Michael Peter Balzary, better known as Flea, was born on October 16, 1962 in Melbourne, Australia. His parents divorced when he was 5 years old, and he moved to New York with his mother. His step-father was a jazz musician and got Flea playing the trumpet.
When he was older, they moved to Los Angeles where Flea attended Fairfax High School. All through his high school years, Flea was teased for his strange accent (a mix of Australian and New York) and his "strange" taste in music. (His main musical idols included Loius Armstrong and Dizzy Gilespie.) Flea met Anthony Kiedis at Fairfax and they became best friends. Another best friend to them both, was Hillel Slovak. They were a "real trio" and did everything together. Flea has said that "At that time I didn't like rock music at all. I thought rock music was for idiots." That is...until Hillel introduced him to the music of Jimi Hendrix when they were 14. Flea became facinated with rock music after that and HIllel taught him to play the bass guitar. The three, plus another friend of theirs, Jack Irons, graduated from Fairfax High School in 1980.
One at the "Kit Kat Club" while they were playing, Anthony jumped onstage and rapped out a poem he wrote, called "Out In L.A." They were immediately in demand. Flea was in a punk band, called Fear, at the same time, but still played with the Red Hot Chili Peppers. They were getting more and more popular and decided to do something a little more crazy. Thus, the infamous "Cocks in Socks" act was born. Within six months, the Peppers got a record deal on an indie label. Flea & Anthony recorded the first album, "The Red Hot Chili Peppers", with another drummer & guitarist. It wasn't as successful as they had hoped for, and they knew it wouldn't work without all of the peppers together, so along with Jack and Hillel, the Red Hot Chili Peppers returned to the recording studio. Produced by funkmaster George Clinton, their second album, "Freaky Styley", was released in 1985. In 1987, The Uplift Mofo Party Plan hit store shelves and they set out on tour.
None of the peppers have denied doing drugs at some time, but Flea says that he never got heavily into them.....unlike Hillel and Anthony. Flea was very supportive of helping his two best friends steer clear of drugs, but after touring was over, everyone went their separate ways for a while. With no support from his friends, Hillel got back into drugs again. This time it was heroin. Hillel died in June of 1987, and Jack quit over sadness of the loss of his friend, but Flea and Anthony were determined to keep striving for the success of their band.
They looked for a new guitarist and drummer and found 17 year old John Frusciante. With the hurried task of filling the positions of 2 lost band members, John was a perfect addition He had been a huge Pepper fan himself and knew all of the guitar music to all the the Red Hot Chili Peppers' songs. Chad Smith was the last of over 30 to audition for the role of the drummer, but he was chosen as the best. Mother's Milk production began, & it became their first gold record.
Flea married a woman named Loesha, and they had a daugher, Clara, who was born on September 16th, 1988. Flea and Loesha divorced in 1990. The band moved into a house together to record Blood Sugar Sex Magik and became close again. John is said to share the same "magic" that Hillel shared with the Peppers, and him and Flea's music had great chemistry on BSSM. It was released on 1991 and started a RHCP craze. They grew popular than ever before and BSSM sold 8 million copies.
During this time, John became distant from everyone around him and didn't like all of the publicity the band was getting. Right before going onstage at a concert in Japan, he announced that he as quitting the band and was leaving after the show was over. The Red Hot Chili Peppers rushed to find a new guitarist until Flea invited his friend Dave Navarro of the group Jane's Addiction to take John's place in 1994. Dave played Woodstock '94 soon after, but was only one of the guitarists that took John's place during his absense. No matter which guitarist played with the Peppers, none of them shared the magic Hillel and John did.
It took them a long time to record "One Hot Minute", but it was released in 1995. It was also the last album Dave recorded with the Peppers. During the time of "One Hot Minute", John became a heroin addict. Flea, fearing what happened with Hillel would happen again could only hope for the best. He said "I was sure John was going to die, it was just a question of when."
Time went by, and one day Flea went on a visit to see John as he usually did since he had kept in touch with him the whole time, and asked John if he would like to be in a band again. Flea says, "His face turned red, just bright, beet red, and he said, 'Well, I think that would be a good idea'". Flea convinced his friend to go into drug rehab, and soon the Red Hot Chili Peppers were back in the studio again, recording another album.
In 1998, recording for Californication began, and it was released in 1999. It has been their best selling album ever. Anthony said the peppers began recording their 8th album in October 2001. Fans can epect to see the new album, entitled "By the Way" on store shelves on July 9, 2002.
