For most of his career, Josh Klinghoffer has been the alt-rock wiz kid. His career began as a Los Angeles-area teenager, and his talents caught the attention of Bob Forrest, who enlisted him in his band, the Bicycle Thief. Since then, he’s had stints with the Forrest-led Thelonious Monster, Dot Hacker, and Gnarls Barkley, and toured with Jane’s Addiction, PJ Harvey, and Sparks. Most famously, he was a member of the Red Hot Chili Peppers from 2007 to 2019 (with whom he was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2012). Since 2020, Klinghoffer has been a touring member of Pearl Jam, serving as a multi-instrumentalist.
While he’s had a charmed career playing with some of the giants of rock, the 46-year-old has also, for nearly a decade, pursued a solo career under the Pluralone moniker. In that span, Klinghoffer released several albums, EPs, and singles, the most recent of which was 2022’s This Is the Show. A history aficionado, the album touched on historical tensions beginning with World War II through the present day. Also that year, he teamed with Pearl Jam’s Jeff Ament to compose the score for the FX television show Under the Banner of Heaven.
Photo courtesy of Josh Klinghoffer
Now, Klinghoffer has released his fourth and newest Pluralone album, A Drop in the Ocean, through his longtime label, Org Music. Produced by Eric Palmquist, the seeds for the sparse, 10-song collection were planted at the end of the This Is the Show sessions. But as he started to sketch out a new album, his “other” jobs called—in particular, Pearl Jam toured on and off, as did its frontman, Eddie Vedder, in whose solo band, the Earthlings, Klinghoffer also plays. Add to that his ongoing session work with superproducer Andrew Watt, and it’s a wonder Klinghoffer had any time to himself (he jokes that he didn’t), let alone time for his own material.
Yet that was only part of the reason A Drop in the Ocean took as long as it did.
“I was recording it during the writing process, which was probably the problem,” Klinghoffer tells Premier Guitar, ahead of a private show in New York with Watt, Red Hot Chili Peppers drummer Chad Smith, and others. “I wasn’t fully done writing some of the songs. While I was trying to build these recordings, half of me was thinking that they were only demos, and then I grew to like them.”
“I’m always trying to simplify and put less on.”
Working at what he calls a “relaxed” pace, Klinghoffer began recording A Drop in the Ocean in earnest last May and had it finished by October. Like its predecessor, the new album carries a thematic thread: The cover art—a trash can and trash bags—nods to the waste we dump into the ocean. For Klinghoffer, though, the symbolism extends to music.
“Lots and lots of music gets dumped into the world,” he says. “Lots of art gets dumped into the world, and it’s an enormous ocean, it’s an enormous sea of stuff.”
Josh Klinghoffer’s Gear
Guitars
1946 Martin 00-17
Vintage koa Martin
1959 Fender Stratocaster
1960 Fender Stratocaster
Pedals
Boss TB-2W Tone Bender
Boss JB-2 Angry Driver
Boss DM-2 Delay
Boss VB-2 Vibrato
Boss CE-2 Chorus
Boss DD-3 Digital Delay
Boss DD-6 Digital Delay
Ibanez WH10 Wah
Klon Centaur
Robot Pedal Co. MS-20 Brain Freeze
Origin Effects Cali76
JHS 424 Gain Stage
Red Panda Context
Red Panda Particle
Red Panda Tensor
Pianos & Synthesizers
Steinway upright piano
Therevox ET-5 analog synth
Roland Juno 106 polyphonic synth
Korg MS-20 analog monophonic synth
Photo by Emily Ulmer
The album’s spare aesthetic came from an unlikely source: Tony Allen. When the Nigerian drummer died in 2020, Klinghoffer posted an Instagram cover of “Poison,” a song by Rocket Juice & the Moon—the trio of Allen, Damon Albarn, and Klinghoffer’s former Chili Peppers bandmate Flea. The response to the sparseness of his version pushed him toward that sound, even if it didn’t fully manifest until A Drop in the Ocean.
“I needed that suggestion,” he says. “I’m always trying to simplify and put less on, and double my voice less. It’s what I’m interested in listening to these days, just smaller stuff, less production.”
“Lots of art gets dumped into the world, and it’s an enormous ocean.”
In 2024, Klinghoffer dipped his toes into producing when he helmed Redd Kross’ first full-length in five years. The well-received effort, which featured Klinghoffer on drums, taught him several lessons that informed A Drop in the Ocean—mainly, getting out of his own head and thinking about what a listener can actually latch onto.
“With Redd Kross, I had an easy job as the producer because they had done all the writing, and I didn’t have to make a single adjustment to the songs,” he says. “For me, it was just a matter of making sure they had the best time and were as satisfied and happy with the result as they could be. When I was doing it for myself, I included things that allowed for most people to connect to it.”
A Drop in the Ocean is Klinghoffer’s fourth album under the Pluralone moniker.
Calling himself “not much of a professional hustler,” Klinghoffer says he enjoyed producing for friends but doesn’t see himself doing it for artists outside his orbit. When Andrew Watt calls, though, he’s always game. Recently, Watt brought him in on new songs for Yungblud and tracks for singer Charlotte Lawrence. Working with Watt, he says, is “always a lesson”—in this case, staying open to new ideas and not clinging to a conviction when it’s clear it isn't moving things forward.
Klinghoffer has no plans to tour in support of A Drop in the Ocean, which he sees as a blessing. He has a few projects on the horizon—a potential follow-up to the Redd Kross album, and music from 2023 and 2024 that he’s finishing with Eric Palmquist—but is otherwise taking things slowly. It’s a career path he keeps in perspective.
“I get to work with people that are, for the most part, really open and supportive,” Klinghoffer says. “I’ve been lucky throughout my whole journey.”
