Fight Like a Brave
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| “Fight Like a Brave” | |||||
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| Single by Red Hot Chili Peppers from the album The Uplift Mofo Party Plan |
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| Released | September 23, 1987 | ||||
| Recorded | 1987 | ||||
| Genre | Funk-rock, Funk metal, Funkcore, Rapcore | ||||
| Length | 3:53 | ||||
| Label | EMI/Capitol Records | ||||
| Writer(s) | Flea/Irons/Kiedis/Slovak | ||||
| Producer | Michael Beinhorn | ||||
| Red Hot Chili Peppers singles chronology | |||||
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"Fight Like a Brave" is a song by the Red Hot Chili Peppers from their 1987 album The Uplift Mofo Party Plan. It is the first song on the album and was released as a single.
The song “Fight Like a Brave” was written by Anthony Kiedis for their 1987 album The Uplift Mofo Party Plan. It was written about Kiedis’ addiction to drugs. Kiedis' drug addiction was interfering so badly with his involvement in the Chili Peppers that he was thrown out of the band because of it. With help from his mother back in Michigan, he attended support groups which really spoke to him and convinced him to stay sober for almost six years. At first he did not take them seriously, but began to recover when he saw that they were filled with people like him who were simply trying to help each other.
When he called Flea to tell him of his success, Flea invited Kiedis back in the band. On the plane ride home, Kiedis wrote this song about his struggles with drugs and his overcoming them (Kiedis 199-201). “Here's a one of a kind convention of the mind/And don't forget to mention that it doesn't cost a dime/Come as you like and leave any time...”
This is Kiedis expressing how easy it is to attend these meetings and how free and simple it is. "You say you're running and you're running and you're running afraid/You say you ran across the planet but you couldn't get away/The fire in your brain was driving you insane/You were looking for a day in a life that never came/So don't tell me that/I've got to take a number/Cause I’ve been to that doctor/And believe me that's a bummer”. This draws on how Kiedis felt about his drug addictions and how common a problem it really is. He is saying here that there is a long line of people with drug addictions, all of whom share the same experiences and same emotions during their use. He is saying how there is no excuse and only one way to end the horrible trip of drug abuse, and the solution is sobriety. Kiedis honestly felt this way at the time of writing this song. Although the pressure from one of his girlfriends and his music career would eventually cause him to plunge back into the abyss of drug abuse, the feeling of everlasting sobriety was dominant in his life for a long time. “You want to stop dying the life you could be livin'/I'm here to tell a story, but I'm also here to listen/No I'm not your preacher/And I'm not your physician/I'm just trying to reach you…”. In these lines, Kiedis expresses his opinions about how drug abusers are killing off their lives and their potential by using. He also sets up the stage for how the support group meetings are. For Kiedis, he found a room full of people willing to listen and help, even though they had no connection to his life other than that group. It also expresses how helpful others who overcame their drug addictions were for him. They told him their story, listened to his, and tried to reach him to show him what he was doing wrong. Kiedis found this incredibly motivational and is trying to inspire that same motivation in others.
(Kiedis, Anthony. Scar Tissue. 1. New York: Hyperion, 2004.)
"Fight Like a Brave" is featured in the video game Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3.
Russian punk rock group Sektor Gaza covered Fight Like a Brave in their 1994 punk-opera Koschei the Immortal (Russian: Кащей бессмертный) which mainly consists of cover songs. Fight Like a Brave is the first track on the album and does not use the original lyrics instead it is titled "Introduction" and acts as a preamble to the story.
[edit] Fight Like a Brave single
7" single (1987)
- "Fight Like a Brave (Album)"
- "Fire (Previously Unreleased)"
12" single (1987)
- "Fight Like a Brave (Not Our Mix)"
- "Fight Like a Brave (Boner Beats Mix)"
- "Fight Like a Brave (Mofo Mix)"
- "Fire (Previously Unreleased)"
12" version 2 (1987)
- "Fight Like a Brave (Mofo Mix)"
- "Fight Like a Brave (Knucklehead Mix)"
- "Fire (Previously Unreleased)"
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