NEWS: Red Hot Chili Peppers' Flea Wanted To Quit The Band

The 48-year-old bassist admits he had serious doubts about continuing in the American group when the guitarist – who has since been replaced by Josh Klinghoffer - quit for the second time in 2008, but he decided to stay after finding a "profound love" for the funk rockers and lead singer Anthony Kiedis.

Speaking to Q magazine Flea said: "I'd thought that if John did go that I would definitely not want to continue the band without him. But after he left, something kind of shifted in me and I found a really profound love for the Chili Peppers and particularly for Anthony."

Flea revealed Josh - who has toured with Gnarls Barkley and PJ Harvey as a session musician - is "way different" to John, but he revealed that is the "best" part about the guitarist.

He added: "The trickiest part of getting together with Josh for me was also the best, which is that he's completely different to John. There were things that I had come to expect John to do: he's such a phenomenal musician that I was used to playing something and – bam! – John would hit it. He and Chad [Smith, drummer] would lock in, and it was undeniably good.

"Josh is way different. He'd be floating around the outside with this ethereal, textural thing. It was like, 'Whoa! When's he gonna do the thing that we know?' And he didn't. I had to consciously say to myself, Dude, relax."

The Red Hot Chili Peppers new album I'm With You is out on August 29th.