Review: Red Hot Chili Peppers

You probably know the bad-boy/clown-prince stories of the Red Hot Chili Peppers: drugs, assorted ribaldry, creative use of hosiery. Well, forget about 'em.

The Chili Peppers who played the Bradley Center on Wednesday night are just a bunch of nice hard-rocking Hollywood boys. All they seem to want out of life is a cold Vitamin Water and some good tuna maki.

And to play their music, of course. Validated as true survivors by the success of Grammy-winning rock album "Stadium Arcadium," the now 40-something Chili Peppers are happy to forget the crazy theatrics and focus on the music: a West Coast brand of deep metal funk that's a head-bobbing love child of Bootsy Collins and Jimi Hendrix.

Most of the time, anyway. As an arena band that has discovered the joys of song craft, the Peppers have evolved while clinging to their roots. Anthony Kiedis can still nimbly spit his rat-a-tat sound poetry, but vocal pyrotechnics have given over to more subtle and subdued singing.

Even his stage presence, once a frenetic blend of prime-time Muhammad Ali and Bruce Lee, is now more about stillness and concentration.

Even without the long jams of their youth, that heady blend of styles was still there. Kiedis' ruminative mea culpas ("Snow (Hey Oh)," "Under the Bridge") were well-seasoned with Flea's thump-and-ping bass work, and John Frusciante's jagged-edge guitar fills. And the 90-minute plus set was peppered with tasty between-song improvs to make the tightly orchestrated show feel loose.

From Frusciante's first fog-cutting riff on "Can't Stop," which opened the set, it was clear how essential he is to the more thoughtful and craft-conscious Peppers. He even stepped up to sing an achingly gorgeous solo version of Fleetwood Mac's "Songbird."

But the band is by no means a one-man show. Frusciante's crackling rhythm vamps work because Flea's ever-more-musical bass knows how to work around them. And drummer Chad Smith's solid back beat doesn't hurt.

Cee-Lo, the singing half of opening act Gnarls Barkley, was having problems with his voice Wednesday night. "I need your energy," he told the crowd time and again.

And no wonder. His classic, there-it-is soul pipes had to work triple time to rise above the din of the muddy and overpopulated back-up band he had in tow. With simple beats like the Femmes' "Gone Daddy Gone" or the hit single, "Crazy," you could make out some of producer DJ Danger Mouse's sonic wizardry. But most of the set was an over-camped, crazy mess.