By Michael J. West | Published March 2026
Out less than a week, Flea’s Honora is already under the usual level of intramural controversy. Another pop-millionaire jazz dilettante! Suddenly he plays trumpet! And this one makes the cover of DownBeat! Does he have any idea what he’s doing? Is it really even jazz? Either way, can it really be good?
Let’s first answer the second question: I don’t know, but I can’t rule it out. Flea (famous as the acclaimed bassist for Red Hot Chili Peppers) is probably not going to start hitting the clubs or the jam session any time soon. But Honora is on the same plane as albums by, for example, Thundercat or Mark de Clive-Lowe, both of whom have also been reviewed in these pages. Much of it is uncategorizable. Best to say, it’s on the jazz spectrum somewhere.
Back to the first question, whether he knows what he’s doing: Not really, but that’s the point. Honora is an experiment, Flea attempting something new and out of his comfort zone. And he’s got great guidance. Flea’s a relative beginner here, especially on trumpet (which he played as a kid) — he certainly doesn’t claim to be Clifford Brown. Yet such accompanists as guitarist Jeff Parker, saxophonist Josh Johnson (who also produces, with liberal use of electronic effects), flutist Ricky Washington and fellow four-stringer Anna Butterss have forward-pointing jazz credentials that can’t be denied, and they keep him on point on pieces like the atmospheric fusion original “Frailed”; the slow, but punchy and anthemic “Free As I Want to Be,” also an original; and a surprisingly delicate “Wichita Lineman” (with rocker Nick Cave on a shaky but weirdly apropos vocal). Flea confirms he can swing on his own boppish composition “Morning Cry” and quasi-postbop-but-also-hip-hoppy “Traffic Lights” (with Radiohead’s Thom Yorke on vocals). There’s some subtle swing gestures as well on a murky electronicized “Willow Weep For Me,” though they’re well disguised in a blank-verse rhythmic matrix.
Finally to the last question, the one that brings you here: Is it any good? It is. All of the above is taken seriously, but with a spirit of adventure. If he’s not a virtuoso trumpeter (as he is on bass, using that instrument to light-touch funky ends on “A Plea”), Flea has put real work into the horn, and he shows it with an interesting mix of reverence and roguishness. That mix raises some question marks when it comes to his version of Funkadelic’s “Maggot Brain.” Originally an improv platform for guitarist Eddie Hazel, Flea gives a verbatim trumpet transcription of the first half of Hazel’s solo (with gauzy flute-and-vibraphone backgrounds). Is it a sincere tribute, a cheeky “whitefacing” of a Black American Musical masterpiece, a showoff of his chops-in-progress, or all of these at once? It’s pretty either way, but also the only thing here that comes off as a novelty bit.
