Former Red Hot Chili Peppers guitarist John Frusciante has released six projects’ worth of music for free on his Bandcamp and Soundcloud pages.
In an essay posted on to the musician’s website, Frusciante says that his decision to release this music is a response to the press that followed an interview in which he said that he had “no audience” and that he no longer planned to release music commercially.
Clarifying his previous statement, his new post states that he does consider himself as an artist with an audience, but that “ever since I quit my old band in 2008, I have made music specifically to learn and to make the music which I want to hear, without an audience in mind”.
Frusciante also discusses the concept of giving away music for free.
Giving people music for free online being so common these days is a good reminder that artistic expression is always a matter of giving, not taking, or selling. Selling is the making money part, and artistic expression, creation, is the giving part. They are distinct from one another, and it is my conviction that music should always be made because one loves music, regardless of whether one plans on selling it or not. Creation is the source of life, while making money is what people do for food, clothing, shelter, necessities and comfort in some cases, and to exercise their greed in others.
So far, the music includes 19 minutes of “weird anti-rock” songs recorded on a four-track cassette in May 2010, a 37 minute collection of tunes made between 2009 and 2011, a 20 minute version of Sect In Sgt, “my all-sample piece”, in its entirety, an interpretation of the song Fight For Love from the movie Casa De Mi Padre, recorded in November 2013 with At the Drive In’s Omar Rodriguez, Medre, a track recorded in 2008, and a vocal and guitar-only version of the song Zone, from his album Enclosure.
