The concept of the other and its semiotic code in RHCP lyrics

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The concept of the other and its semiotic code in RHCP lyrics

Tombulatova I.I., Odesa I.I. Mechnikov National University

Introduction

In the age of an ongoing fast transformation of an everyday lifestyle, social media and further development of communication all over the world it must be quite useful to get to study some of the main socio-cultural concepts and their reflection in mass-culture phenomena, among which the concept of the Other is one of the most actual nowadays and it is studied by a number of sciences to improve communication and understanding the role of the communication by people and their perception of themselves and others in the process of communication.

Actually, usually the scientists analyze the texts of classic / popular literary works, the critics of different epochs, the interviews of influencers and authors, but it may be rather beneficial to get to the texts which have already had their impact on several generations by means of popular songs' lyrics, for instance. Such texts are often considered to be "simple", by the way, still, this short research is focused on an attempt to dwell on the concept of the Other in the lyrics of RHCP, as this band is beloved by the public from the 1980s (the first album - "The Red Hot Chili Peppers", August 10, 1984) and recently they have released a new album ("Unlimited Love", April 1, 2022), that is a great news for all of the fans worldwide. Moreover, on March 31, 2022 the band got their Star in the Hollywood Walk of Fame in the Category of Recording. On August 29, 2022 the band got two awards at the MTV VMA ceremony for the Best Rock Video ("Black Summer") and Global Icon Award. Next album of the band is to be released in October 2022. Due to these facts it is, obviously, clear that for almost forty years some concepts, ideas and senses were revealed to lots of people and were absorbed by the audience of the band so they are quite influential for their public and beloved by the audience in creating not only music but the ideas and senses to reflect a contemporary society.

Presenting main material. The concept of the Other can be analyzed by means of rather a varied methodology of social studies, philosophy, cultural studies, literary studies, semiotics, imagology, monomyth poetics and so on. This brief research is based on some common approaches, connected with the analyzing the concept of the Other in culture, but - mostly - literary studies, semiotics and monomyth poetics as the article deals with the lyrics (texts) of some RHCP songs of different years (chiefly: "Around the World", "Californication", "Otherside", "Dark Necessities", "Snow", "Parallel Universe" etc.). In fact, the methodology is quite extend as the "concept" is a broader term, than "image", for example, still different representations of the image / concept of the Other are focused on either imagological context, as well as on some semiotic peculiarities of the texts and / or the main archetypes used by the author/s of the lyrics and their role in these verses.

Concepts are considered to be somewhat as the building blocks of thoughts. Generally, they are crucial and really important to such psychological processes as categorization, memory, studying and decision-making. It is, in fact, uncontroversial in spite of the fact that concepts were the subject of much debate for some time and still there are various approaches on concept-theory in science. As L. W. Barsalou states in his research on concepts: "It certainly appears that there should be a relationship between concepts and meaning, but it is not entirely clear what this relation is. We shall assume that concepts are people's psychological representations of categories whereas meanings are people's understandings of words and other linguistic expressions" [1, p. 1], which both are to be presented in this article. Dwelling on the concepts as the world model metaphor (individuals and models) he writes that: "Analogous to frames for individuals, the frame for a model is a data structure that integrates perceptual symbols across multiple individuals, capturing constancies and organizing variability. Also like frames for individuals, frames for models contain both generic and episodic information, which generic information compromising repeated perceptual symbols across individuals, and with episodic information being their most recent specializations from last-processed individuals" [1, p. 12]. That is why it is evident that the researcher of the concept needs to get to analyzing the semiotic code of the subject which is lyrics in the case of this article.

The concept of the Other in RHCP lyrics is generally represented as an imagological issue as there are lots of the texts which depict the image of travel, different countries, the whole diversity of the world in its unity of differences, the typical features of the citizens of represented countries or cities and the setting of the road (for instance, "Road tripping" [2]). Also there are some cases of the image of exotics (frequently represented by such artistic details as tangelo in the song "Tangelo"[3]) or imagemirage ("Californication"[4]).

In fact, another case is the situation in which the concept of the Other in RHCP lyrics is connected with the dark self of the person, chiefly represented as the features of a Shadow archetype ("Dark necessities"[5], "Snow"[6]), the archetype of Trickster ("Sir Psycho Sexy"[7], "Nobody weird like me"[8]), and the texts that reveal the whole Hero's Journey cycle ("Otherside"[9], "Scar Tissue"[10], etc.) and are the reflections and models of a person's life path.

Actually, any trip is a kind of experience and shapes personality somehow.

It must be stated that while constructing the reality of the trip usually it is not just about something connected with an ordinary travel or the setting of the road, in majority of cases it is mostly about a metaphysical trip and the process of changing and gaining experience by a lyric hero. That takes the recipient from the imagological methodology to the study of archetypes or even the monomyth poetics and its pivotal Hero's Journey.

Still, briefly something must be stated about the ordinary (connected with changing the countries and cities) trips in RHCP artworks. Mainly, there is no any "simple" text about some "ordinary" journey. Usually the recipient gets into the web of references or metanarratives.

""Around the World"[11] lyrics show the audience more traditional version of geographical Travel, here we got into several exact locations: state of Pennsylvania, California, Alabama, Bombay, Wisconsin, Sicily, Swiss Mountains, Russia. Still, this text is not just about a geographical trip as any point of this travel is related to the experience gained by the personality. By the way, it must be underlined that such associations can create imagological stereotypes afterwards. Also, the fact is that "Life is Beautiful" (Roberto Benigni, 1997) was the inspiration to create lyrics, so we can trace and analyze the point of intertextuality in this case, either" [12, p. 162]. Intertextual codes can be found in a number of lyrics of the band, as for example the reference to R. Bach's "Jonathan Livingston Seagull" ("with the birds I'll share this lonely viewin'"[10]). These alternative codes of the Other-self are to be emphasized later in this research.

"Hit-single of the same studio album is - obviously - "Californication"[4]. This text continues developing the imagemirage of "California-dreaming", which is quite popular in the world, and especially in music and cinema industries. This text is full of references and can be one of outstanding examples of the intertextuality nowadays. For instance, "Psychic spies from China try to steal your mind's elation" - The Manchurian Candidate, (Movie, 1962); "Celebrity skin is this your chin or is that war your waging" - Celebrity Skin (Album, 1998); "A teenage bride with a baby inside getting high on information" - Educating Rita (Movie, 1980); "Space may be the final frontier but it's made in a

Hollywood basement" - Star Trek (Series, 1966); "Cobain can you hear the spheres singing songs off station to station" - reference to Kurt Cobain and "Station to Station" (Album, D. Bowie, 1976): "And Alderaan's not far away" - Star Wars (Movie, 1977); "And earthquakes are to a girl's guitar they're just another good vibration" - Earthquake (Movie, 1974) (full list of the references can be seen here - [13]). These are some of the references- interpretations those could be found in the text by fans and researchers. Of course, the lyrics can be called the "intersection" of intertextual references or even the "crossroad" of this Travel across an exotic image-mirage of California. [12, p. 162]. Furthermore it must be stated that this imagological - in its basis - trip becomes a cultural one because of all this range of references and creates its own image of the popular / mass culture of the second part of the 20^th century, appealing to the artworks which can be recognized all over the world and were the signs / symbols of the cultural landscape at that period of time.

Being-on-the-road also can be decoded as to "live life" when the way is the symbol of a life-path. Sure, life itself always correlates with a death concept and the process of passing (passing as going through life and passing as dying, as well). Of course, all of these shades of the palette are represented in analyzed lyrics.

""Road Trippin'" - even the poetics of the title contributes to the image of the Travel in the lyrics. This text is existentially based on the meaning of friendship. Geographically it depicts the Travel across the USA ("Let's go get lost anywhere in the USA"[2]). Actually, the most important part of this trip is having friends around ("Road trippin' with my two favorite allies"[2]), eventually - this trip becomes the metaphor of the life itself, spent with beloved friends ("So much as come before those battles lost and won / This life is shining more forever in the sun / now let us check our heads and let us check the surf / Staying high and dry's more trouble it's worth in the sun.. ."[2]). The location of this travel isn't so important as a lifelong way of the friendship which makes the road trippin' truly valuable. [12, p. 163]. Moreover, this type of perception of the road / way as a life-path is quite universal and generally doesn't need to be intentionally interpreted due to some national or social code. The process of decoding symbols like that is rather clear and easy to understand in any part of the planet.

To sum up this brief material it must be emphasized that in the texts which were analyzed above the images of the Other has their own semiotic code which has an imagological background and are associated with the process of travelling and seeing new places and new people who have their traditions and unique lifestyles. This diversity on the one hand and some universal symbols (life as the way / road, for instance) on the other hand, make this concept of the Other complicated (as it is varied) and simple (as it is often based on universal symbols) concurrently.

Also in the lyrics of different songs the image of the Other can be represented in different archetypes. As it is known while talking about the stages of individuation process Carl Gustav Jung determined the parts / stages of it and called them Anima / Animus, Shadow and the Self. All of them shape the personality as the whole self (often represented as Wise Old Man / Woman depicting the image of wholeness). In monomyth poetics there are several archetypes which the hero of the art-text can go through or meet during his "journey". The most common are: Hero, Mentor, Threshold Guardian, Herald, Shapeshifter, Shadow, Ally, Trickster.

The Other here - in analyzed lyrics - is mainly represented by the archetypes of Shadow or Trickster.

In the first case (Shadow - "Dark necessities"^], "Snow"[6]) it represents the dark side of the Protagonist (the Hero). Joseph Campbell underlines that "Jung's concept is that the aim of one life, psychologically speaking, should be not to suppress or repress, but to come to know one's other side, and so both to enjoy and to control the whole range of one's capacities; i. e. in the full sense, to "know oneself' [14]. As Christopher Vogler states: "The archetype known as the Shadow represents the energy of the dark side, the unexpressed, unrealized, or rejected aspects of something. Often it's the home of suppressed monsters of our inner world. Shadows can be all the things we don't like about ourselves, all the dark secrets we can't admit even to ourselves. The qualities we have renounced and tried to root out still lurk within, operating in the Shadow world of unconscious. The Shadow can also shelter positive qualities that are in hiding or that we have rejected for some reason" [15, p. 65]. - "When it's killing me / What do I really need / All that I need to look inside" [6]. Here the whole self is taken for granted, so it can be understood that the author/s don't reject a dark side of personality and even "communicate" with it to know oneself better, as the whole individual.

Another example of such an archetype is, for sure, the text of "Dark Necessities". A popular site "SongsMeanings+Facts" emphasizes that "according to the Red Hot Chili Peppers' leader Anthony Kiedis, "Dark Necessities" is embedded with a special meaning. The title alludes to the negative aspects of an individual personality, i.e. his or her dark side" [16] - "Dark necessities are part of my design"[5]. Scott Jeffrey states that "we can't eliminate the shadow. It stays with us as our dark brother or sister. Trouble arises when we fail to see our shadow. For then, to be sure, it is standing right behind us" [17, p. 3].

An outstanding verses to dive into the Self and the Other is the text "Otherside"[9]. Dwelling on the lyrics of "Otherside" it is important to start with the poetics of the title. As it can be seen the fusion of two words creates an exact location (place) which must be different from the place which is taken as a real world or traditionally so-called reality. Due to the public sources "Otherside" was created by the members of the band in honour to their friend who died because of the drug-overdose, therefore, the word "otherside" is connected with the concept of the destination or place, which is associated with a drug trip or the afterlife world, with the images of passing, death and more generally - transformation of so-called reality anyway.

"As for the "Otherside", this text might seem to be one of the most complicated as it tells about different concepts of Travel simultaneously. It focuses on Life and Death issues and crystallizes the image of Passing. Furthermore, the lyrics are connected with the state of transformation of the personality during experiencing drug-trips and even overdosing. "The problem of drug addiction mentioned in the lyrics refers mainly to the band in general, from the fallout of Anthony to the black period of Frusciante, passing through Slovak's overdose. The interpretations given to this song are multiple and apply to every aspect, from the title to the video. "Otherside" is written in one only word, depicting good and evil as one thing, two sides of the same coin, two inseparable bodies" [18] - writes Manuel Vieni about one of the most dramatic and profound texts of RHCP. [12, p. 162]. Actually, this proves that this text is about the unity of the good Self and the Other as an evil self in one person, so here the concept of the Other deals with the fact that the Other is the part of everybody, just according to the system of archetypes the Other as the Shadow can appear to dominate any time and shape the personality with a new type of experience.

The semiotic code which can prove that the image of passing or death is widely represented in certain lyrics is that there are a number of symbols associated with the end of life and passing, afterlife and afterdeath concept, even, suicidal motifs that are reflected in the lyrics of the song ("slit my throat", "push the trigger", "pull the thread", "pour my life into a paper cup", "the ashtray's full and I'm spinning my guts"[9]). Still, the death is considered to be not the end but a kind of transformation because of treating it as another beginning "I tear it down and then it's born again", "cemetery where I marry a sea"[9]. Moreover, this drugtrips or trips as passing to the world of the dead are not treated as something dangerous or troublesome "separate my side, I don't believe it's bad"[9].

In fact, in the lyrics we see lots of semiotic mixes of alive and dead, for instance the metaphor: "I heard your voice through the photograph"[9] (the photograph as a symbol and reflection of something / somebody real but artificial which still has the voice as an alive creature). Either in the metaphor "pour my life into a paper cup"[9] (thus life which is limited by an artificial borders of a paper cup which is a sign of the future trash / process of decaying and something of a low price and a poor quality). Furthermore, the separation is the main structure principle of the lyrics. The basic ones are the binary oppositions "here-there" / "reality-otherside" / "Eros-Thanatos" (as opposite energies: energy striving to life / sex and energy striving to death / destruction. Also, the timeline is separated: "I thought it up and brought the past / once you know you can never go back / I gotta take it on the otherside"[9]. As it can be seen the past is understood as something from the "otherside", due to the fact that it has already passed and in "here- reality" it is over.

Even in the Eros-hemisphere the mix of low-high genres can be traced as the correlation between love-for-sale and noble sentiment where the latter is in the process of separation from life, passing as dying: "scarlet starlet and she's in my bed / a candidate for a soul mate bled"[9]. Still, here "bled" is an ambivalent symbol as blood is associated with life and death at a time as it is the liquid of life but "bleeding" is the process of losing this life-energy.

The most powerful line in the meaning and form is the opening of the lyrics "how long, how long will I slide?"[9]. It is quite a catchy trick to start the lyrics with a rhetoric question, first of all. The verb "slide" here can be decoded as an active action but still the action that is similar to going down, that gets to the end of the life way, traditionally taken as going to the lower world / underworld which is mostly associated with such a location as Hell, not Heaven which is usually treated as the upper world somewhere in the skies. This point can be proved by the Cambridge Dictionary. The article "Slide" (as a verb) presents the readers two main meanings of the word: "to (cause to) more easily and without interruption over a surface / to go into a worse state, often through lack of control or care" [19]. Thus, in these texts the concept of the Other contains the image of the oppositions anyone has in oneself, mostly represented by the opposition "the Self - the Other", "Life - Death" and the trip is again extremely broader than can be just geographical one, as here the trip is associated with a dangerous drug-trip experience, overdosing and with the travel to the otherside that is about the process of passing.

The archetype of Trickster, in fact, is common for the RHCP lyrics too ("Sir Psycho Sexy"[7], "Nobody Weird Like Me"[8], etc.).

Going back to Vogler's studies it can be found that Tricksters "cut big egos down to size, and bring heroes and audiences down to earth. By provoking healthy laughter they help us realize our common bonds, and they point out folly and hypocrisy. Above all, they bring about healthy change and transformation, often by drawing attention to the imbalance or absurdity of a stagnant psychological situation. They are the natural enemies of the status quo. Trickster energy can express itself through impish accidents or slips of the tongue that alert us to the need for change. When we are taken ourselves too seriously, the Trickster part of our personality may pop up to bring back needed perspective" [15, p. 77]. Therefore, the Other as the Trickster as the mask of the personality can exist as an existential Other, which has to be different from the so-called crowd.

This can be noticed even in the title of the song "Nobody Weird Like Me"[8], where the opposition "Me-Crowd" can be read. Actually, it is quite natural as the majority of creative people need to be out of the crowd to take the position of an observer for some time to create afterwards due to these observations. Genius or just a talented person is always outstanding and for some people even weird. As for the Trickster-Other personality it can be revealed in the lines "living my life in and out / of the twilight zone"[8], that proves the marginality and liminality of the personality, and these are the characteristics of the Trickster archetype definitely. "Nobody weird like me / intercourse with a porpoise / is a dream for me / hell bent on inventing / a new species / bust my britches / bless my soul / I'm freak of nature" [8] - in such curious poetry the process of transformation is expressed, the way of becoming the Other, still, this exact Other can take you even closer to a true self while uncovering and discovering the nature of the personality, declaring it. In addition, again here the liminality can be noticed, the hanging between "hell" and " bless me" - the words which are the sings of one paradigm, but opposite to each other in sense, connotation, subtext. That also shows the natural contradiction of the personality.

Moreover, in this text the image of rabbit can be noticed ("Nobody weird like me / enchanted as a rabbit / that my is a dream"[8]), and as it is known rabbit is usually associated with the Trickster archetype, as well. "Trickster Heroes have bred like rabbits in the folktales and fairy tales of the world. Indeed, some of the most popular Tricksters are rabbit heroes: the Br'er Rabbit of the American South, the Hare of African tales, the many rabbit heroes from Southeast Asia, Persia, India, etc." [15, p. 78]. "The freakiest show I know / is the show of my own / living my life in and out / of the twilight zone"[8] adds to the concept of the Other the sense of "playing a game" or even " wearing the mask". This can be coded in the words "show" as something opposite to life, something artificial or directed. Also, again there is the word "twilight" - the period between light and darkness, which is the sign of the liminality of the whole image of the lyric hero.

Interestingly, the line "I'm freak of nature"[8] can be noticed in the text "Sir Psycho Sexy"[7], it characterizes the lyric hero of the verses, so it is different in person "he's a freak of nature"[7]. Still, this lyric hero is associated with an "I-position" (so is the mask and the Other personality): "lived a man, lived a man I know / lived a freak of nature named Sir Psycho / Sir Psycho Sexy, that is me"[7]. These are some general examples of the Trickster archetype in RHCP texts. It can be seen that Shadow and Trickster are rather frequent masks of the Other in band's lyrics, and they can be found and decoded in a number of tracks of RHCP during different periods of their creative story. other communication people

A unique semiosphere of the other representations of the world, the other embodiments of the reality can be seen in the text of the song "Parallel Universe". ""Parallel Universe" is the song which deals with a number of different spaces: parallel universe, underwater, the sky, solar system, microcosm, spider web, stars in your head, fields of space..." [12, p. 163]. Many of them can be taken as the representations of the universe of one person as a dream-world ("stars in your head") or as the variants of the afterlife world (traditional representation of such symbolic locations as "underwater", "sky",etc.). Moreover, this text gives the representation of the Other space as different structures of it: "parallel universe", "solar system", "microcosm", "spider web". All of these spaces are structured as the world and are associated with this system, in addition, they are the parts of a greater systems themselves. Thus, they are creating the images of the Others which can inhabit these spaces, those might be quite different from people, even if they are the representatives of varied nations, genders or social statuses.

Conclusions

The Concept of the Other in RHCP lyrics contains different images of the Other that can be interpreted by means of a varied range of methodology. It can be treated as just a simple concept connected with changing of geographical places but still if the reading is profound all the trips are becoming metaphysical.

Moreover they are enriched by cultural code and reflect the a socio-cultural background of the world of last 40 years (the 1980s - the 2020s) with the diversity of the ideas and values of the people coded into the texts of the band.

The Other can be also the mask of the personality that usually correlates with the archetypes of Shadow and Trickster. Communicating with a dark self of the personality and trying to understand it is one of the pivotal motifs in the concept of the Other in this case. In addition, definitely the most common oppositions are "Me-Crowd", "Evil-Good", "Life-Death", "Eros-Thanatos", "Here-There" and the transformation of the personality into the Self or into the Other.

There are lots of signs and universal symbols to define and decode the basic ideas and senses of the concept of the Other. They can be interpreted in different ways due to the national, social, gender, age, cultural peculiarities or just according to the person's experience. The Other can be Inner and Outer and the communication structure depends on it greatly, as well.

References

1. Barsalou L. W. et al. Concepts and Meaning http://barsaloulab.org/Online_Articles/1993-Barsalou_et_al-chap- concepts_meaning.pdf

2. Lyrics. Road Tripping https://genius.com/Red-hot-chili- peppers-road-trippin-lyrics

3. Lyrics. Tangelo https://genius.com/Red-hot-chili-peppers-tangelo-lyrics

4. Lyrics. Californication https://genius.com/Red-hot-chili- peppers-californication-lyrics

5. Lyrics. Dark necessities https://genius.com/Red-hot- chili-peppers-dark-necessities-lyrics

6. Lyrics. Snow https://genius.com/Red-hot-chili-peppers- snow-hey-oh-lyrics

7. Lyrics. Sir Psycho Sexy https://genius.com/Red-hot- chili-peppers-sir-psycho-sexy-lyrics

8. Lyrics. Nobody Weird Like Me https://genius.com/Red- hot-chili-peppers-nobody-weird-like-me-lyrics

9. Lyrics. Otherside https://genius.com/Red-hot-chili-peppers-otherside-lyrics

10. Lyrics. Scar Tissue https://genius.com/Red-hot-chili- peppers-scar-tissue-lyrics

11. Lyrics. Around the World https://genius.com/Red-hot- chili-peppers-around-the-world-lyrics

12. Tombulatova I. The Image of the Travel in the "Californication" Lyrics (RHCP, 1999). Дослідження різних напрямів розвитку філологічних наук: Міжнародна науково- практична конференція, м. Одеса, 26-27 листопада 2021 року. - Одеса: Південноукраїнська організація "Центр філологічних досліджень", 2021. - С. 161-164.

13. Californication - Lyrics Analysis / Interpretation https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bu-3IQjNRSY

14. Jeffrey S. A Closer Look at Carl Jung's Individuation Process: A Map for Psychic Wholeness https://scottjeffrey.com/ individuation-process/

15. Vogler C. The Writer's Journey. Mythic Structure for Writers. Third Edition. - Michael Wiese Production, - CA, 2007. - 452 p.

16. SMF. "Dark Necessities by Red Hoy Chili Peppers https://www.songmeaningsandfacts.com/dark-necessities-by-red- hot-chili-peppers/

17. Jeffrey S. A Complete Guide to Working with Your Shadow https://scottjeffrey.com/wp-content/uploads/Shadow-Work-Guide.pdf

18. Vieni, M. Red Hot Chili Peppers, Otherside: beyond the meaning of the lyrics https://auralcrave.com/en/2019/06/05/red- hot-chili-peppers-otherside-beyond-the-meaning-of-the-lyrics/

19. Cambridge dictionary. Slide https://dictionary.cambridge.org/ dictionary/english/slide

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