Perry Farrell on what he thinks is Jane’s Addiction's most underrated song

Jane's Addiction in 1988 — (Image credit: Paul Natkin/Getty Images)

In May, Jane’s Addiction will embark on their first UK and European headline tour in eight years. The dates, which also include a performance at Bearded Theory festival, will see Perry Farrell, Dave Navarro, Stephen Perkins and Eric Avery stop off in London, Glasgow and Manchester before heading to the continent. If you’re planning to attend and you want to make Farrell happy, then what you should really do is shout out (not when Perry is talking, that would be rude) for the band to play either their epic, ten-minute 1990 single Three Days or the similarly vast Then She Did…, both taken from the LA rock quartet’s classic second album Ritual De Lo Habitual. That’s because, as Farrell told this writer back in 2021, the Jane’s Addiction singer thinks they are two of his most underrated tunes.

Asked to elaborate on why he chose those two, Farrell came up with a solid defence. “Well, one is about a beautiful ménage à trois,” he explained, referring to Three Days, “being up for three days, getting to make love to two women that you really are in love with. And man, you can't beat that can you?”

My limited experience with a beautiful ménage à trois slightly hampered the conversation at that point so I safely guided the conversation back onto the music-making rather than the love-making and how Farrell thrives on collaborating in a room, vibing off fellow musicians. “I like to write songs like that because when you play them, you'll find that those are the best songs for parties,” he said. “I like to write during a party because I always know that subject and the vibe and the sentiment will grow greatly in a song for people that are in a in a partying environment.”

The Jane’s Addiction Billboard number one Stop! was created like that, he recalled. “We were getting high at The Wilton House, it was probably 1986. The Wilton House was a place that I started Jane's Addiction. I was wrapping up Psi Com, my first group and everybody was there at rehearsal and after rehearsal. Essentially, I had found a big, old rundown house off of Melrose in Los Angeles. I couldn't afford the whole house myself so I just invited in all the musicians that didn't have an apartment or place to stay. If they could come up with 500 bucks, they can get a room. And so I had six rooms there. Actually five, I lived in the attic. And that's where we would rehearse. Jane lived there herself. Good time, for sure.”

Watch the video for Stop! below or, if you’re in the mood for some sauciness, skip on past that and have a listen to Three Days instead:

Niall Doherty is a writer and editor whose work can be found in Classic Rock, The Guardian, Music Week, FourFourTwo, Champions Journal, on Apple Music and more. Formerly the Deputy Editor of Q magazine, he co-runs the music Substack letter The New Cue with fellow former Q colleague Ted Kessler. He is also Reviews Editor at Record Collector. Over the years, he's interviewed some of the world's biggest stars, including Elton John, Coldplay, Radiohead, Liam and Noel Gallagher, Florence + The Machine, Arctic Monkeys, Muse, Pearl Jam, Depeche Mode, Robert Plant and more.