John Frusciante is ‘Overrated’ According to The Darkness’ Justin Hawkins

John Frusciante is one of the most popular guitarists in rock. He's often been included on various lists ranking the best guitarists in music history. However, not everyone is super impressed.

Justin Hawkins, vocalist/guitarist for The Darkness, touched on Frusciante's guitar playing on his podcast, Justin Hawkins Rides Again. His full remarks can be heard below, but Hawkins takes issue with Frusciante's style of playing.

"Somebody said to me it’s deliberately minimalist," said Hawkins. "Maybe it’s like that thing where you become a super-accomplished painter and start doing some naive child-like daubings, and that’s your phase. I think that might have been one of the things he was exploring, but it doesn’t stop it from being sh-t."

Hawkins also says, "My issue with Red Hot Chili Peppers is that I get nothing from John Frusciante’s guitar playing. I feel like if we can call Mark Knopfler an underrated player, I would describe John Frusciante as an overrated player. In fact, I have done that, more than once." He added, "It’s always like, ‘You’re jealous because he sold more records than you have.’ And it’s like, well, Mark Knopfler has sold a lot more, more, more records than me, and I’m not jealous of him. I love his guitar playing. So that argument doesn’t really hold any water."

Joining Hawkins on this episode was Pat Finnerty, the host of the podcast What Makes This Song Stink. Finnerty says at one point, "I don't know why [Frusciante] is so revered. I feel like whoever’s listening to the Red Hot Chili Peppers only listens to the Red Hot Chili Peppers. I do think his tone is good."

For more than three decades, the Red Hot Chili Peppers have twisted rock, funk, punk and soul into new, surprising, usually fun and sometimes sad jams.

Singer Anthony Kiedis and bassist Flea have kept the band together and have stayed relevant far longer than most of their peers or their idols. We took a deep dive into the hits and some album tracks to come up with this list of their 42 greatest songs.

We included every era, not to be fair, but because every lineup had at least a few classics. The early lineup of Anthony, Flea, guitarist Hillel Slovak and drummer Jack Irons is some people's favorite. Anthony, Flea, drummer Chad Smith and guitarist John Frusicante created their most successful albums and songs. But credit is also due to former guitarists Jack Sherman, Dave Navarro and Josh Klinghoffer, and ex-drummer Cliff Martinez.

When Johm Frusciante rejoined the band, they showed that the most successful lineup still had something to say (and a lot of it: they released two double albums in a year). Take a look through our countdown of their 42 best songs (and yes, the list surely could have been much longer).