Flea

From HitStory, the pop encyclopedia of School of Rock · Artist

Flea's real name is Michael Balzary, and he was born in Melbourne, Australia, in 1962. When he was four the family moved to New York, and after his parents' divorce he went with his mother and stepfather, a jazz musician, to Los Angeles. There he played the trumpet and idolised Miles Davis, Louis Armstrong and Dizzy Gillespie. Rock did not interest him. His childhood at home was violent. At Fairfax High School Anthony Kiedis became his best friend, and the guitarist Hillel Slovak taught him to play bass guitar.

Music and breakthrough

With Kiedis, Slovak and the drummer Jack Irons he founded the Red Hot Chili Peppers. Their debut was released in 1984, and for the second album, Freaky Styley (1985), they chose the funk musician George Clinton as producer. The big successes came later, with albums such as Blood Sugar Sex Magik, Californication and Stadium Arcadium. Flea also played with Johnny Cash, Tom Waits, Nirvana and Jane's Addiction, among others, and was in Atoms for Peace. He also appeared in films such as Back to the Future Part II and The Big Lebowski.

Influence

Flea's bass playing mixes funk, punk, psychedelia and hard rock. Striking is his slap bass: he hits the strings with his thumb and pulls them with his fingers, so that the bass sounds like a percussion instrument. In this way the bass is often at the front of the Chili Peppers' music. Readers of Rolling Stone chose him in 2009 as the second-best bassist of all time. In 2012 he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame with the band. He also founded a music school for children from poor families.

Listening

Discography

Studio albums

• 1995Unreleased Tracks From the Sidi Mansour Album
• 2026Honora

In School of Rock

The chapters, maps and magazine stories of School of Rock are currently available in Dutch only.

• Mixtape 4: When Rock Was Still Pop^NL Reader