OTTAWA - The Red Hot Chili Peppers circus rolled into Scotiabank Place yesterday, even the setbuilders were freaking out. After all, it took something like 13 tractor trailers to tote the band's dazzling live Stadium Arcadium show into the hockey arena for last night's concert. Moments into the show -- the first the band's played Ottawa since 2003 -- you could see what all the fuss was about.

Backdropped by what looked like the biggest television screen ever, a real floor-to-ceiling job that extended all the way up to the 300 level and then out, nearly covering the whole floor on which they projected lots of spacey video and live action of the band.

That alone made the concert a real rock and roll spectacle. About the only thing the band didn't bring were the lions and dancing bears.

So with all that going on, you'd think that the Red Hot Chili's were, you know, red hot. And for the most part they were.

And yes there is a big but.

Things kicked off with bass player Flea, guitarist John Frusciante and drummer Chad Smith all trading licks with a frenetic funk jam before singer Anthony Kiedis hopped onstage as if he were a boxer to open the set with Can't Stop and their recent single Dani California to get most of the 13,000 attending up on their feet.

The band largely stuck with the same set list they've been using throughout the tour with more than half their set taken from this year's yummy Stadium Arcadium including Charlie, Fortune Faded, Readymade and Snow (Hey Oh) with favourites Scar Tissue, Right On Time with a few bars of The Clash's London Calling and their encore Under The Bridge and Give It Away.

By most accounts, the band was even sharper than they were back in May, 2003, when Sun concert reviewer Ann Marie McQueen gave them a 41/2 out of 5 stars.

And when they were on, it was scary how good they were, especially when Flea and Frusciante, both dazzling players, went off on their own, which was frequently.

Far and away, Flea was the fan favourite, bopping and bouncing like a bobble-head doll without stopping once throughout the nearly two-hour show. Near the end, he even performed a little Swiss call for "Ott-a-wa" that rhymed with "Ricola."

Meanwhile, Frusciante was spectacular, adding eccentric solo covers of The Bee Gees' How Deep Is Your Love and Led Zeppelin to blistering solo fretwork.

Granted the Red Hot Chili Peppers were predictably outrageous fun -- Flea even attempted to walk off stage on his hands.

But musically it wasn't quite as thrilling, with Kiedis not that strong vocally and their glorious punk-funk sound getting badly washed out in The Bank.