The Getaway World Tour

The Getaway World Tour is a current concert tour by American rock band Red Hot Chili Peppers that is in support of their eleventh studio album, The Getaway which was released on June 17, 2016. It marks the first time since June 2014 that the band has toured. The tour began with benefit shows and North American festival dates in February 2016 followed by a summer festival tour with dates in Europe, Asia and North America starting in May 2016 and ending in August 2016. The headlining tour to support the album began in Europe in September 2016 and will last until the end of the year with the North American tour beginning in January 2017.^[1] Chad Smith said that the entire tour would last for 18 months.^[2] Like the previous two tours, Chris Warren will serve as a backing keyboard player while Nate Walcott joined the tour as a pianist and the band's assistant tour manager Samuel Bañuelos III provides additional bass on "Go Robot".

Pre-tour benefit shows and North American festivals

Prior the summer festival dates in June 2016 and start of their headlining tour in September 2016, the band performed at a few benefit and North American festivals. On February 5, 2016, the band performed in Los Angeles at the FEEL THE BERN political fund-raiser in support of 2016 presidential candidate Bernie Sanders.^[3] "Nobody Weird Like Me" made its return to the set list for the first time since the 2006–07 Stadium Arcadium World Tour. The following night, they performed at a private, invitation-only Super Bowl 50 party in San Francisco called "DirecTV Super Saturday Night Co-Hosted by Mark Cuban’s AXS TV" where they played "Aeroplane" for the first time since July 1997.^[4] The band also performed covers of "Cracked Actor" and "Starman" in tribute to their friend David Bowie, who died the previous month. On April 13, Flea played the national anthem before Kobe Bryant's final NBA game. That night, the Chili Peppers played four song set at a unannounced private show in Los Angeles, CA in support of Sean Parker and The Parker Foundation Launch for The Parker Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy^[5] The band performed a sixteen song set at the Jazz & Heritage Festival on April 24 where they were joined by The Meters for a jam. On April 29, 2016, Chad Smith and Will Ferrell will host the Red Hot Benefit Comedy + Music Show & Quinceanera. The benefit will featured a performance by the Chili Peppers along with comedy acts selected by Ferrell and Funny or Die. A portion of the proceeds will go to Ferrell's Cancer for College and Smith's Silverlake Conservatory of Music.^[6] It was announced in March 2016 that the band headline the 25th anniversary Lollapalooza festival in July. The band's May 14, 2016 performance at the KROQ Weenie Roast was suddenly cancelled prior to them going on stage due to Kiedis suffering stomach pains. The following show, an album preview show for The Getaway on May 17, 2016, was postponed until May 26, 2016. "Dark Necessities", the lead single from The Getaway, made its live debut on May 22, 2016. New songs "Go Robot" (the band was joined by Thundercat on bass), "Sick Love", "The Ticonderoga" all made their live debuts on May 26, 2016 at the album preview show for iHeartRadio which aired on DirectTV on June 17, 2016. "The Getaway", the title track to the new album, was released by the band on May 26, 2016 however unknown at the time to fans, the band had teased the song live during their performance of "Give It Away" at Super Bowl 50 party in San Francisco back in February. The song made its full live debut on May 29, 2016.

Anthony Kiedis health scare

On May 14, the band were forced to cancel their headlining slot at the annual KROQ Weenie Roast as Kiedis was rushed to the hospital prior to the band appearing on stage due to severe stomach pain. Flea alongside, Smith and Klinghoffer made an announcement on the stage as they were due to appear. It is unknown whether upcoming shows would be affected as a result ^[7] Kiedis' mother Peggy posted the following morning on Facebook that "Anthony will be OK. No surgery is needed. I will keep you updated, I promise"^[8] It was confirmed that Kiedis was suffering from intestinal flu and was expected to make a full recovery soon however the band was forced to postpone their iHeartRadio album preview show on May 17, 2016 and has rescheduled it for May 26, 2016. The band returned to the stage on May 22, 2016 in Columbus, OH.^[9][10] According to Chad Smith, Kiedis had suffered from the stomach flu a few weeks earlier as well.^[10][11] In a May 20, 2016 interview with Entertainment Tonight Canada, his first since being released from the hospital, Kiedis said that his illness was brought on by an "inflammation in my guts" which he said was complicated by a recent stomach virus and existing scar tissue from previous hernia operations which required his stomach being pumped at the hospital due to his food not being able to properly digest. "That becomes an incredibly painful situation where you get a fever and pass out... Lo an behold, I'm on the mend" He went on to say "so it turned out to be a good thing, albeit painful and very sad to have to cancel a show. We don't really do that. I'd rather play deathly ill than not play at all, but in this particular instance, I was starting to go down, as in to the ground, so I got rushed to the hospital, got some help, and now I get to figure things out."^[12]

The Getaway world tour

Singer Anthony Kiedis in a May 5, 2016 interview discussed touring and said they were very excited to have a lot of new songs to play. Kiedis said "this being our second record with Josh, it feels a lot more fulfilling. And, it’s always great to have a job as a musician. It’s great to be in this band. We love seeing the world. But to have all these new songs at our disposal for live shows makes it feel like ‘Let’s go. Let’s go. We have a mission now. You do this incredible thing in the studio and then you go practice and rehearse and make sure you can play this stuff live and then you go see the world. You know everywhere; from Asia to South America to Europe and Eastern Europe and hopefully the Middle East and Africa and you know, you give this music life to people far far away that it means something to and you have this communal experience together. And when you just can’t take it for another day and you’re beat and you’re haggard and you’re tired and you want to collapse and you come home and you gather some new life experience and start writing a little bit and Flea sits down at the piano and says, ‘Hey, I have these chords. What do you think about these chords? And I say, hmmm, I hear melody in there and you start it all over again."^[13] Drummer Chad Smith said on May 17, 2016 that the band would be playing in Europe for pretty much the remainder of the year once the tour starts with the North American tour not happening until 2017.^[11]

All purchases of tickets through the band's website include a free download of The Getaway.

Summer festivals

Promotional poster for the band's concert at Nova Rock in June 2016

The Getaway World Tour got underway on June 4, 2016 with festival dates in Europe, Asia and North America which will last until August 2016.

The band using their Festival production in Leeds

A day after its release, "We Turn Red" made its live debut on June 10, 2016 at the Pinkpop festival while "Wet Sand" was performed for the first time in over two years. Flea, Anthony and Chad also teased George Clinton's "Bullet Proof", a song they haven't performed in 23 years. During the opening encore jam, Kiedis took over Flea's bass while Flea played keyboards and Klinghoffer played piano. The jam included a tease of The Beatles' "Hey Bulldog". After over three years not being performed, "Tell Me Baby" returned to the setlist on June 12, 2016 at Novarock. The rarely performed "She's Only 18" also made its return after a two-year absence. On June 13, 2016, in a pre-taped segment on The Late Late Show with James Corden, the band appeared in the show's popular Carpool Karaoke segment.^[14] During the filming of the segment, Kiedis saved the life of a baby. "a woman came out of her house, holding a child saying ‘My baby, my baby, my baby can’t breathe!’ We all ran across the street, the woman thrust the baby into my arms, the baby was not breathing and I thought ‘I’m gonna try and do a little baby CPR real quick, see if I can get some air in this kid.’ Tried to open the mouth, [it was] like locked shut. So I started rubbing the belly, bubbles came out of the mouth, the eyes rolled back into place, the ambulance showed up and I handed the baby over, who was now breathing and fine, and we went back to Carpool Karaoke. The little baby looked at me the entire time until the ambulance came, little baby Nina." Kiedis said^[15] On June 14, 2016, the band performed eight songs at Studios SFP in France. "Dark Necessities" and "Give it Away" appeared on the television show Le Grand Journal^[16] while the remaining six songs, which included the live debut of "The Longest Wave", were recorded for radio station RTL2's "Très Très Privé" concert series. The Live In Paris EP was released on July 1, 2016 and features five songs from the Canal+ performance in Paris. The EP was released exclusively through the music streaming website Deezer. "Detroit" made its live debut on June 29, 2016 at the Roskilde Festival while "Goodbye Angels" made its live debut on July 10, 2016. "Dreams of a Samurai" made its live debut on July 24, 2016 at the Fuji Rock Festival in Japan.

In an August 2016 interview, Flea discussed touring and playing the same songs saying "Has there ever been a night where I've been like 'If I play fucking 'Give It Away' again my cock's gonna fall off'? Yes. There are moments of having a hard time finding the essence and spirit of a song, but in general it's all about the people in the end. It's all about connecting with the people.I try to keep myself in a place of being completely selfless about it and doing my best to use every song, whether it's one I've heard a million times or a new one, as a vehicle for connecting with people and making them feel less alone in the world."^[17]

European tour

The band's European headlining tour began on September 1, 2016 and is expected to last the remainder of the year. Deap Vally and Babymetal serve as the opening acts. "Feasting on the Flowers" made its live debut on September 8, 2016 in Oslo, followed by “The Longest Wave” second time ever played on September 14 in Helsinki. "Search and Destroy" was performed for the first time since 2003 on September 10, 2016 in Sweden and for the first time with Klinghoffer. At the band's October 11, 2016 show in Italy, Anthony's 9-year-old son Everly Bear joined his father in singing "Dreams of a Samurai".^[18] "Don't Forget Me" was briefly teased in tribute to a fan from Peru who passed away the previous year. The band's October 13, 2016 show in Montpellier was cancelled due to weather conditions. The band is trying to reschedule the show.^[19]"The Zephyr Song" (which was in the band's setlist on November 1, 2016 but dropped in favor of "Soul to Squeeze") was performed for the first time since 2004 and first time with Josh on November 3, 2016. At the band's November 9, 2016 show in Amsterdam they performed "Mommy Where's Daddy?". This was only the third time since 1999 the song has been performed. They had previously performed the song acoustically in September 2016 and once in September 2015. "Emit Remmus" was performed for the first time since 2012 while "Catholic School Girls Rule" and "Freaky Styley" were for teased at during the band's November 16, 2016 show in Denmark. On November 17, 2016 in Germany the band performed "Yertle the Turtle" for the first time since 2001. It marked the first time a song from "Freaky Styley" was performed with Josh. The song was dedicated to one of the band's longtime fans who had been following them on the tour.

Los Angeles Rams opener and Silverlake performances

The band performed two songs before the opening home game of the Los Angeles Rams at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum on September 18, 2016. The Rams made their return to Los Angeles after 22 years in St. Louis. "Since I was a little boy, I've taken joy in the beauty of the Rams. When I moved to Los Angeles in 1972, I was getting uprooted from my home and I thought, 'Well, where I'm going they've got the Rams. It's going to be all right'" Flea said.^[20] On September 23, 2016, the band performed a short acoustic set at a benefit for the Silverlake Conservatory of Music. "Mommy, Where's Daddy?" from the band's debut album was performed for only the second time in the past 17 years (it was last performed in late 2015) and for the first time ever acoustically.

North American tour

The band's 51 date North American headlining tour will begin in January 2017 according to the band's June 2016 interview in Rolling Stone. The first 24 dates of the North American tour will be from January to March 2017. Due to overwhelming demand for tickets after selling out quickly and in response to scalpers, second shows in Boston and Philadelphia were added while second and third shows in New York City and Los Angeles were also added. The final 27 dates of the tour were announced on November 7, 2016. ^[21][22]Trombone Shorty and Orleans Avenue will open all North American dates while the band's original drummer Jack Irons will open select dates.^[23]

European tour II

The band will return to Europe for a second leg starting on July 13, 2017

South American tour

On September 14, 2016, the first date of the leg was confirmed for September 24, 2017 at Rock in Rio

Tour dates

Cancelled shows

Songs performed

Studio album originals

Cover songs

• A recording of Eric Dolphy's version of "God Bless the Child" is played prior to the band taking the stage at every show

Personnel

• Flea – bass, backing vocals, keyboards (during jam on 6/10/16)
• Anthony Kiedis – lead vocals, bass (during jam on 6/10/16)
• Josh Klinghoffer – guitar, backing vocals, piano (during jam on 6/10/16)
• Chad Smith – drums, percussion

Additional musicians

• Chris Warren – keyboards, electronic percussion pad
• Nate Walcott – piano, keyboards
• Samuel Bañuelos III - bass (on "Go Robot")

Guest musicians

Opening Acts

• Deap Vally (Sep 1 - Sep 10, 2016)
• Babymetal (Dec 5 - Dec 15, 2016)
• Trombone Shorty and Orleans Avenue (Jan 5 - June 25, June 30 - July 1, 2017)
• Jack Irons (Jan 5 - Jan 21, 2017)

External links

• Red Hot Chili Peppers website
• RHCP Live Archive
• The Side: Red Hot Chili Peppers Touring History

References