{"id":684,"date":"2002-08-08T02:21:00","date_gmt":"2002-08-08T02:21:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/acloserlookmedia.com\/?p=684"},"modified":"2024-03-27T02:21:57","modified_gmt":"2024-03-27T02:21:57","slug":"creative-and-commercial","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/acloserlookmedia.com\/?p=684","title":{"rendered":"Creative and commercial"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Those Flaming Lips put out some strange stuff, but is it catching fire?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"The
The unconventional and successful Lips.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Live! \u201cUnlimited Sunshine 2002\u201d at Sacramento Memorial Auditorium, 1515 J Street on Friday, August 9 at 7:30pm, $32.50 with Cake, De La Soul, Modest Mouse and Kinky.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Y<\/strong>oshimi Battles The Pink Robots<\/em>, The Flaming <\/strong>Lips\u2019 new album, was just released on July 16 and continues the band\u2019s tradition of psychedelic-leaning, experimental rock. From robots to fairy tales gone awry, it\u2019d be fair to say that there were more outside influences creeping into their strange mix. As the band\u2019s mastermind, Steven Drozd, explains, \u201cWe\u2019d like to think that we make children\u2019s albums \u2026 I mean half of this stuff is like that anyways.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since its inception, The Flaming Lips have always delivered music for the off-center crowd. It\u2019s been a rough ride at times, but current members Wayne Coyne, Michael Ivins and Drozd have persevered doing things their way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The year 2002, however, has been exceptionally good for The Flaming Lips. After their new album, Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots, <\/em>debuted on the U.K. charts at an astounding number 13, they hit jackpot yet again landing the number 50 slot on the U.S. Billboard. In addition to the numerous accolades achieved from the band\u2019s last full-length, The Soft<\/em> Bulletin<\/em>, the new album has yielded even bigger prospects, including The Unlimited Sunshine package tour\u2014which stops at Sacramento Memorial Auditorium on Friday, August 9\u2014with Sacramento darlings Cake, De la Soul, Modest Mouse and Kinky. Although the band had released numerous albums to date, it wasn\u2019t until now that international attention would come, other than from the media.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Flaming Lips\u2019 live experience, not to be missed, features the band\u2019s trademark samples and off-kilter personas. From the instrumental interludes down to singer Wayne Coyne\u2019s vocal warblings, the band delivers a heady mix of synthesized and percussive music. Unfortunately, the only thing plaguing their upcoming show is their short set time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe\u2019re playing about 55 minutes a night,\u201d says Drozd, who normally likes to play more luxurious, extended sets. \u201cWe\u2019re doing three or four songs from the new album and stuff from The Soft Bulletin<\/em>, which a lot of people seem to like, one from Zaireeka<\/em> [the band\u2019s experimental album released on four, separate discs that could only be experienced running four CD players simultaneously] and we\u2019re doing a cover which is a surprise.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Aided by Mercury Rev studio bassist\/producer Dave Fridmann, to whom Drozd refers to as the \u201cfourth member of the band,\u201d the band\u2019s sound and imagery owes as much to space pop as it does to Fridmann. As Drozd points out, Fridmann\u2019s role could be as simple as, \u201cWhy don\u2019t you cut this chorus in half? Why don\u2019t you play this faster?\u201d to complete arrangements. \u201cHe\u2019s been helping us make records since 1992.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Perhaps the most striking quality of The Flaming Lips is their inability to cater to conventional song structure. As evidenced on the album\u2019s pseudo-instrumentals, which are aided by various screaming and chanting\u2014\u201cYoshimi Battles The Pink Robots Part 2\u201d and \u201cApproaching Pavonis Mons By Balloon\u201d\u2014radio singles weren\u2019t even an afterthought.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The closest thing to conventional pop is the album\u2019s opener, \u201cFight Test,\u201d and \u201cDo You Realize,\u201d which did get sent to commercial radio without much response. Perhaps it\u2019s this quality that keeps The Flaming Lips albums in college station rotation\u2014currently top number 5 on CMJ\u2019s nationwide charts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After only the first night into the tour, Drozd is already talking about plans for the future. \u201cWe\u2019ve been talking to Beck. He\u2019s got a new record coming next month and wants us to be his backing band for a month. In the winter or late fall, we\u2019re gonna do a tour and take a few bands with us.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From experimental shows\u2014the band did a whole national tour utilizing headphones and FM frequency\u2014to unconventional tour billing, not everything has been smooth sailing for Drozd and company. Dubbed the \u201cheadphone dates,\u201d the band played theater-size venues funneling their music through FM waves\u2014each audience member was given a Walkman\/radio device to experience the show in stereo. Regarding the dates, Drozd is quick to retort, \u201cI\u2019m not sure how much [the headphones] enhanced the show. If we start playing bigger places, I can\u2019t imagine we\u2019d go through it again. As far as tours, we did a Candlebox tour in 1994 as the support act. We were like the weirdest thing.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nah, really?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As of press time, singer\/lyricist Wayne Coyne resides in Oklahoma City, while Michael Ivins and Steven Drozd live in New York.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While most couldn\u2019t work under these conditions and living arrangements, it\u2019s these circumstances that somehow further enhance the band\u2019s sound and growth. The Lips\u2019 ability to create boundary-breaking, yet commercially viable, music hasn\u2019t been hampered yet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

(SN&R)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Those Flaming Lips put out some strange stuff, but is it catching fire? Live! \u201cUnlimited Sunshine 2002\u201d at Sacramento Memorial Auditorium, 1515 J Street on Friday, August 9 at 7:30pm, $32.50 with Cake, De La Soul, Modest Mouse and Kinky. Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots, The Flaming Lips\u2019 new album, was just released on July 16 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-684","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-media"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/acloserlookmedia.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/684","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/acloserlookmedia.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/acloserlookmedia.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/acloserlookmedia.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/acloserlookmedia.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=684"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/acloserlookmedia.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/684\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":685,"href":"https:\/\/acloserlookmedia.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/684\/revisions\/685"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/acloserlookmedia.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=684"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/acloserlookmedia.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=684"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/acloserlookmedia.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=684"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}