Red Hot Chili Peppers's Flea on how to avoid becoming 'an old fart'

"Maybe I'll just plant rutabagas." 

When you imagine Flea, founding member of The Red Hot Chili Peppers, bassist extraordinaire, pondering his future, you might not immediately imagine a turnip farmer.  And yet, that's an image that pops into his head.

Flea told CBC Radio All In A Day host Alan Neal he never knows what the future holds.

"I'm 53 years old. But I feel like I did when I was a kid. I never know what's going to happen...I embrace change. It's not always easy. Change is difficult often. I want to continue to change… it's about learning. As soon as you stop being willing to learn, humble yourself to what you have to learn, [that's] when you become an old fart."

Backstage at the Ottawa Bluesfest Saturday, just before the Red Hot Chili Peppers were about to perform in front of thousands of fans, the bassist described some of the ways he has embraced that change and learning.

Some of it is new music: Kamasi Washington's The Epic and Kendrick Lamar's last album are among those he says he was listening to while writing the music for The Red Hot Chili Peppers' latest album The Getaway.

And then there's literary influences. His latest obsession : IQ84 by Haruki Murakami ("It's so good, but it's big: 900 pages"), read devotedly before bed.

"Since I've been a little boy I read one book after a next. I'm a pretty uneducated person. From an early age, I was a street kid. Me and Anthony [Kiedis] on the street, robbing and stealing and doing drugs. Looking like we're going nowhere fast. Thankfully there was music. And even through that, I always loved books. "

Fighting distractions

Taking the time for literature has been important to Flea, as has taking the time every day to write music and practice. But sometimes other things get in the way.

"The stupid phone", he scowls. "Late at night, I'll find myself...Oh, let's look at the news, The Guardian, Twitter… some bullshit that doesn't lift my spirit at all. My forehead's all crunched up, staring at this stupid device. I always feel better when I read."

And, he says, there's the therapy of music itself. For the album The Getaway, Flea says a lot of the music he wrote was actually on the piano, as opposed to past compositions that started on bass or guitar. Sometimes the original piano lines of composition ended up on the album itself.

Of course, there was another piano player present on The Getaway. Guest star Sir Elton John, who plays keys and co-wrote the tune Sick Love.

"He's all right. I'd never heard of him before," jokes Flea, "I heard he made an indie record in college. Turned out he was pretty good."

At one point in the interview, Neal played a clip of Flea that he found in CBC archives from 1989. At the time Flea told the reporter: "I don't think you can dedicate yourself to something as divine and beautiful as music and really have an evil soul."

So, what does that quote mean to the bassist now?

He chuckles.

"I don't know what I was thinking then about an evil soul. But in terms of dedication: it's getting up every day and going to work. I could be smoking weed and shooting hoops with my buddies. But I choose to go into a rehearsal studio and work, roll up my sleeves and go to work. Being on the road, being in the band, it's hard to have a regular life. It's hard to keep a relationship together. But it's what I've dedicated myself to do," he said.

"I know I'm well compensated. I like making a buck as much as the next guy....[Dedication is] the willingness to show up and work every day, and not because you have a boss, but because you care."

Heading into his mid 50s, Flea says he does ponder life without the Red Hot Chili Peppers.

"I think about it from time to time. If I weren't in the band, I would be much more free and much more compelled to pursue other parts of myself as a musician in a less interrupted way: composing, film scores. I can't imagine I'd be in another band. But I love making music."

And then, there's always the rutabagas.