Jeff Parker and Flea Want to Build Bridges with Jazz

Guitarist Jeff Parker has a discography that stretches back to the 1990s, when he was both a member of the lauded post-rock group Tortoise and a crucial player in Chicago’s jazz scene. Though he’s amassed many credits over the years, it’s only recently that his name has started to ring out beyond jazz circles, with his transfixing solo albums like Suite for Max Brown and Forfolks getting rave reviews.

Part of the reason for this belated recognition comes from his long-running residency at ETA, a slim cocktail bar in Los Angeles’s Highland Park neighborhood that was known for its $1 oyster happy hour deal. Beginning in 2016, Parker would play there on Monday nights with a band that became known as the ETA IVtet— drummer Jay Bellerose, bassist Anna Butterss, and saxophonist Josh Johnson. They were packing the room every week by the time the space closed in 2023. The Way Out of Easy, Parker and the IVtet's second collection of improvisations recorded live at those performances, was released last week on vinyl and CD, and comes to streaming services on December 12th.

Among those now evangelizing about Parker’s music is Flea — incomparable Red Hot Chili Peppers bassist, ride-or-die Lakers fan, and inspirational LA advocate. Parker and Flea have met casually before (their kids go to the same school), but GQ decided to get the two of them together on a Zoom call for a deeper talk. For over an hour, the two discussed having or not having a mentor, knowing and not knowing the language of jazz, what it takes to truly get free, and basketball—obviously. The following is a condensed version of their conversation.

GQ: Flea, how long have you been familiar with Jeff's music?

Flea: Longer than I thought. I had a Tortoise record that someone gave me in the ’90s, but it was a burned CD with “Tortoise TNT” written on it in pen. I didn't know who was in the band or anything about it, and I loved that album. And then I heard [Parker’s] Suite for Max Brown, and I love that record too. Sometimes things go straight to your heart and you really feel them, and that did that for me. I listen to music all the time. It makes me happy. The two songs from [The Way Out of Easy] that are out, I had already heard “Late Autumn,” and then this new one, what's it called?

Jeff Parker: “Freakadelic.”

Flea: It’s fucking funky as fuck, dude. You guys have such a thing. I feel like such a dummy for not knowing that you've been playing together for so long. What's your relationship like with Josh and Anna and Jay?

Jeff Parker: I was playing a gig in Chicago with this great alto saxophone player named Matana Roberts, and during the break, this kid with big dreadlocks came up to me and was like, “Hey, can I take a lesson with you?” We exchanged information and he came over to my house, and it was Josh. He was 16 years old. Man, he already sounded amazing, and I was like, “I don't have anything to teach you—let's just play something.” And my relationship with him started right there. He finished high school and then went to college. After college he moved to Chicago and we started to play some around town.

He moved out to LA to go to what was formerly called the Monk Institute, which is a jazz program that Herbie Hancock and Wayne Shorter and Ron Carter were running at UCLA. Josh was going to school there and that's when I met Anna, after I moved out to LA. We started to play a lot and just hang out. I got the residency at ETA — I wanted a place to play on Monday nights, so I asked them both to play. And Jay, I went to college with him at Berklee. I've known Jay since we were both 18, and I'm 57 now. So yeah, it's a long journey. I look at Josh and Anna as peers, but they're a lot younger than me. I guess if you talk to them, they'll kind of call me a mentor, where I just look at them as great musicians that I collaborate with.

Flea: What's the name of your record that’s just solo guitar?

Jeff Parker: It’s called Forfolks.

Flea: Sorry, man. I'm so bad with names.

Jeff Parker: That's okay.

Flea: I love that record. It's so hypnotic. And I wonder—it seems like such a sacred space for you to invite people into it that might do any old thing. Anna and Josh have a voice and you can hear that clearly. They're contributing something much different than what you contribute. So I guess my question is, has it been hard to find other people to bring into your thing?

Jeff Parker: Yeah, definitely. I mean, it's gotten easier. I always tell people that I look at the things that I've done as creating a body of work. They're different from one another, but there's a line that I can draw through all of them. Like I said, I partially mentor Josh and Anna, and they came up listening to my music. They know the recordings and they understand where I'm coming from. I have a different take on jazz that's informed by my experiences being in a band like Tortoise, but also playing straight-ahead jazz and being a working musician, but still kind looking at what I'm doing as art and trying to filter all my interests and experiences into a way to present my own work.

The last probably 10, 15 years, once sampling technology moved from hardware to software, and I could sample shit and make beats on my computer, I got more into dealing with drones and loops and bringing that aesthetic into the way that I view improvising. I never had to talk with Josh and Anna and Jay about anything. We never talk about music. After a few years of us playing standards and bebop, the music started to open up into where we were improvising in this way of trying to exploit these static spaces, like drones and loops and music that has more of a barren or flat landscape.

Flea: Like a minimalist darkness to it. One of the things that really strikes me is everything of yours that I hear — whether there's loops and beats or you're by yourself or you're with them — there's this feeling of restraint. People always want to show off, but no one shows off. It's always this feeling, like, “I'm only going to play what comes through.” You think about people speaking, and if someone only says what really needs to be said from within them, they don't say a lot. The restraint really gets me.

Jeff Parker: I think about that a lot. That's even why I called the record The Way Out of Easy. Within the context of free improvisation or free jazz, sometimes freedom seems like it can be exploited where cats feel like everything has to be really dense. Sometimes freedom can mean just not doing anything, or it can be very restrained. The band, when we improvise together, we really are trying to think compositionally and really developing things and letting stuff go slow, and being very intentional and deliberate about what we're doing.

Flea: You want to build bridges to people's hearts.

Jeff Parker: Yeah, totally. Absolutely, man.

Flea: Playing free, if you don't have structure or restraint or even knowledge of where you're at in the context of all the sound that's happening, you're just being whimsical or random. That's all cool, but John Frusciante and me, we were listening to Albert Ayler or something on the bus, it was really getting to us, and he talking about how all these guys playing knew all the bebop stuff and all the theory and all the harmony so well that if they didn't know all that stuff, it wouldn't feel as great because they wouldn't be breaking away from anything.

Jeff Parker: I was an improvising musician in Chicago for years. Before I joined Tortoise, I was a working musician, playing weddings, playing jazz tunes at cafes around town. Eventually I moved into a more art space where I was pretty much just improvising, playing free improvised gigs. People would come through town and we'd set a show up and we'd play together and see what would happen for a couple hours. Not compositions, not standard repertoire, just free improvising. Sometimes it was good, sometimes it was terrible, sometimes it was hard., sometimes it was very easy. And in some circles, if you were improvising and the drummer decided he wanted to play some back rhythm, cats would look at him, like what are you doing? It was like you weren't allowed to do certain things. It wasn't actually free. If things went into a more familiar realm, cats would, like, vibe you.

Flea: They're acting like you're a square…

Jeff Parker: Right.

Flea: Yeah, I know the feeling. Most of the musicians that I played with when I started playing bass were not educated like you guys are. With the Fishbone guys and my friends, we'd have jams every Monday or Tuesday at these clubs, and it was always really fun, but even in this different context, it was the same shit. Someone would play something that, for some reason, wasn't hip, and they're not invited back up or they get snubbed to the side.

Was there a time in your life where you felt like you found your identity as a player?

Jeff Parker: Yeah, for sure. Well, two situations. One, when I started to really compose, write my own music, and think about the context that I wanted to hear my sound in. Once those ideas started to become original to me, then my playing started to become more original.

I also had mentors. One of my biggest ones was a tenor saxophonist named Fred Anderson, who's one of the founders of the AACM, the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians, which is a musicians collective in Chicago that came out of the Black Liberation Movement of the ’60s, founded in 1965. I played with him a lot and he died probably 15 years ago or so. I was really flattered that he even asked me to join his group. Fred was a really powerful improviser — energetic but also pretty introspective. You could tell there was a lot of intention behind everything that he played. When I would play, he could hear me thinking and struggling and second-guessing myself. One day he was like, “Jeff, you just got to trust your instincts.” And from then on, it took a weight off of me and I was able to really just be myself.

Flea: Music is wild like that. I had the good fortune to play with Ornette [Coleman]. I did four or five concerts with him.

Jeff Parker: Wow. Oh, man.

Flea: He invited me. It was so cool, and I was terrified. Like I say, I just love music and I love to play bass, but I'm terrified of jazz. It's what I grew up with. When I was a kid, I wanted to be a jazz trumpet player, but I’d look at all the chords in a Charlie Parker song like, “Oh, those fucking chords, they change every two beats. And what do the lines through it mean? How do you know what to do?” And I was so scared. And so his son, Denardo, sent me all this music, like we're going to play these tunes. And I practiced, but I knew that they all understood this complex language that I'm baffled and bewildered and terrified by. And I showed up to do the first show and Ornette wasn't there yet. I was jamming with the drummer, and I think he had another bass player, and [Coleman] walked up and he goes, “You sound great. Just play whatever you feel.” Right in that second, I was like, “Ahhhhh…” Once I got inside it and was listening and playing and I found my way, it felt fun and free. I felt like I had something to offer.

I don’t know if envy is the right word, but I never had a music teacher. When I was a kid, I had a trumpet teacher for a little while. We played scales out of the Arban’s book. Then I just got in a rock band in 11th grade and it took over my life for the next 50 years.

Jeff Parker: So you're completely self-taught on bass?

Flea: I had one lesson when I first started, I didn't like it. It was just jamming with my friends, and there was stuff that I liked and I would kind of interpret it my own way.

Because I always read interviews with musicians, and they always had somebody. You had Fred Anderson, and Josh and Anna had you, and it's great. I've been studying now for the first time ever. I've been studying trumpet with Ricky Washington, Kamasi's dad.

Jeff Parker: That's a tough ax, man. You've got to play every day. You can't take any days off.

Flea: You tell my wife.

Jeff Parker: I'm always very, very impressed with all the brass players. I played trombone through junior high and high school. I actually went to Berkele partially on a trombone scholarship, mostly because they needed trombone players. But as soon as I finished high school, I never played. I think I played it once when I was in Boston. I just wanted to play guitar.

Flea: Who were the guitar players that you loved coming up?

Jeff Parker: My favorite guy was Gábor Szabó, the Hungarian guitarist. I liked Santana. I think Santana and Gabor were pretty close in terms of approach. I liked Hendrix, Grant Green, Eddie Van Halen.

Flea: I love Eddie Van Halen.

Jeff Parker: Yeah, man, he's incredible.

Flea: What about [Allan] Holdsworth?

Jeff Parker: Yeah, for sure. I was always more impressed by him. It's a different approach for me. I'm kind of contradicting myself by saying I like Eddie Van Halen, but as I got older, I was more attracted to cats who played slower, like Kenny Burrell, Grant Green, Jim Hall…

Flea: That Undercurrent record.

Jeff Parker: Oh, man. It's so beautiful.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EIly8muXwb8

I look at myself as an unconventional guitar player in that I was always more interested in trying to make the guitar sound like something else. When I was in college and studying jazz, I wanted to play like Sonny Rollins. I wanted to sound like Charlie Parker, Trane, Bud Powell.

The first time I heard Tortoise, it was in the early days where the band was two bass guitar players and two drummers, and then [Dan] Bitney floating around and playing percussion and vibes and stuff. They had a really unique sound. So when they asked me to start playing with them, my thing was to not guitar it up. I started playing more ambiance stuff and really trying to sound not like a guitar player at all. And so I spent a lot of time trying to make the guitar sound like different instruments.

Flea: It’s nice, man.

Jeff Parker: You said you're working on a trumpet album?

Flea: Yeah, I'm excited. I'm working really hard on it. Not only do I need to play with restraint, but I have lots of restraints just from lack of cerebral knowledge and physical ability. But I play every day. I'm working really hard trying to do something beautiful.

Jeff Parker: It will be for sure.

Flea: I hope so. And I would really love for you to play on some stuff if you have the time and inclination.

Jeff Parker: Absolutely. You don't have to ask twice. I'm there immediately.

Flea: I took bass lessons from Anna.

Jeff Parker: On double bass or bass guitar?

Flea: I was playing bass guitar, but she brought her double bass. I grew up loving bebop, and when I was at the age when I should have started studying, I started going playing bass in a rock band and smoking pot all day and wanting to be a rockstar. So I am trying to work on being able to walk through bop changes and for it to make sense to me. We only did [the lessons] twice, but it was great. And then I made a record for the Chili Peppers and went on tour. Story of my life.

Jeff Parker: I’ll never forget when you played the national anthem at the Lakers game on bass and you quoted Charlie Parker.

Flea: Only Charlie Parker riff I know. Are you a basketball fan?

Jeff Parker: Oh yeah.

Flea: Is it the Bulls?

Jeff Parker: You'll probably get mad at me, man. I like the Celtics.

Flea: What happened to you?

Jeff Parker: I'm generally not a fan of the Celtics, but I really like Jaylen Brown.

Flea: I love Jaylen Brown too. And you know what? I really love [Jayson] Tatum.

I loved Magic Johnson and the rivalry with Larry Bird. And basketball is one of the places in life where it's okay to have hate. You can act like a 2-year-old, which is how I do it. I always hated the Celtics, but if I act like an adult for a second, it's really hard to hate those guys. Jaylen Brown's super smart and cool. And Tatum, he wore a Kobe armband. It was such a sweet thing for a Celtic to do. So it's hard to hate.

Jeff Parker: At the end of the day, I just like the sport. I like the NBA. I like every team because every team has players that I like. But I really liked Jaylen Brown because of the way he carries himself. He is very eloquent. And then I started to want him and them to win.

Flea: Growing up, I played basketball every day. It's all I did. What you’re talking about with Jaylen Brown, that's what Kareem Abdul-Jabbar did for me when I was a kid. He liked jazz, and I was a little 13-year-old and wanted to be Dizzy Gillespie when I grew up. Then I started hearing him speak, and he was so eloquent and he didn't suffer fools. Even as a kid, I was like, “No one tells this guy what to do. No one tells him what to say. He's going to be himself.” I just instinctively loved him. Then he came to LA in ’75 and that made me fall in love with the Lakers.

I've always thought of music and basketball as one and the same in terms of all the relationships between the players, communicating without using words, looking at someone, feeling someone, knowing where they're going to be, knowing when it's time to support somebody, when it's time to take the lead. In improvisational music, in particular the record that you put out today, there's so much of that. You guys are feeling each other so acutely.

Jeff Parker: I've always felt like music is a collective movement. It feels weird to even put my name out front. It's all of us making the thing, moving together.

Did you always think that you would have a life in music?

Flea: I didn't really know. I was a wild street kid. From a young age, I was really unwatched and kind of running feral. But it was definitely always a sanctuary for me. I never really had plans for the future or anything. I never thought that far ahead.

When I started playing the trumpet, I would fantasize about being in an orchestra or being in a band. I really loved Dizzy when I was a little boy. My mom took me to see him play, and I couldn't even believe it. I could cry now just thinking about it. Before he went on, I went to go to the bathroom. I was 11 and I didn't know to go to the back. I went to the front and went backstage, not thinking. I opened the theater door and went in, and there he was standing there with his horn, in his suit, by the wings getting ready to go on. I ran up to him and I couldn't even talk. I was in awe. And he put his arm around me and hugged me really tight and held me in close and was talking to somebody and held me there for five minutes. And then he went on and started playing “A Night In Tunisia” and I couldn't even believe it. So I wanted to do that, but I was very undisciplined. And then I got into a rock band with my friends and girls started talking to me. But it's always been something that made me feel like the world is sane.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8hq1jdqAPac

Jeff Parker: Yeah, there's always sanctuary in it for me too. I knew from a very early age that I wanted to play music.

Flea: Did you have any idea of what it would be to make a living doing it?

Jeff Parker: No, I didn't. I mean, in many ways I feel like I still don't. Just to see the landscape change so much — see things move from analog to digital, see hardware move to software, and as an artist have to adapt to those changes.

Flea: You mentioned creating a body of work and this line goes on and it grows, and [The Way Out of Easy] is really a cool thing to have in your body of work. It'll touch people for a long time. There's nothing else like it.

Jeff Parker: Thank you.

Flea: I hear new jazz records and sometimes it feels academic to me. Even when it feels academic, I'm still respectful of it—I mean, I can't play it, I wish I could. But when I hear something that I can feel, it's like that thing we were talking about building bridges. It's this freedom and trust.

Jeff Parker: I don't like hearing academic-sounding music, so I definitely don't want to make it.

Flea: Well, you don't have to worry about it. Your record makes me feel really emotional. It makes me feel like I'm not alone. It is like this comfort, and that's what I want. That's what I want in music more than anything. I'm sure you've heard the quote from the [Thelonious] Monk interview where the guy says, “What music do you like?” And he says, “I like all music.” And then the guy says to him, “Even country music?” And Monk says, “What part of what I just said did you not understand?” And I feel the same way. I have my kids and they listen to the wackest fucking music I ever heard in my life, but I still like it. It's like, look how happy they are.

Jeff Parker: I try and communicate with people. Of course I get fulfillment out of it, but I want people to feel something. I want them to come into the world. We got to live here together. Like you said, build bridges. You're putting positive energy out. This stuff, it’s bigger than us, especially if you look at the world now and shit seems really dark sometimes. You got to shine some light.

Flea: That's the thing. It's chaotic, it’s violence and hatred and misunderstanding. Energy spent on making something beautiful and putting it out in the world is a noble gesture. These are the things that we actually have to hold onto. When I heard your record today, you feel sadness and pain and loneliness being articulated, as well as joy and hope and yearning. Being able to articulate those feelings, it's like Jaylen Brown being able to articulate his feelings into a sweet jump shot. It's all part of it. It’s humanity, man.

Jeff Parker: Humanity. That's it.