Between his solo releases, his work as guitarist for Red Hot Chili Peppers and The Mars Volta, and various collaborations with rap duo Black Knights and Duran Duran (yes, that Duran Duran), John Frusciante has tackled nearly every genre under the sun. For his latest project, however, Frusciante will be exploring the uncharted territories of electronic music.
On April 7th, he’ll release a self-titled album as Trickfinger, his new acid house alter ego. Due out via Acid Test, the eight-track effort is a long time coming, with Frusciante explaining that he became serious about electronic music as early as 2009. When he started recording, the music was “all experimental acid house,” and that his “skills at making rock music” didn’t figure into Trickfinger whatsoever.
In anticipation, Frusciante has shared album opener “After Below”, a dazzling thumper of a track.
Below, read Frusciante’s full message about the new album and his growing love for acid house.
I started being serious about following my dream to make electronic music, and to be my own engineer, five years ago. For the 10 years prior to that, I had been playing guitar along with a wide range of different types of programmed synthesizer and sample-based music, emulating what I heard as best as I could. I found that the languages machines forced programmers to think in had caused them to discover a new musical vocabulary…
In 2007, I started to learn how to program all the instruments we associate with acid house music and some other hardware. For about seven months I didn’t record anything. Then I started recording, playing 10 or so synced machines through a small mixer into a CD burner. This was all experimental acid house, my skills at making rock music playing no part in it whatsoever. I had lost interest in traditional songwriting and I was excited about finding new methods for creating music. I’d surround myself with machines, program one and then another and enjoy what was a fascinating process from beginning to end.
Trickfinger Tracklist:
01. After Below
02. Before Above
03. Rainover
04. Sain
05. Exlam
06. 85h
07. 4:30
08. Phurip
