Anthony Kiedis is keeping busy without his Red Hot Chili Peppers ("We're disbanded for the moment," he tells Rolling Stone — for more on the band's year-long break, keep reading). The California dad recently pulled together Bob Dylan, the Raconteurs and more bands for Pittsburgh's New American Music Festival (sponsored by American Eagle Outfitters), which takes place August 8 and 9. Kiedis dialed up RS to explain what exactly a festival curator does, where the RHCPs are at and whether he's putting any thought into the ever-evolving business end of the music biz.

Tell us about the New American Music Festival. I've heard you're curating and I've heard you're hosting. Which is right?
Curating is more accurate, but I guess curation is a word that could be defined differently by many. It's kind of vague. You think of it a little bit more in term of the visual-art world.

How did you get the job?
Basically, American Eagle came to me saying, "Do you want to curate a show?" And I've known people that have curated festivals before and I thought, "Hmm. Is it real? Do I really get to choose the music? Because if I do, I'm in." I was listening to a lot of very exciting music. I thought, "What a great opportunity for me to basically design a concert for myself, that I would want to go to." So I kept asking, "Do I really get to choose the music? Are there strings attached?" I didn't really want to get into something where I signed on and then suddenly they flipped the switch on me and it wasn't real. And they were incredibly gracious about allowing me to have the final say in choosing.

How did you find the experience? Was it difficult?
It's not as easy as it sounded. It was kind of an interesting experiment because at first I was kind of like a kid, who wanted what he wanted, when he wanted it. And then I realized, "Okay, that's just not how this works." I'm an absolute die-hard LCD Soundsystem fan and they're one of these bands that are completely dismantled and some of them are in England and some of them are on tour with other bands. I got to engage in e-mail conversation at length with James Murphy, and that turned out to be a really incredible experience. He is an excellent human being and is very smart and I have to say, his music gets to my good nerve. For every kind of door that closed, another wild or totally fascinating door opened, like Bob Dylan.

I wouldn't have pegged you as a Dylan fan.
Well, you really can't argue with Bob Dylan's music. I put him in the top 10 of all-time greatest musicians that I have ever encountered. I also loved the idea of getting Ringo Starr and his All Star Band to be on this bill, which we couldn't do. But I wanted to expose this college-aged audience to the greats while the greats are still being great. So Bob Dylan, after much negotiation and deliberation, made himself available for this festival which was enough said at that point. I knew everything was going to be all good from there. The same for the Raconteurs. They were very busy and all over the place. People forget musicians are very giving people. They give this music and their time and their energy and their heart and their soul to the public, but they also have families and lives and friends and homes and sometimes they want to go experience that. And all we want them to do is to keep giving us their music. Fortunately, Jack and his Raconteurs were willing to go one more time because they kind of wanted to go on vacation and do the family thing, but in the end they were kind enough to come around and play this one more show for us, which I'm totally grateful about.