John Anthony Frusciante (/fruːˈʃɑːnteɪ/ ⓘ froo-SHAHN-tay; born March 5, 1970) is an American musician and the guitarist of the Red Hot Chili Peppers, having been with the band across three stints.

In 1998, he completed drug rehabilitation and rejoined the Chili Peppers, taking them to major success with their albums Californication (1999), By the Way (2002) and Stadium Arcadium (2006).

The producer, Michael Beinhorn, disagreed with this approach and wanted Frusciante to play with an uncharacteristic heavy metal tone, largely absent from the band's three preceding records.

"[26] Frusciante had developed serious drug habits while touring with the Chili Peppers; he said that when he "found out that Flea was stoned out of his mind at every show, that inspired me to be a pothead".

[29] Frusciante focused on painting, producing 4-track recordings he had made while working on Blood Sugar Sex Magik and writing short stories and screenplays.

"[31] In 1993, Frusciante briefly performed with the band P, alongside Depp, the Butthole Surfers frontman Gibby Haynes, the actor Sal Jenco, and the songwriter Bill Carter.

Warner Bros., the Red Hot Chili Peppers' label, owned rights to the album because of the leaving-artist clause in Frusciante's band contract.

[38] A 1996 article in the New Times LA described Frusciante as "a skeleton covered in thin skin" at the nadir of his addictions and nearly died from a blood infection.

[45] The album strayed from the alternative rock he had just written with the Red Hot Chili Peppers on Californication, focusing more on electronic and new wave elements.

[46] In 2001, Frusciante began recording his fourth album with Red Hot Chili Peppers, By the Way (2002); he considered the time to be among the happiest in his life.

[19] The album marked Frusciante's shift to a more group-minded mentality within the Red Hot Chili Peppers, viewing the band as a cohesive unit rather than as four separate entities.

In February 2004, he started a side project with Joe Lally of Fugazi and future Chili Peppers guitarist Josh Klinghoffer, called Ataxia.

[51] In June 2004, he announced that he would be releasing six records over six months:[52] The Will to Death, Ataxia's Automatic Writing, DC EP, Inside of Emptiness, A Sphere in the Heart of Silence and Curtains.

[56] In the arrangements, he incorporates a wide array of sounds and playing styles, similar to the funk-influenced Blood Sugar Sex Magik or the more melodic By the Way.

[59] Frusciante began a series of collaborations with friend Omar Rodríguez-López and his band the Mars Volta, by contributing guitar and electronic instrumentation to song "Cicatriz ESP" off their album De-Loused in the Comatorium.

Following the Stadium Arcadium tour (early May 2006 to late August 2007), the Red Hot Chili Peppers agreed to a hiatus of indefinite length.

[65] Frusciante quit the group on July 29, 2009,[66] but did not publicly announce his departure until December 2009, two months after the band ended their hiatus in October 2009 and began work on their next album with Josh Klinghoffer as their new guitarist.

Frusciante stated: "I'm really happy with [the record] and I've listened to it a lot for the psychedelic experience it provides," suggesting the album is "to be played as loud as possible and is suited to dark living rooms late at night.

[87] Unlimited Love, the Red Hot Chili Peppers' twelfth studio album and their first with Frusciante in sixteen years, was released on April 1, 2022.

[98][99] Frusciante attributes this recognition to his shift in focus, stating that he chose an approach based on rhythmic patterns inspired by the complexity of material Jimi Hendrix and Eddie Van Halen produced.

... People like Robert Fripp, Mick Ronson, Tony Iommi, and particularly John McGeoch from Siouxsie and the Banshees, who played a Yamaha SG, which is why I bought one in the first place".

[108] With the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Frusciante provided backing vocals in a falsetto tenor, a style he started on Blood Sugar Sex Magik.

[108] PBX Funicular Intaglio Zone was recorded while Frusciante looked to find new ways to play the guitar with the new forms of music and production that he had been studying.

In his now-deleted blog post, "My Recent History," he notes that "aspects of PBX are the realization of combinations of styles of music I saw in my head many years ago, as potentials, but which I had no idea how to execute.

[108] He currently uses the music tracker Renoise as his main digital audio workstation along with some drum machines, sequencers, and other hardware, along with his Doepfer, Arp, and other modular synthesizers.

Although Hendrix and Slovak were arguably Frusciante's most profound influences, he was also inspired by glam rock artists David Bowie, and T. Rex; as well as avant-garde acts such as Syd Barrett, Captain Beefheart, the Residents, the Velvet Underground, Neu!, Frank Zappa, and Kraftwerk.

[123]During the recording of Blood Sugar Sex Magik, Captain Beefheart and the acoustic, one-man blues of Lead Belly and Robert Johnson, were among the most noteworthy influences.

[126] On Californication and By the Way, Frusciante derived the technique of creating tonal texture through chord patterns from post-punk guitarists Vini Reilly of the Durutti Column and John McGeoch, and bands such as the Smiths, Fugazi and the Cure.

[127] During the recording of Stadium Arcadium, he moved away from his new wave influences and concentrated on emulating flashier guitar players such as Jimi Hendrix and Eddie Van Halen.

He has used his guitar to emulate the synthesizer melodies of Depeche Mode, the Human League and Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark, drawing inspiration from how those acts "were playing in a very minimal way, where every note means something new".