Album Reviews |

Flaming Lips

Hear! It Is 7½ ( 1986 )
With You / Unplugged / Trains, Brains & Rain / Jesus Shootin' Heroin / Just Like Before / She Is Death / Charlie Manson Blues / Man From Pakistan / Godzilla Flick / Staring At Sound-With You

The Flaming Lips debut EP may as well have been an instrumental for all the good Mark Coyne did vocally. So, out he goes and up to the mic steps his bro Mr Wayne Coyne. And, it all works out for the best. The sound of the atrociously produced ( eg, recorded for a bucket and string, and a few penny marbles ) debut EP has been replaced by a similar murky garage sound, only not quite so murky as before. Oh! And if you're only familiar with The Flaming Lips from their more recent works - marvel at the fantastic joy that is 'With You' - a little guitar singalong from Wayne. You can imagine this particular song appearing on any Flaming Lips album, more or less. Well, it'd be recorded wildly differently if this was Flaming Lips circa 2003, but that's not the point. The basis of 'With You' is a simple strummed guitar and the voice of Wayne Coyne. There's a groovy loud section of wild noisy guitars in the song too, by the way. This 'wild noisy' guitar sound is a key to 'Hear! It Is'. Simple riffs and songs that sound like they were recorded live with a real live band featuring real live people! Nobody can play their instruments very well, but that's the sound of the underground for you. The sound of the underground? It's a marvellous thing, actually. Play 'Trains, Brains & Rain' to any of your pop loving friends and they'll recoil in horror, even though this song is actually a great spanking marvellous pop song at heart. Loads of gorgeous little melodies, wonderfully off-key and off in the distance backing vocals. Ah, its all here, but it's joyous. Suddenly the mud clears and the melodies appear and they never ever leave you ever again. For as long as you live, and for the rest of your life.

'Jesus Shootin Heroin' for a song with such a name is suitably stark and dark ( and not sung by a guy named Mark, rather sung by Wayne in a worryingly convincing way ) and rather a highlight of the album. Following the seven minute long 'Jesus Shootin Heroin' is the catchy little punky rock n roll guitars of 'Just Like Before'. The performance doesn't sound quite together, everything constantly sounds as if it's about to collapse... but that's half the charm. Besides, the drummer sounds like he's having fun, if nothing else! 'She Is Death' is truly the sound of punk rockers taking acid, and i'm not at all apologising for using the name of The Flaming Lips three CD box set in this review for my own purpose. I'm not, it's a damn good description of 'She Is Death' and I'm too lazy to think of a better one. Anyways, eventually the main problem with 'Hear! It Is' reveals itself to be the repetition in sound across the albums ten tracks. Well, correction. 'With You', 'Jesus Shootin Heroin' and 'Trains Brains & Rain' stand out from the pack, as does 'Godzilla Flick' which is back to the simple strummed guitar behind Wayne's vocals approach - with other instrumentation added along the way to fill out the sound. Nice song though, and a nice album, even with a few faults here and there.

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Hey, 'Everything's Explodin' sounds like everything the first album tried to do, but all wrapped together in the one song and minus the messing around. Just a tight, compact shining pop song with loud noisy alternative rock/punk guitars. Great big stomping chorus, you see? Ah, it works for me. The second song has an incredibly long title and lasts for an incredibly long nine and half minutes, which to be frank, isn't very punk rock! Ah, but there's the rub! Still, they had wacky song titles that begged the listener to cry out, 'ha ha!' and actually listen to the song and the band, rather than just ignoring them. You know, out of curiosity more than anything else, but that's a start isn't it? Getting noticed! Now, there's my tip of the day to all you aspiring musicians and Rock and Pop song-writers! Get noticed!! Call a song 'Eat My Fuck' or something, I don't care. Just remember to actually write a decent song whilst you're at it, which isn't something The Flaming Lips have quite managed to do here. It has nice sections here and there and a drained vague psych feel - but little to hold your attention right through to the end of the song. 'Maximum Dream For Evil Knievel' has funny dumb lyrics, eg, "Well we're standing in the kitchen / And we're cookin us some chicken / And the house is burning down / And we don't really care" before bursting into a flurry of loud guitars. Repeat this idea for the next section of the song, then go insane. Hey, sounds good to me! 'Can't Exist'? There goes the strummed guitar and there goes Wayne Coyne! Soft, tender.... nothing else happens in this song, unfortunately. A song like 'With You' exploded here and there. This is just.... well, it's okay.

I like 'The Ceiling Is Bending' which comes and goes - and I like the six minute noisy mess of fast drums and fast guitars, and HECK! FAST LIVING! of 'Prescription: Love', it's good! 'Thanks To You' has harmony vocals, or at least, tries to have harmony vocals. 'Can't Stop The Spring' includes various funny little things to mix up the guitar / bass / drums formula, and it's good to see a group actually trying and thinking, and being creative. 'Can't Stop The Spring' has a simple riff but it's catchy in a way, and it's enough. 'Love Yer Brain' opens with a piano sound and 'Oh My Gawd' overall manages to vary its sound more than 'Hear! It Is' did, yet without including as many standout moments overall. It may well be more consistent overall, and may well be better recorded and put together - but sometimes that doesn't equal better. Ah, it's pretty close anyway.

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Readers Comments gnome king cr615996@ohiou.edu I don't usually check my e-mail because frankly-I haven't since I was in college and I've forgotten the password over the past three years-butI will say that "Oh my Gawd" is probably the trippiest album I've ever heard-even moreso than "Sgt. Pepper" or pink floyd's "Piper at the Gates of Dawn"and yes I am a fan of 60's psychedelic music-especially Syd Barrett-and That is why this Flaming Lips cd appeals to me. It makes total nonsense but the fu3ked-up part about that is that the nonsense makes TOTAL sense to me in the context of "The Ceiling is Bending" and other songs. I like the fact that they sing about Salvador Dali "watches from his window in a dream"- Dali is my favorite artist. I create extremely detailed post-modern surrealistic artwork that is sort of new age avant garde.Even though the Flaming Lips music is sort of chaotic and amatuerish on these early recordings-I still respect them for attempting harmony and soft melodies in an age where punks would crush a guy f! or admitting that he has a sensitive side. By the way- I do record songs with catchy titles and weird lyrics like "Pink and green paisley alien starfish Organisms." "Speckle-crested gnome vision" is one of my catchiest songs.

Any song named 'The Spontaneous Combustion Of John' just begs to be listened to, doesn't it? Ah, 'Telepathic Surgery' moves The Flaming Lips forwards a little in that it sounds a little better played - the bass guitar guy sounds more powerful at least. 'Drug Machine In Heaven' includes a groovy bass line and gets 'Telepathic Surgery' off to a strong start. 'Right Now' squeals and bites and ROCKS and is really quite exciting. Oh, an aside, but it's related. That famous drum intro Phil Spector used for 'Be My Baby' has to be the most often repeated drum pattern in the history of the world. 'Chrome Plated Suicide' uses it, and it pops up all over the place in the world of Rock and Pop, if you care to notice such things. Back to the matter at hand? 'Hari-Krishna Stomp Wagon' has catchy riffs, simple drums, bass that fills in and fills in better than it did on the first two albums. The lyric mentions gasoline and the riffs continue. This isn't clever material, music wise it's pretty basic stuff - but it convinces all the same. Well, if not convinces, at least it does actually stomp, which is good! 'Miracle On 42nd St' is experimenting with sweet guitar and bass with little other things as well, an instrumental that doesn't actually do anything, but works within the context of the album even though it doesn't do anything. Does that make sense? Or do I need to do something in order for it to make sense? Does it speak to you? Does 'Fryin Up' speak to you?? It should do, it includes an immortal Rock N Roll introduction with a shouted 'Alright!', which will do me.

I dunno, you know. This album right here does move The Flaming Lips forwards, but doesn't include quite as great material as before. It moves to further vary and improve the groups sonic assault and variations, but doesn't actually hang together quite as well as the two albums before it. But, all in all, it's not bad, you know? It's more Rock N Roll, albeit in a totally unapproachable way in terms of any kind of mainstream acceptance. 'Hell's Angels' is totally bizarre and defies description. Sampled operatic vocals appear at one stage, for example. 'UFO Story' is indeed a UFO story, or so it seems. I can't actually hear what the hell the guy is saying. Well, that's three minutes of the track. The other three minutes are self indulgent noise and the sound of a band temporarily short on good ideas if not actually short on ideas. A couple of reasonable songs follow, a few pieces of filler follow. Etc. 'Last Drop Of Morning Dew' has a melody to hold it together and the closing 'Begs And Achin' almost resembles normality. 'Telepathic Surgery' is a somewhat confused album all in all. Well, it confuses me. Chances are it was meant to be this way. Maybe, maybe not. Maybe i'm amazed by the way you move me.

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Readers Comments Graveyard Poet markwilde_sea7@yahoo.com What makes the Flaming Lips one of my favorite bands and what keeps them remaining possibly the most exceptionally unique alternative rock bands (and THE band of our times) is that they are unafraid to be defiantly experimental! (In lyrics, music, and particularly in concept). And this second album of their first lineup (back when they were a "power trio") is definitely the Lips at their most far out. On the official website of the Flaming Lips, synopsis and notes are given on each of the albums of their long, multitalented, and fascinating career. The notes on this album describe it as an absolute and total mess and state that it retains a very dark and sinister air that makes it unlike any of the rest of the Lips' discography. I would, of course, agree. It doesn't get any heavier, louder, balls-to-the-wall trippy, and freaky and scary than this mess of an album. Whether it's the one-two punch of the raging psych-punk openers "Drug Mac! hine in Heaven" and "Right Now", the drifting phasing effects, bells, and utterly memorable metallic riffs of "Chrome Plated Suicide", the outrageous hallucinations and humor which pervade songs like "Hari Krishna Stomp Wagon", "Redneck School of Technology", and "Fryin' Up", or the epic, indescribable assault on all of your senses in the deranged, overpowering, and bizarre wildness of "Hell's Angels Cracker Factory" (which places this album in that small magic circle of oddities such as Syd Barrett-era Floyd like Piper at the Gates of Dawn, Hawkwind's Space Ritual, Can's Tago Mago, etc.) and clocks in with over 23 minutes of spiraling guitar solos, motorcycle engines, psychotic horns, and spaced-out opera.

Imagine you're Wayne Coyne and you've got some 'wild' ideas! But you know, your guitar player has just left and maybe your band won't even exist anymore. You know that it probably will still exist, but you're worried. So, enter Jonathan Donahue ( now the main 'rev' in Mercury Rev ) and enter Dave Fridman ( as in, 'produced by' ) and you've got yourself a band once again! Thank Jesus for that. Thank Jesus, and shine on sweet Jesus! Speaking of which, ( hey, nifty handover! I should be a dj or something? Okay... i'll give it up... ), the opening 'Shine On Sweet Jesus' has interesting guitar lines and a shambolic yet sing-a-long chorus sung flatly, tunelessly - the noises and feedback do what they suggest they do by their very names, and? It sounds magnificent. No longer is Wayne working alone. You know, it's Wayne suggesting, 'Hey, I wanna do this!' and Dave saying, 'Okay, lets do it!' and Jonathan saying, 'hey, what about this?' - so you see. A stronger band and line-up all round, I'd say. Oh, 'Unconciously Screamin' is good, oh it's glorious. Endlessly remixed according to the liner notes for 'The Day They Shot A Hole In The Jesus Egg', and it sounds good indeed. Was 'Jesus Shootin Heroin' endlessly remixed? You see, probably not? But then, it didn't need to be. Neither did this, but they couldn't resist making it more pumpin than it already was. The vocals drift off, "ahhhahhahahhhhh", etc. The guitar does things - everything is held together by solid melody. The type you might get on a better Sonic Youth song of yore, not the type your mother used to recommend to you when you were young. You understand. The Flaming Lips, even with the arrival of all this extra creative talent - still sound like the sort of band whom the guys and gals you work with would throw up upon hearing. So that's good!

'Rainin Babies' is utterly glorious, and people round here tend to get excited by the opening three songs from 'In A Priest Driven Ambulance'. People round here like these kind of songs! But, ah. Not everything is so good, although mostly everything is good. 'Take Meta Mars' with its strong drum introduction and sci-fi noises. A couple of draggy, uninteresting songs, but then 'God Walks Among Us Now' which cooks! What it cooks, i'm not sure - the fuzz and distortion is genuinely exciting to my set of ears. 'There You Are' seems like a folk song, all serious acoustic guitar, very nice. Of course, 'Mountain Side' which follows is pure alternative rock, the kind they never ever play on M2, the MTV alternative rock TV station. You know the kind, the proper kind. 'What A Wonderful World'? Good god! It is that song, as well. Sung in a typically Wayne Coyne, half singing, half speaking voice - infused with fuzzy guitars and meaningful drums. Can drums be meaningful? He sounds bored actually - like he doesn't at all approve of The Flaming Lips performing such material - but sod him. I like this, it's an amusing diversion. No high art, nothing to blow rooftops off houses you understand - but it all adds to 'In A Priest Drive Ambulance'. And, then it ends. Goodbye, my love. I'll never know but I think to myself - I wanna stick around for these guys! Okay, so i'm speaking in hindsight, but it was clear they'd got better. It's clear, just from a casual listen to this album. <

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RustWillNeverSleep@webtv.net RustWillNeverSleep@webtv.net 9-Wayne Coyne is the Brian Wilson of his time, without a doubt. His musical vision is singular and unique. He has a vision of what he thinks pop should be, and puts it out for all to hear, with each album being a quantum improvement over the other. This is their first truly brilliant album, and it's so fresh and full of creative ideas, it's hard to believe they'd be able to top this. "Five Stop Mother Superior Rain" is my personal favorite, with a melody very similar to the Rolling Stones's best haunting ballads. "Shine On Sweet Jesus" is a terrific opener, and the band's ironic take on Louis Armstrong's "What A Wonderful World" is touching and moving, contrary to what they were trying to achieve. This band only gets better. A near masterpiece, for sure. Joseph Parisi jparisi1@nycap.rr.com According to the liner notes for the Day They Shot a Hole in the Jesus Egg, Donahue was an old acquaintance of Coyne's, but they got into an argument over Neil Young -- Donahue thought that he was a significant factor in the history of rock music, whereas Coyne thought that he was negligble other than for two albums. This led them to parting company and not speaking for a long while. They sort of patched this up years later, leading Donahue to join the band, but it was a basic personality conflict for his leaving after less than two years (the Neil Young debate makes it clear, IMO, that Donahue was the true musical mind and Coyne is an idiot).

The Flaming Lips move across to a major label, Warners in their case. Their first release for said major label is an EP retail pleasingly titled 'Wastin' Pigs Is Still Radical'. Their next release was the LP 'Hit To Death In The Future Head', and it's good! There's no obvious indication The Flaming Lips were now on a major label, to judge by the music. Maybe the melodies are stronger than last time out, but then, these stronger melodies are covered in walls of noise and guitars, just as they were before, more or less. It's important to remember that major labels, in the wake of Nirvana, were signing all sorts of weird and wonderful underground/alternative bands. Even 'Tad' got signed to a major!

'Hit To Death In The Future Head' sounds great listened to loud. It still sounds good listened to at more neighbour pleasing volumes, which says something about the strength of the material. Imagine the material stripped of all 'external excesses' of noise and effects - picture it played by Wayne on acoustic. It'd still work. The songs are great, the melodies strong. About effects and walls of guitar noise, though. The charmingly titled opening number has all sorts of fabulous noises. Still, the chorus is super catchy and the guitar break arriving two-thirds of the way through the song hugely enjoyable, too. I don't know if this is just me, but if you DO play this song at loud volume, it sounds to me like an ice cream van is coming around the corner a couple of streets away. You can't quite make out if it's something in the song, or if an ice cream van actually IS coming around the corner! 'Hit Me Like You Did The First Time' rules my world for three minutes and forty one seconds and 'The Sun', with trumpets and all sorts of weird and wonderful instrumentation, invented The Polyphonic Spree. 'Felt Good To Burn' sounds like some weird hippie drooling out of the corner of his mouth with an indian sitar, but it's still good! And, omigod! This album, if it wasn't already good enough, just gets better. 'Gingerale Afternoon' should have made The Flaming Lips stars. It didn't, and neither did 'Hit To Death In The Future Head', sadly. The Flaming Lips move to a major didn't immediately result in any huge leap in record sales for them. They did get heard, however. But then, if you go around writing and producing songs as good as the wonderfully melodic alternative rock guitar GOLD of 'Gingerale Afternoon', you hope that you will get noticed, I should think.

'Haloween On The Barbary Coast' initially carries on with the Indian thing going around buried in the background of 'Felt Good To Burn'. We switch to more regular Lips for the remainder of the song. They had themselves a great guitar sound around this time. No doubt Jonathan Donahue had a big part in this wall of beautiful swimming guitars. Sadly, he'd leave after this record. He'd go on to form Mercury Rev though, so that's good. Where was I? Well, 'Hit To Death In The Future Head' carries on. 'The Magician Vs The Headache' is semi-hardcore guitars infused with a big helping of pop melody along the way. 'You Have To Be Joking' is beautiful with a very Mercury Rev sounding noise effect appearing in the background amidst tapped drums and Wayne Coyne vocals. 'Frogs' is blasting guitars and noise, the closing 'Hold Your Head' a slower, ballad type song. Bells, whistles and gorgeous melody. You better believe it, and The Flaming Lips move forwards again.

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Readers Comments The Chamber stroom@web.de Their best! Every song is great! This album may be the pivot of their career, so you can find the psych-rock of their early days AND the early-prog-odyssey of CLOUDS... and SOFT BULLETIN on it. Gingerale... and The Magician... are better than the songs on PRIEST DRIVEN AMBULANCE. Halloween... is their most hypnotic acoustic journey! SOFT BULLETIN sounds like a weak Disney- soundtrack compared to this. HIT TO DEATH is the album, where the deranged virtuosity of the Lips was ''in bloom''. 10 out of 10. I don't see track 11 as a part of the album, just as a hissing joke. A bad joke. But a very good album. Graveyard Poet markwilde_sea7@yahoo.com This is a wondrous transition between their earlier underground fusion of punk and psychedelia and their acid pop sound from their third lineup with Ronald Jones and Steven Drozd in Transmissions and Clouds. Although Hit to Death in the Future Head, like Telepathic Surgery, is the Lips at their most freewheeling, rowdy, and crazy, don't let that keep you from listening to this album. It is their most musically and stylistically challenging and diverse recording (with the exception of their obvious masterpiece The Soft Bulletin). On no other album (besides the previous mentioned album perhaps) have the Lips expanded their own musical consciousness and, especially, the consciousness of their fans and listeners. Starts off with the incredibly goofy and yet strangely catchy "Everyone Wants to Live Forever" which does, as people have noted, have a warped sound in which doo-wop is filtered through messy garage rock. This is followed by one of t! he most rocking and melodious songs on the disc "Hit Me Like You Did the First Time" which is a major triumph with Jonathon Donohue of Mercury Rev fame displaying his feedback based guitar prowess. "The Sun" is, by far, one of the Lips' most overtly lush and psychedelic songs which floats along like a spring or summer daydream with cool intermittent inclusions of horns. "Felt Good to Burn" takes this druggy ambience even further with heavily distorted and backwards tape looped vocals, power drill drones, and the Lips' most explicit and cynically, earthy lyrics. "Gingerale Afternoon" is THE Lips' song. Well crafted genuine alternative rock genius with this one, complete with violins and an insistent driving rhythm that is my pick for one of the Lips' most uplifting songs (before the more poppy happiness of their middle and later period). "Halloween on the Barbary Coast" is the obvious masterpiece of the album and possibly in the rank for ! the Lips' greatest song. Other picks might be "Five Stop Moth! er Super ior Rain", "Moth in the Incubator", "They Punctured My Yolk", "Feeling Yourself Disintegrate", "The Gash", etc. It contains a trippy use of echoing vocals, saringies, tablas?, etc. and is a journey to the center of your mind and back again. "Magician vs. the Headache" is a fuzzy patch of pure noise and can induce the conundrum of the title "Autopsy of the Devil's Brain" is quite loopy, and "Frogs" is another gem of comic insanity from Wayne Coyne and gang. The closer "Hold Your Head" has a deliciously eerie feel and returns the album to a whirlpool effect encountered in the opening songs. You enter the vortex at the beginning and unwind out of it at the end, holding your head. Brilliant.

The Flaming Lips replace Jonathan Donahue with a guy who lasted just this and one other album. Well, Mr Donahue was only on two albums as well, but went off and did Mercury Rev, you know? I don't know the detail behind why the replacement for Jonathon left, or was he pushed? I don't know. Maybe they begged him to stay, because they liked him so much? For my money, the guitar and the overall sound of 'Transmissions....' is just so less interesting than the previous album. They've retreated as a band, but it's not as simple as that. Wayne Coyne continues to progress as a song-writer. That much is clear, but the sound of 'Transmissions' leaves a little to be desired. This may sound a strange thing to say in relation to The Flaming Lips, but 'Transmissions' doesn't offer a single surprise. Not one. It does offer a bunch of good songs, but not surprises. Take the thick, sludge guitar effect of 'She Don't Use Jelly'. Such an effect was being far better employed by UK bands at this time, the likes of Ride and Catherine Wheel. God, dozens of others, literally. 'Transmissions From The Satellite Heart' is the sound of one man, Wayne Coyne, growing and growing and getting better and better, surrounded by a band who quite simply, in a word, weren't. It took me a while to write this review, I'll be honest with you. Well, it took no time at all to write about, but quite a while to actually think of what I was going to say. 'Transmissions' just doesn't interest me. It doesn't make me wanna stick it on again right after playing it already.

Still, as I said earlier, Wayne is moving forwards. 'Oh, My Pregnant Head' has some gorgeous melodies and sounds and feels. 'Chewin The Apple Of Your Eye' is really getting there, the sound of Wayne, some crackling sound effects and little else. No longer a garage or alternative post-punk band, but the sound of The Flaming Lips becoming something else. 'Moth In The Incubator' is absolutely fantastic, and one of the highlights of the set. Opens all Wayne with voice+acoustic. Moves into noisy distortion, but the initial idea is retained, and the vision is there. Of the closing three songs, I only like one, the final track titled 'Slow Nerve Action'. It's got a real heavy, manipulated drum sound. Wayne sings nicely and the vocal melody is good.

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Readers Comments willie8911@comcast.net willie8911@comcast.net I just wanted to point out that your perception of this record is innaccurate. A good majority of the melodies and arrangements were definatly not Wayne Coyne's making. Their new drummer, Steve Drodz took the helm and started writing most of the melodies while steering the band in a new direction. Wayne adopted him as his full songwriting partner, and as a result they started to become poppier and more musically experimental. Wayne still writes all the lyrics, but Steve writes most of the melodies, and this would continue all the way up to 2002's Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots. The band's sound is definatly not about Wayne Coyne, although Wayne's overall vision remains dominant.

Some things here I like. I like the fact that Wayne and company are listening to DIFFERENT bands, seemingly. 'Psychiatric Explorations' screams out Joe Meek to me, a pioneering experimental producer of the early sixties. At least, the introduction of said song does, before it sounds like a less sensible Weezer for the rest of the song, sadly. 'Placebo Headwound' is quite lovely though, from start to finish, with a Brian Wilson influence permeating the writing, all of a sudden. The drums and the rhythm and very cool and the harmonies are cool. Where did this come from? Well, it didn't come from listening to The Stooges or Sonic Youth, you know? Whatever. 'This Here Giraffe' has a very strong melody, nice lilting guitar - the guitar is better on this album, by the way. Maybe I was harsh on the guy, maybe it wasn't his fault, but rather the result of The Flaming Lips trying to sound a certain way on 'Transmissions', even though they no longer exactly had the capacity to do so. 'This Here Giraffe' has lots of detail, in terms of additional instrumentation and percussion. It's interesting and enjoyable, even with the nonsensical, fake semi-hippie vocals. What a thing! What once was funny is now simply irritating. Take a look at the song titles? Jesus christ guys, grow up! Progress, move on! It's been done, you did it yourselves! What does 'They Punctuated My Yolk' even mean? Absolutely nothing? Darn right! Still music doesn't always have to mean something, of course. This doesn't even provide entertainment, says me, OBVIOUSLY in purely objective mode! Well, what is it? It drags, it's sound and effect and a lazy melody and vocal - although the harmonies are right out of Beach Boys land, so in theory, I should like this.

'Brainville' is the one. This is the one, the key to salvation. An acoustic guitar, a soft, genuine vocal. Lyrics that still mean nothing most likely, but include lines such as "take pity on the small ones" that you can construe with meaning. In the groups earlier days, it didn't seem to matter so much. It was more clearly obvious the group were just having fun, the enthusiasm was clear - which is less clear for this, and the previous album. Still, back to 'Brainville'. A huge Beatles influence is clear - and this is a good thing. A guitar nearly always threatens to sound like a country or slide guitar, but doesn't. The rhythm is Beach Boys and this is some combination. A lazy sounding song, but it works magnificently. Songs such as 'Guy Who Got A Headache' are lazy, and not terribly melodic either. Just arseing around, basically. Anybody can play guitar, sang Radiohead in a flop single of theirs a year or so before this Flaming Lips album was released. Such a comment rings true. What about melodies, ideas and creativity? Where did those things go? Pretending to be dumb, albeit doing it in a clever way, just isn't clever. Pretending not to give a damn isn't clever. These lyrics are tripe, in any event. 'Lightning Strikes The Postman'? 'Christmas At The Zoo'? Oh, those wacky guys? Still, the latter has a stellar melody, and overall, 'Clouds Taste Metallic' is a decent enough record to spend a period of time having a certain amount of fun to.

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Readers Comments willie8911@comcast.net willie8911@comcast.net I understand the 7 rating, because everyone's first impression of this record is kind of a 7 feeling, but please, keep playing it, and you will realize that this is one of the greatest records of the 90s. Once this record sinks into your soul, it will never let go. The melodies are really all perfect in their awkwardness, and that is the most objective assessment I give of them regarding that manner. You have to really play these songs a bunch of times to understand that statement. They for sure are not lazy by any means, and on the contrary manage to sound both complex and off the cuff at the same time. Probably the enthusiasm you are referring to. I honestly feel that this record taps strait into the primal psychedelic power that the Beatles had experimented with during the Magical Mystery Tour period. But all of that aside, the thing that really bugs me about your review is your critism that Lips need to grow up. Because they haven't really matured is exactly why people love them. They have the naive but secretly intelligent Beatle vibe going for them that so few bands can tap. You also didn't mention Kim's Watermelon Gun, which is one of the greatest pop songs ever in terms of combining a roaringingly strange guitar, a beautiful melody, and heavenly playful lyrics. Guitars never sounded so simtaneoly strange and emotional on any record outside of Jimmy Hendrix. The visual imagery you get while listening to that song is amazing. When You Smile, is such a brilliant ballad in that the lyrics are all about atoms making a smile, to me that is such a beautiful articulation of the post-modern amatuer philospoher's perception of the world. I could go on about all of the songs, but there is no point, just listen and listen and listen, and you will get it, I promise. No one is bowled over the first time they hear this record, but it is such a treat in the end. This is the ultimate conventional Flaming Lips album, and they would continue to challenge the music world with Zarieeka, which would both put an end to their early sound by taking it as far as it could go, and by leading them into a new symphonic direction with Soft Bulletin. The history and musical instincts of this band is legendary, but the world didn't notice, and its a shame. This record is genius from top to bottom Jeff Pfeifer jbp703@gmail.com He Adrian! I agree with that other guy who left a comment. This album is agruably there best. Also you should really really try and check out Zaireeeeeeeka. Ya its hard to get 4 cd players but it is worth it. The album good. Wayne pushed to medium to the limits with that album! karl leisky new zealand The 7 given to this album isnt what it deserves. If you listen to it instantly after a priest driven ambulance or even hit to death it admitedlt sounds dull. or if after the soft buliten it sounds like it is lacking direction. but listen to it on its own and it becomes a beutifull thing. I got the f.l albums in a funny order but this was the album that renewed my faith in the flaming lips afer yoshimi. Yes it got a huge amount of aclaim from both critics and fans alike but i found it incredibly boring apart from fight test and yoshimi battles (do you realise is a great song but the e.p version was and is better).

( 1999 )
Race For The Prize / A Spoonful Weighs A Ton / The Spark That Bled / Slow Motion / What Is The Light? / The Observer / Waitin For A Superman / Suddenly Everything Has Changed / The Gash / Feeling Yourself Disintegrate / Sleeping On The Roof / Race For The Prize / Waitin For A Superman / Buggin

Firstly, it's been drawn to my attention that the US and UK versions of this album differ in terms of tracklisting. It's the UK version i'm reviewing, cos that's the one that was in the shops when I went out to buy it. Secondly, it's been drawn to my attention via a readers comment in said review above, that apparently ( although how the commentator was supposed to know this, I really DON'T know ) that I only listened to 'Clouds Taste Metallic' once or twice! I had that album for a long time, for three years or so and listened to it plenty. 'The Soft Bulletin' was the album that brought The Flaming Lips to the attention of the world outside of the US. Seeing as there is more world existing that isn't the US - that means that, like the album or not, 'The Soft Bulletin' is a major album in terms of The Flaming Lips career. It's possible, almost certain - that because of the UKs late discovery of The Flaming Lips, for example, that those guys are likely to view the band differently. I myself made a complaint about the wacky song titles that The Flaming Lips were famous for, becoming 'boring', in a word. That's gone, 'The Soft Bulletin' is a very serious, almost dark work - nearly completely lacking in the humour and playfulness of The Flaming Lips of the past. Of course, I can understand a long-term fan frowning upon 'The Soft Bulletin', because it's such a change.

I should mention 'Zaikeera' whilst i'm here, shouldn't I? 'Zaikeera' is the missing link inbetween 'Clouds Taste Metallic' and 'The Soft Bulletin'. An album released as four CDs which you had to play simultaneously in order to hear the album correctly. Given everybodies differing hi-fi equipment, even assuming they have 4 cd players to play it on in the first place (!) - this meant that 'Zaikeera' was an album heard differently by every single person that ever played it. For 99% of people, it was impossible to even play - thus a brave, innovative - but in the end, rather pointless venture. People come up to me in the street (! - okay, so they don't, but they may as well do ) saying 'Zaikeera' is the Flaming Lips greatest work. That's a very elitist viewpoint, seeing as said people cannot even play the album as the group intended it to be heard, because nobody can. Or maybe that was what they intended all along? For the record, several 'Zaikeera' tracks were issued as b-sides to 'Soft Bulletin' era singles here in the UK, as single CD versions - and they sounded just like that. B-Sides. They fitted perfectly, good songs, 'Soft Bulletin' style production, at least, compared to earlier Flaming Lips - amid a wealth of wacky nonsensical song titles and nonsense. Beautiful music with no meaning whatsoever and a slowing sense of humour relating 'Zaikeera' to past Flaming Lips more than 'Soft Bulletin' or any future Flaming Lips. 'The Soft Bulletin' was a new beginning, with all that implies.

Speaking of being humorous or playful - don't let me give you the impression the 'The Soft Bulletin' entirely lacks either of those two aspects - it doesn't. The opening 'Race For The Prize' features a huge, massive drum sound ( a gong bashed furiously by Wayne when they performed the song live ), amid a gorgeous pop melody and thought provoking, serious enough lyrics. The melody is one of the finest The Flaming Lips have ever written, add in the orchestral sounds, fake orchestral sounds - added to the weirdness of the gongs and the bashing drums and everything else, truly startling. The melody is one Joe Meek of Telstar fame, would have been proud of, and that's not a bogus comparison, it's a comparison that makes sense, but hardly one you could have made about 'Transmissions From A Satellite Heart'. The Flaming Lips change, and it's long overdue change as far as this writer is concerned. The Flaming Lips go into orbit, fly off taking their unique character with them - only to see it grow via outer space and old fifties sci-fi movies. 'A Spoonful Weighs A Ton' has such a beautiful delicate melody, so beautiful you'd safely play the songs introduction to your kid to send them to sleep with a blissful smile on their face, before the bashing quiet to loud interruption of the dynamic drums 'interfere'. The lyrics sound serious, dark - end of the world, weight on the shoulders. But the music retains elements of past Flaming Lips, more so than the lyrics. In terms of structure, rather than distorted guitars, etc. 'The Soft Bulletin' actually features very little in the way of guitars, compared to past Flaming Lips. The semi-orchestral nature of 'The Soft Bulletin' becomes clear with the likes of 'A Spoonful Weighs A Ton', and it's a grand thing.

'The Spark That Bled' has alien and heavenly sounding backing vocals, very sad and moving. 'Waitin For A Superman' should have been a number one single all over the world - it's just so gorgeous and pretty and beautiful and serious. High art. Music is important and hopefully full of feeling and emotion. No other Flaming Lips album contains as much beautiful melody and deep emotion as 'The Soft Bulletin'. There are highpoints and relative weakpoints here, the two remixes of 'Waiting For A Superman' and 'Race For The Prize' probably weren't required, although 'Buggin' is a gorgeous pop song more akin to past Flaming Lips. Speaking of weakpoints though, apart from the two remixes, none of the songs fail to work well on some level - and when we reach 'Feeling Yourself Disintegrate', with it's clever vocal backing parts, then gorgeous harmonies, then a Wayne Coyne singing..... truly sadly, movingly and beautifully - for possibly the first time in his life... well, it gets to me. Nobody else could have made and recorded 'Feeling Yourself Disintegrate' and have it come out quite as well as it does here. The Flaming Lips themselves of a few years previously couldn't have done it - because they would have drenched the thing in distorted guitars and not paid attention to beautiful delicate percussion, etc, etc.

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Readers Comments jeff bluemanblue@bellsouth.net The Soft Bulletin is the best album that the flaming lips have out yet so for. There is not one song on here that is not worth a bagfull of shit. The talent that has come out on this album is amazing. A spoonful wieghs a Ton, i sing and sway every tiime. I would be utterly happy if the flaming lips would release another album with this talent. I cant seem to quit listening to it. I have all of the others but none compare to this one Chris Fletcher studysquare@hotmail.com This album is obviously going to be considered a classic for all time, it all fits together and portrays exactly what questions wayne was asking at the time. Steven was in the middle of being a heroin addict but still managed to somehow connect with his muse to arrange a stunning masterpiece. when I first heard this record I must have listened to it everyday for about 5 months, I love the way the music moves underneath the same melody and what inspiring melodies that really make you beleive in some king of god. I think its like a futuristic cousin of 'pet sounds' where the lips realised the faith and love that their fans had given to them elavated them to new musical/spiritual highs. If you close your eyes and listen to this album you feel like you have been left in space and the mystery of your life is unfolded to you. You can't help but cry and come back down with a smile. simply beyond being reviewed. Matt Colville6969@yahoo.com I would just like to say that i recently tracked down a copy of zaireeka and that its really not all that hard to listen to. Just suggest that you get either 4 car stereos or a couple stereos and some boom boxes. Now im not going to be so bold as to call it the lips best work because i've heard it once, but i will say its the most original album i've ever heard and reccomend that every flaming lips fan try to hear it, because its absolutely worth it. by the way thanks for the reviews found plenty of new bands thanks to you

On the face of it, this is a loose concept album surrounding the story of Yoshimi, indeed battling those pink robots. When I first saw the artwork, and this may very well sound cynical - my first thought was, "those guys are really going for the Japanese market, aren't they?" - hence the writing and entire style of the artwork. Still, if the Flaming Lips don't deserve to sell more records, then I don't know who does. The first single was 'Do You Realize?' a very 'Soft Bulletin' sounding thing but not quite as charming as any of the 'Soft Bulletin' singles, but still good. Switching to another single, 'Fight Test', we get those distorted drums, bass and also, squelchy sounding keyboards. A new thing, oh yeah! 'Yoshimi' is an album that further updates and removes The Flaming Lips from their guitar oriented origins by including several songs that are very keyboard/computer/machine heavy. This isn't a bad thing, because they are using technology to write proper songs with, not just using it for the sake of it. 'Fight Test' is a beautiful song, plain and simple, and that's what really matters in the end. 'One More Robot' features computers and keyboards, for the most part. It's very sad and lonesome sounding and the concept of the album makes sense, some kind of futuristic alien thing, with very human emotions tied in. 'Yoshimi Part One' is a gorgeous pop song, part two is an electronica styled experimental instrumental, albeit with real drums and everything else. More soft, slow and lovely songs follow, eg, 'In The Morning Of The Magicians' and it sounds like Wayne is about to give up living or something - it's the sound of heartbreak.

Ah, I love the funky squelchy keyboard/computer rhythm sound of 'Ego Tripping', love the electro sounds amid acoustic guitar of the very pretty and moving 'It's Summertime'. The tone of sadness is actually even more pronounced all through this 'Yoshimi' album than it was with 'The Soft Bulletin'. We don't get the same variety here, little of the bashing, funny gong/drums thing going on - but still this is mighty fine stuff. The electronica based, very quiet yet pretty ballad, 'All We Have Is Now' is full of sadness and semi-orchestral sounds played by machines, akin to 'The Soft Bulletin', yet very 21st Century at the same time. The Flaming Lips are no longer a Rock band, rather some kind of art project - but you know? They're at a pretty high level, right about now

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Readers Comments Anthony Billington anthonyb@waikato.ac.nz Am I the only one on earth to have noticed the striking melodic similarity between "Fight Test" and "Father and Son" by Cat Stevens? Yoshimi is a great album nonetheless, but come on guys! gnome king cr615996@ohiou.edu Ok, I'll admit that this cd "Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots" was what initially exposed me to the Flaming Lips music. In fact it was the first and only Flaming Lips cd I owned until a couple weeks ago, so this opinion may be a bit biased. A friend lent me his copy of this cd but I am glad now because it sparked an interest in the band that never ceases to amaze me with it's continual creative experimentation. If this were the only cd that existed by them it could stand alone as an innovative new futuristic electronic music composition or a new wave movement in the music world all together.I especially like "One More Robot","Ego tripping at the gates of Hell" and "Do you realize?" Of course, all of the songs are equally good, and "Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots" should be their hit song to launch them on the charts, but,unfortuneately the mainstream music business isn't as hip to real art as we are. Music executives need to open up their minds or shut the f@ck up if they're! going to continually promote those multi-million dollar money making theories that sell crap by hip=hop artists or people with no talent, or those old used has beens like Rod Stewart that sing the same freakin' love song every time just because he's been around for toooooooooo many years. We need a new alternative revolution like the Flaming Lips to spark an interest in experimentation so there will be a new direction in music. It's like when the movie industry remakes old classics like Godzilla orPeter Pan over and over again.We're getting sick of the same plot ideas.That's why we want something new. The Flaming Lips are definitely a breath of fresh air in all of this and I look forward to going out and Buying "The Soft Bulletin" now, based on all of your reviews! Joe dibiddy_dob@yahoo.com Ok, i own 75% of the lips catalog and i couldn't go any longer without posting. Earlier lips music is influential, but the more recent (Clouds-Yoshimi) is ground-breaking. I work for an indie label and 18 yr old kids are comparing Yoshimi to Dark Side (not in style, but in impact) all i can say is as a life-long lips friend and fan, what they have done up until clouds is GOING to be considered their back catalog. and i Think that Yoshimi is one of the best records of the Decade. David Sawicki dsawicki@voicellc.com I bought this album on a whim for my wife at Christmas in 2007. She gave me Satellite Heart many years earlier which was "just OK" in my opinion. This album blew me away. The concept, the aural soundscapes, the production, the fun, the experimentation. They don't play this shit on the radio...which explains why I gave up on FM after Kurt Cobain died. Yoshimi can be played back to back with Darkside of the Moon and stand it's own ground. This album turned me onto the Lips. I've since purchased Soft Bulletin, Zaireeka, and At War with the Mystics. The "new" Flaming Lips have inspired me as a musician. I'm writing songs again and getting back into the studio. Thank Yoshimi!

The punk rockers who took acid have been listening to seventies MOR singer/songwriters? Possibly, possibly not. They may have been listening to REM. They've forgotten how to bang gongs, have fun, not take themselves too seriously. We've a third of a potentially great, cohesive album here with 'At War With The Mystics', a third of a pop album where the Flaming Lips try and fail to sell records to Madonna fans, and a third of an album where the material is markedly weaker than Flaming Lips material of the recent past. It's a strange album and no mistake. It's interesting, it's human. It's very human and weary sounding. The first two songs scream out at me. They taunt and mock me. 'Yeah Yeah Yeah Song' is deliberately dumb and irritating, to the point of annoyance. Yet, this is an irresistable melody. 'Free Radicals' is another irritant, a song that sounds all the world like it was actually recorded by Scissor Sisters. Yet, Flaming Lips have scrawled with colourful crayons all over the top of this pop song. Singing songs for children, designed to show the record label you're serious about shifting units. Front load the album a little, although hope the discearning fans will look a little deeper than playful, mocking versions of pop music that sells.

What follows these opening two numbers almost convinces me of this. 'The Sound Of Failure' sounds like the product of different sessions, a different decade. There's a whiff of 70s MOR, yet topped with squelchy and futuristic noises. Some beautiful vocals feature and, quite rare for a lengthy tune these days, 'The Sound Of Failure' doesn't bore you for a single second. The interestingly titled 'My Cosmic Autumn Relation' contains bird sounds. The lyrics match this feeling as far as i'm concerned. 'The Sound Of Failure' and 'My Cosmic Autumn Relation' are crucial cuts on the album as a whole, wholly different animals to those devious and playful opening two numbers. One undercooked acoustic psych number followed by a rather dull instrumental number with strange squeeky noises forms the mid section of the album. We lose interest a little, although the ambitious three part 'It Overtakes Me' wakes us up, before letting us down gently with quiet solitude. Subtle songs follow, clever tunes with clever mature production that contains a bunch of weird noises and potentially ruinous and needless ideas for little reason. Suddenly, Flaming Lips are floating back down to earth after more than a decade of spiralling out amongst the stars then, are they? Well, yes, quite frankly. The final song then is redemptive simplicity, the lyrics are meaninglessly trite, yet redemptive all the same.

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Readers Comments Johnny Canada ilikegrapes528@hotmail.com I love this album! Although i always start at track three- the first two songs are just by-the-numbers fluff this band can write in it's sleep (although the production is still interesting). After that unfortunate start, the bands psychedelic sensibility and Wayne Coyle's beautiful lyrical imagery perfectly compliment each other through most of the rest of the album. The interestingly named "Pompeii Am Gotterdammerung" has a great energy and the production is immaculate. "W.A.N.D." is the best seventies style hard rocker I've heard since... the seventies, although I was only born in '78. "Vein of Stars" has a great stripped down sound and the lyrics are very sad whilst avoiding being corny. I too am quite taken with the last song, a nice 70's style easy-listening(!) song that is very sweet and in the true spirit of that era. I personally would give a 9 for this album with a 1 point deduction for the few slipups. Jude Bolton spikeedogmangowoof@hotmail.com Some people seem to be waiting and rejoicing on the Flaming Lips' downfall. Is it because they are a 'pretentious' band? I personally have no problem with artists striving to make music 'beautiful'. How many Strokes and White Stripes and Interpols do we really need? I admire ambition, and I'm grateful for what Wayne, Steven and Michael have given us in recent years. Furthermore, I find The Sound of Failure and My Cosmic Autumn Rebellion to be as emotionally moving as the best songs off their last 2 albums.

Flaming Lips are one of those bands that have more former members than current members and it's partly enforced evolution that's has, until now, propelled their career so succesfully forwards. From early amateurish alternative fumblings towards finding their own voice with a new kind of psychedelia through to the era that began with 'The Soft Bulletin', a more melodic approach that resulted in both critical acclaim and sales. The start of Flaming Lips move away from this style occurred with 'War With The Mystics', a slightly confused set that didn't seem to know where it was going with itself. On the fact of it, 'Embryonic', a double album set, is even less focused and sure of itself. He has admitted 'Embryonic' contains 'free-form jazz' and celebrates its rambling contents. Here we are, this is where we are. It's actually a refreshing honesty in these days of hiding behind falling record sales by blaming music piracy. Some of us want something different, something nobly ambitious, even if said ambition results in failure, or partial failure. Have no doubt, 'Embryonic' is a partial failure, these free form distorted jams failing to be songs in any regular sense, the bangs of loud drums, 'Pop' era U2 bass guitar and barely developed vocal melodies/lyrics are not the work of band who have toiled at their craft, this time around.

The very album title reveals something else, this is perhaps meant to be a transitional work on the way to the next phase in Flaming Lips career. There are, after all, some beautiful moments along this seventy minute journey. Since this seventy minute journey, Flaming Lips have recorded a cover album of Pink Floyds 'Dark Side Of The Moon', on the fact of it something very much tighter in concept than 'Embryonic'. Some old school Flaming Lips fans bemoan 'The Soft Bulletin' especially but also 'Yoshi' as the bands weakest offerings. Can we see 'Embronic' as Flaming Lips attempt to return to their roots? Sure we can! We'd be wrong, i'm certain it's an attempt to move forwards from a band who aren't actually sure where they want to go anymore. I'll mention a few individual tracks that grab my attention, such as 'Evil' or 'Gemini Syringes'. The latter is a beautifully floating thing, heavily influenced by early seventies Pink Floyd. The former is so light as to hardly exist, yet evokes a melancholic darkness and desperation I found quite enticing. Is 'I Can Be A Frog' just as annoying as the singles from 'At War With The Mystics'? Well, we have 'silly' lyrics and 'silly' sound effects. Yet, we have a dark space, a vocal floating from the depths of space. We have a misery that can't put a name to itself. We have 'Worm Mountain', a song so loud the lack of clearness in the recording and the lack of cohesion does indeed become an exhilarating asset.

Perhaps that sums up 'Embryonic' best, something that shouldn't work but does. Something that you will admire more than actively enjoy but also something to be endlessly fascinated by.

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