rather weak and a rather strong track on this release that I would only recommend to the real fans of the band that are looking for the purchase of each one of the nine single releases. Let’s see how the next two tracks will sound as they are already going to be released in a couple of days.

(Online October 16, 2012)