Red Hot Chili Peppers delivers hit songs and euphoric jams at Innings Festival in Tempe

Chad Smith strolled on stage at Innings Festival and banged a gong to usher in the lengthy instrumental jam that set the tone for Red Hot Chili Peppers’ performance at Tempe Beach Park.

It was a hit-filled set that put the focus squarely on the interplay between returning lead guitarist John Frusciante, Flea and Smith as they stretched out in jam after jam with lead singer Anthony Kiedis supplying the hooks.

To say it’s good to have Frusciante back would be an understatement. The man is an amazing lead guitarist, a point made abundantly clear by the time he’d taken that first instrumental jam to an electrifying climax and reinforced repeatedly throughout the set, from that bent note that opened his “Scar Tissue” solo to the frenzied explosion of notes on "Snow ((Hey Oh))."

Frusciante hadn’t toured with Red Hot Chili Peppers since 2007 when they launched this tour in 2022. That same year brought two albums with Frusciante back on board for his first full-length studio release since “Stadium Arcadium” 16 years earlier.

The songs they sprinkled in from those new albums held their own against the classics, especially “Eddie,” which built to a fantastic climax, and “The Heavy Wing,” which featured yet another awe-inspiring Frusciante guitar solo.

It was a loose-limbed performance full of lengthy instrumental passages that felt like conversations between the musicians, songs frequently falling together and falling apart after scaling ridiculous heights between those points.

Flea remains a joy to witness, leaping through the air in his purple skirt (a look Kiedis called “a human eggplant”) and tossing off cryptic asides (“A lot of truckers coming through Arizona on a lonely night”). His musical chops are undeniable and there’s a physicality to his playing that definitely adds to the intensity of the entire band’s performance.

Several songs started with Flea and Frusciante standing head to head, locking into the groove of the opening riff as though they had some sort of telepathic understanding.

Kiedis held it all together with his conversational delivery, whether rapping his lyrics with requisite swagger and conviction, from “Can’t Stop” to “Give it Away,” or letting his vulnerability take the lead while sharing this lonely view with the birds on “Scar Tissue.”

The setlist touched on any number of their biggest hits, from “Soul to Squeeze” and “Scar Tissue” to “Californication,” “By the Way,” “Can’t Stop” and “Snow ((Hey Oh)).”

But it never felt like pandering to the casual observer with a hit-friendly festival set. They’d clearly come to jam, and that’s exactly what they did to glorious effect.

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Red Hot Chili Peppers setlist: Every song they played at Innings Festival

Here’s a look at every song the Red Hot Chili Peppers played at Innings Festival on Friday, Feb. 23, at Tempe Beach Park:

• Intro jam

• "Can't Stop"

• "Scar Tissue"

• "Universally Speaking"

• "Here Ever After"

• Jam

• "Snow ((Hey Oh))"

• "Soul to Squeeze"

• "Eddie"

• "Right On Time"

• Jam

• "Californication"

• "The Heavy Wing"

• "Tell Me Baby"

• "Black Summer"

• "By the Way"

Encore:

• "I Could Have Lied"

• "Give It Away"

Reach the reporter at ed.masley@arizonarepublic.com or 602-444-4495. Follow him on Twitter @EdMasley.

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This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Red Hot Chili Peppers jammed through classic songs at Innings Festival