While working on their 2006 double album, Stadium Arcadium, the Red Hot Chili Peppers struggled with one particular song. The verses of “Desecration Smile” were amazing – moody, atmospheric, and they just felt right. However, the chorus was still a work in progress, and everyone recognized that it wasn’t quite right yet.
The band themselves were honest about it. During the track-by-track” style interview/commentary with the band included on the Stadium Arcadium Deluxe Edition DVD, they described the original chorus as “not very good” and “very confusing.” They were aware that the rest of the song had great potential, but without a strong hook, it wasn’t going anywhere. Producer Rick Rubin agreed, but the band continued to circle the problem without resolving it.
“Desecration Smile,” a little number that has also been performed live way before we started even tracking this record, when it had a different chorus and had a completely different course that was not very good. It wasn’t as good, a very confusing course. It was a whole another can of worms.
Anthony Kiedis & Flea
You can hear this old version of the chorus below, around the 1:22 minute mark.
Since the band was performing the song in front of an audience before it was even released, they had the luxury of people hearing it and giving them feedback. What they also had was luck – because at one of those shows was none other than Paul McCartney. Rick Rubin, who worked with the band on producing the album, told the band about McCartney’s reaction to the verses – that he was nodding along, clearly digging it.
But here’s where Rubin made his move. With McCartney’s positive reaction to the verses established, Rubin pressed his own critique about the chorus – he said that it really wasn’t taking off, and it couldn’t match the verses that came before it.
This, of course, wasn’t new information, but Rubin’s timing was smart – he delivered his criticism right after invoking McCartney’s approval of the verses. So the message was clear: if a Beatle thinks your verses are great, your chorus needs to be at that level too. The band realized they needed a chorus that could either match the verses or, better yet, lift the whole song higher.
The pressure was on, and guitarist John Frusciante came through. He came up with an entirely new chorus that brought a bright, major-key feel, contrasting perfectly with the darker verses. Instead of trying to match the mood, he went the opposite direction, creating a moment of release and uplift that made the whole song just click into place.
I remember there was a certain quality in the other course that it went from major to minor when it went from the chorus back into the verse. And so, I think I made even more of that because I made a course that had a really major key feel, and then, and then, and then back into the dark verse
John Frusciante
If you’re curious about the gear and the process that John used on Desecration Smile, he recorded most of the song on his vintage Martin 0-15 acoustic guitar. On the chorus itself, he recorded an additional track, just strumming his 1962 Fender Stratocaster. Right after the first chorus, there is a harmony part that John created with the Analogue Systems Phase Shifter, which is a synthesizer module.
