despite the band's new enthusiasm, kiedis and slovak continued to struggle with their worsening drug addictions. kiedis was even briefly fired by the band prior to the tour. both kiedis and slovak stopped using heroin prior to the tour and decided to help each other "steer clear" of the drug. during the tour both experienced intense heroin withdrawal, with slovak much more unstable than kiedis. his withdrawal symptoms took a toll on his ability to play his instrument; at one point slovak had a mental breakdown and was unable to play a show, leaving the rest of the band to play an entire set with no guitar. he recovered a few days later, but his bandmates felt he was not healthy enough to perform and replaced slovak with dewayne mcknight for a few shows. after a few days with mcknight, the band decided to give slovak another chance, and he rejoined for the european leg of the tour. kiedis attempted to take slovak to drug addiction counseling, but slovak had difficulty admitting that his addiction was serious enough to require medical help.