10 Musicians That Saved Their Careers By Changing Genres

From day one, funk rock has been the bread and butter for the Red Hot Chili Peppers. Long before the days of their big MTV hits, the sounds of records like the Uplift Mofo Party Plan is what something like Parliament Funkadelic would have sounded like had they been reborn as a punk outfit. Even though the energy may have stayed the same, the Peppers' rise to the top has made for some drastic changes.

As much as albums like Blood Sugar Sex Magik sent them into the stratosphere, the first move towards something accessible ended up coming at the expense of Hillel Slovak, who died of a drug overdose after their third album. Although there was nothing inherently wrong with Slovak's funky melodic side, the inclusion of John Frusciante into the mix gave us some of the most memorable guitar parts in the Peppers' catalog like Under the Bridge and Give It Away.

Since then, the Peppers have carved out some more elaborate melodic material than most people originally gave them credit for, going from funk to classic rock to full on metal, sometimes within the span of a single song like in Around the World. Instead of just sampling one kickass genre like in their heyday, the Peppers decided it was more fun to bring everything into an elaborate musical stew.