The Red Hot Chili Peppers' early material suffered from a lack of energy, focus and consistency. But by 1987, when the time came to enter the studio for their third album, "The Uplift Mofo Party Plan", things were poised to change. With the original band finally in place on a professional recording (vocalist Anthony Kiedis, bassist Flea, guitarist Hillel Slovak and drummer Jack Irons) and a producer whose personality would neither constrict the Peppers (as Andy Gill did) nor dominate them (as George Clinton did) in Michael Beinhorn, the band finally hit their stride.