special introductory paragraph!

The Flaming Lips EP

Hear It Is

Oh My Gawd!!!

Telepathic Surgery

Unconsciously Screamin' ep

In A Priest Driven Ambulance

Wastin' Pigs Is Still Radical ep

Hit To Death In The Future Head

Transmissions From The Satellite Heart

She Don't Use Jelly EP

Providing Needles For Your Balloons

Clouds Taste Metallic

Zaireeka

The Soft Bulletin

Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots

Finally The Punk Rockers Are Taking Acid

The Day They Shot A Hole In The Jesus Egg

Fight Test EP

Ego Tripping At The Gates Of Hell EP

At War With The Mystics

"The W.A.N.D." CD-single

The Fearless Freaks 1986-2006

And the songs? Three of them are great; buzzsaw "Bag Full Of Thoughts" and "Sex Bomb"-twister "Out For A Walk" kick acid-drenched dirt all over the garage, while "My Own Planet" alerts us, the home listeners, of the poppy pleasures imminent in Lips future. And the others???? Well, a little weak. A tad dull. Don't do much. Just kinda rest motionless on the shag carpet waiting for a dog biscuit. Wonderfully enough, though, this is one of the worst records they've ever released, and it's still "purty dagnab gut," as Southern Germans are wont to utter.

Reader Comments

drazy@gatecity.com
True story: A guy made me a mix tape of 60's era garage rock stuff, kinda like the material found on Nuggets and the like. So in the middle of the tape, he sticks "Scratching The Door," a song from this, The Flaming Lips' debut e.p. about twenty years removed from the rest of the material on the mix tape. I didn't catch it until they included this e.p. at the end of the "Hear It Is" cd, released on Pink Dust in '87. Coulda swore the song was recorded at the same studio as The 13th Floor Elevators. Fun stuff, especially if you drop acid as frequently as I used to do. Lead singer Mark Coyne chose "hard narcotics" after this release, and the world is thankful.

soul_crusher77@hotmail.com (Mike K.)
Howdy. I just sprung for the 3 cd set "finally the punk rockers are taking acid", which is the first ep, the first 3 albums, and myriad bonus tracks. As a result I now have all the albums, and you can expect a lot more flaming lips reviews from me as soon as I digest this thing a little better. Right now after one listen to the whole thing, I really only feel qualified to review this here EP...

It doesn't nearly approach the later material, but then again, it's not trying to, because it's more or less a totally different style of music. I'm a young'um, and my parents didn't have much good vinyl to dig into other than the beatles and decade by neil young, so I haven't actually heard much actual vintage garage rock, but this is exactly what I would imagine those sort of bands would sound like. I could completely imagine someone stumbling on a little known 45 with a psychadelic jacket at a garage sale, taking it home, dusting it off, and hearing "bag full of thoughts" come on. It's interesting to hear the lips do this style of music, and more interesting to hear them fronted by a guy with such a low voice. Mark does have a very limited vocal range, but it suits the music fine. For me the only unmemorable number is "forever is a long time", although admittedly "scratching the door" I mostly like for all those spooky and yet hillariously overdone false endings. All in all it's a pretty good ep, but more interesting for historical purposes than the music contained within. 7/10 on the "I only grade albums when I feel like it/remember to" system.

SneakthaSlinger@aol.com
I can't believe how awesome these guys started out. There's way too much flanger on the guitars, the singer can't sing(which only adds to his goofy charm) and his vocals sound like he shouted them into a tin can with a string through it, the drums sound like they're all made out of wood, and the bassist is a decidedly funky fellow. I can't help but love the repetitive monotony of "Bag Full Of Thoughts" and "Out For A Walk;" the music just grooves and hums along like they think it's still the 60's, and Mark is the stoned-est sounding lead singer ever. Believe it or not, this pretension-free low-key style actually complements the songs and lyrics perfectly, especially on my personal favorite track, "Garden Of Eyes/Forever Is A Long Time." The only place where his singing doesn't fit is "My Own Planet." In my opinion, it would've sounded a lot better with Wayne singing lead. And "Scratchin The Door" also tries way too hard to be spooky but just ends up being way too long and kind of stupid. But neither of those detracts from my overall enjoyment of this magically delicious EP. I give it a 8 and suggest that more young garage rock bands start by playing fuzzed-out psychedelic post-punk.

bolton_154@hotmail.com (Jude Bolton)
This is the only time its OK to put out an EP. When you're a bunch of young, amateurish, acid-eaters with probably no experience at playing in a band or even singing. In which case, a whole LPs worth of material would be ridiculously boring. So yeah, I love this EP. Scratchin the door and Forever is a long time are my 2 favourites. The latter is kinda similar to Buzzcocks Something gone wrong again, but then again Bag Full of Thoughts rip offs the About A Girl riff, so that evens things out nicely.

princess_vachtangov@yahoo.com
The author of the above message is a spooty faced doofus. About a girl was recorded at least 2 years after Bag Full of thoughts. The key word is AFTER. The song it actually seems to rip off is "I'm not satisfied" from Frank Zappa's "Freak Out"; or maybe it's Mark E Smith who ripped off Bag full of thoughts when he was recording his vastly superior version of I'm not satisfied, unaware of the fact that Kurt Cobain had already ripped it off for About a girl. But then again perhaps Kurt Cobain ripped off I'm not satisfied directly, and Mark Smith then ripped off About a girl without ever hearing Bag full of thoughts. Another possibility is that Mark Smith would've listened to both Bag full of thoughts and About a girl but not to I'm not satisfied, and would've randomly reproduced the Zappa original down to the lyrics and title. I find this the least likely of scenarios due to mr. Smith's frequently professed disdain for American bands who apparently do nothing else but rip off his old songs. On the other hand, he did manage to perform a very convincing subliminal reproduction of Offspring's "Gotta Get Away" on his "Sparta FC" record, so I wouldn't discard the possibility altogether. As a matter of fact I've suddenly recalled that there was a Sonic Youth song that sounds a whole lot like the Fall's version of I'm not satisfied (which sounds a lot like Bag full of thoughts, remember?). I think it was called Youth against Fascism but I may be mistaken (I hate Sonic Youth). And on a COMPLETELY unrelated note, the song "Electric Head" by White Zombie is like totally ripped off from a song called "Monk Time" by the Monks. Trust me on this, use all illegal means at your disposal to obtain these two tracks - it's the most incredible rip-off of all time. Besides, the Monk Time song RULES! It OWNS ALL OTHER SIXTIES SONGS!

Look, I don't know if there's some sort of limit on the length of these "comments", but I've got some more here. I was watching the Angry Beavers cartoon today, and there's this idiot scientist who walks up with Dagget who has a bump on his head and says he's discovered the last of the great horned beavers, and Dag goes "where?" and the scientist answers "right here, you am him". I almost fucking fell off my chair!!! You am him!!! MAN!!!

"Hey, do I know any of the songs on it?" you're probably asking a neighbor or group of anonymous passersby at this particular moment in the time/space continuum? Should I not have put a question mark at the end of that sentence? It looks really weird without one. Unirregardless, the only classic on the album is "Jesus Shootin' Heroin," a slow, somewhat blasphemous (or perhaps not!) and lengthy epic that shifts from religious query to Stones tribute without batting an eye - or, heh heh, LIP, as it were. Heh heh. Oh, how droll I can be.

Reader Comments

ABRU9502@Mercury.gc.peachnet.edu (Adam Bruneau)
Hmm...I expected this was going to be very different from their Ninties masterpieces and I was right! Loud, druggy, sometimes-fast sometimes-slow bizarre underground rock for the tripped-out masses, this one is! The album as a whole doesn't blow me away, but there are a few really cool tracks on here..."With You" and "Jesus Shootin' Heroin", of course...and for some reason I just can't shake "Godzilla Flick" out of my head! Ah, and tho the rest is kind of filler (tho I suppose "She is Death" and "Train, Planes, and Brains" are purty kewl as well...) it's interesting to see where these guys started from!

Jcjh20@aol.com
Great album. Not an amazing album like Zaireeka or Clouds Taste Metallic or any of those 90's 'Lips efforts, but all the songs are very good. Great melodies, awesome little surfy-type guitar riffs here and there, and good production. My favorites are "With You", the epic "Jesus Shooting Heroin", "Godzilla Flick" and i love the "With You" reprise at the end of the record too. I also have a newer copy with a great punk rock/indie rock version of the classic Eddie Cochran "Summertime Blues". Great album, and its only just a taste of what will yet to come later on. 9/10.

drazy@gatecity.com
Yeah, it's a 1987 release. I know this because it was the first year I dropped acid and the Flaming Lips were right there with me. Mark Coyne chose drugs too and left the band to little brother Wayne. Apparently, Mark's drug use really must have burnt some images into Wayne's mind because he seems fascinated by 'em, writes a lot of songs about 'em, and then says that he's drug free. I believe him, though, because this release is a huge, I mean fucking huge, improvement over their first e.p. It starts out with the wistful "With You," a song about love and how it makes you feel like your on drugs. Then it's onto more songs about drugs, a song about Manson and a song about a man from Pakistan that I've been thinking about incessantly since 9/11. Drugs? Here it is.

soul_crusher77@hotmail.com (Mike K.)
They're still not quite sounding like the lips as we know them today (heck, Wayne doesn't even really do that quavery neil young-ish thing with his voice yet), but they're on their way. The biggest surprise for me here were noise-rockers like "Charlie Manson Blues", which as someone who started with the soft bulletin and worked his way back, is the sort of thing I'd never have expected them to have written. This isn't a bad thing, the flaming lips have always had lead guitarists who knew how to make neat noises come out of their guitars (except now, because they sort of don't have one at all), it just sorta seems like it was just their way of taking advantage of this situation before they figured out they could merge the guitar noises and the pop melodies together. They're all really good noise songs, and they add a nice edge to compliment the occasional slow druggy ballad. Only a few of the songs venture into lost Lips classic status (namely "Jesus Shootin' Heroin", "With You" and maybe "Godzilla Flick"), but it's all very solid. If not for In A Priest Driven Ambulance, this would probably be their most consistent pre-warner brothers album. I agree with the 8 records.

Oh, and I'm sort of wondering about what version of this cd has the "summertime blues" cover on it. It's mentioned in the liner notes of Finally The Punk Rockers Are Taking Acid, but curiously absent from the product itself, despite a bunch of other apparently contemporary covers showing up. It's a shame, because I'd love to hear that. Oh well, at least I get to hear that hillarious cover of the batman theme anytime I want.

knowstev@med.umich.edu (Steven Knowlton)
The questions mark should go within the quotes (as you have it) and the end of the sentence should be marked with a period. But you probably knew that.

walrus_ruckus@hotmail.com
Blue Cheer on LSD. If I could go with four words where fifty-nine thousand septic sylables I can't fucking spell would suffice I'd leave it there, but I can't so ya get more sour gummi wonder commentary. Can hear everything to come from a 20/20 hindsight listen of "Trains Brains and Rain": subtract the big drums and squint your ears. "Jesus" is surely the standout (though I prefer "Godzilla Flick" or maybe even "Just Like Before"). It's an odd track really. Doesn't fit with any later releases. Structure puts it on Priest (my 10 choice) but doesn't have the big black spiky ball o wet wool sound. As I type this it ended and "Just Like Before" started and I gotta say I'm enjoying myself a lot more. It's a stupid chugger and I love it. 8 of 10.

Well, four, if you count all the members - all the current members, that is. 1996, I mean. Unless they threw someone out. Hell, why would you count all four of them anyway? What the hell's your problem?

Reader Comments

iceman@sugar-river.net (Nathan Brewer)
i really like this album a lot. it's my favorite flaming lips album (although I've only heard a few of em...). "Everything's Explodin'" rocks pretty hard and has cool lyrics. "Ode To CC, Part 1" reminds me of Beck a lot, because, well, the song is backwards. "Love Yer Brain" is really pretty sounding. and besides, they smash everything at the end of it.

drazy@gatecity.com
Oh my God, it's their second full-length and they're already releasing a self-produced masterpiece! It starts off with a Lennon lift and ends with one. Dali appears on the cover and in the lyrics. Pop icons like C.C. DeVille and Evel Knievel are name-dropped. Buddhist monks set themselves ablaze. Hell and the United States' got all the good bands anyway. We're a bunch of megalomaniac fuckers, better than the rest of the world, violent needing more guns, co-dependent junkies of something, Snake River jumping, too proud to show how fucking afraid we really are. We invented rock music and, by god, we will destroy it too when we're good an ready starting with smashing the fuck out of a piano. Want a sample of one of the most important bands in the past twenty years? It all starts here folks.

soul_crusher77@hotmail.com (Mike K.)
This has a few more tracks I don't particularly like (in particular "Maximum Dream For Evil Kenievel", and "Ode To C.C. Part 1", although Part 2 is hillarious), but it's about on par with the last one. A couple of flashes of brilliance, a bunch of not quite brilliant but still really solid numbers, and one or two songs that don't really do anything. The classics are "One Million Billionth..." and "Love Yer Brain", but other things worthy of mention are "The Ceiling Is Bendin'" for the way the instruments keep disorientingly fading in and out during the verses, "Everything's Explodin'" for just being a good catchy punk rock number and starting off the record with a bang, and "Can't Stop The Spring" for those 'Sorcerer's Apprentice' samples. The songs Richard English penned are pretty damn good too, if you look past his weak and occasionally barely audible vocals. 8/10 again.

edm1213@msn.com
Yeah a second guitarist woulda made it better. Wayne says all the time that he's not a good guitar player, but he was still at this point the sole guitarist and wrote songs as good as "One Millionth Billonth of a I'm Not Gonna Write Out An Entire Song Title This Long Although I'm Actually Making It Longer Now" and "Jesus Shootin Heroin" back in 86-87. I guess there wasnt a lot of second guitarists in Oklahoma back then until they met Donahue. Maybe they coulda gotten Paul Leary or something. I also like "Ode to CC" which I guess is about CC Deville, "Everything's Explodin" "Love Yer Brain" (the only song before She Dont Use Jelly represented on the UFOs at the Zoo DVD), and most of the rest. The high point of the first 3, though i enjoy "With You," "Charlie Manson Blues" (i have a song called "George W. Bush Blues" though i'm probably not gonna do anything with it), "Trains Something and Rain" or whatever it was called and some others on Hear It Is too. 8/10

Still, folks complained. Frankly, I'm baffled as to what they might have found to complain about, but there you go. If you axe my ass, it's every bit as strong and lovely as the last two. They could still use a second guitarist, sure, but what else can you bitch about? Melody's the name of the game when you're talking about the Lips, and it's certainly here in SPADES, as they played in CLUBS, winning the HEARTS of girls wearing DIAMONDS. It's not metal. It's not good-time rock 'n' roll. It's a sort of messy cruddy pop rock created by some guys who know where it's at (musically speaking, of course). At least, in 1989, it was. Oh, how things change.

Reader Comments

InMyEyes82@aol.com
This album is not very good, IMHO. The 23 minute song is interesting and at times wonderful, but apart from that, the piano part, and "Chrome Plated Suicide", this album sounds disconcertingly like cruddy Dinosaur Jr. type stuff, but without the melodies.

ratkinson@epicrealm.com (Ryan Atkinson)
Oooh gotta agree with MyI's here. Love the Lips, and I really find it difficult to want to put this on with any regularity. Its almost like they started to get conventional here without really knowing how to do it. Considering Im a great big ol' fan of Oh my Gawd and Ambulance, I gotta consider this one something to get last by the Lips.

drazy@gatecity.com
I'm no drummer, but I play one in my basement. And I'll be Goddamned that drummer extraordinaire, Richard English, grabbed a bus home to OK right in the middle of this tour. Man, was I pissed. What did Wayne say to him to make him leave? Did Mike's hair get on his nerves? Come back, Richard! Play those fills. Fail to keep proper time every now and again! I miss you! This album is pretty weak too, which made me even more bitter until someone played me "Five Stop" from their next album. Then everything was o.k. They got back on my good side again. "Telepathic Surgery" isn't that bad, it ain't that good, either. You try knocking out another masterpiece after being on the road 300 days a year. It's tough. I forgive you, Flaming Lips. Honest.

galleyian@mac.com (Ian Galley)
I have to agree with most of the comments made above, Telepathic Surgery is not a particularly good album. There are a few good songs littered around, but most of it is pointless filler. Even at 30 minutes 'Hells Angels...' is shockingly bereft of ideas.

It's saved by the wonderful 'Right Now' and 'UFO Story'.

Good job you can now get in in a set, shame that wasn't out when I bought this.

Reader Comments

Jcjh20@aol.com
I agree with the 9. The title track and "Lucifer Rising" both rock very much. "Ma, I Didn't Notice" is my fave, as its beautiful balladry, except for that weird-butt ending with 3 minutes of industrial noise and feedback.

susieliva48@nyc.rr.com (Susanne Livathinopoulos)
Just one superfluous comment, really: the title track and the especially intense "Lucifer Rising" are full of distortion. But the "two beautiful, frigged-up ballads" are pretty raucous as well. Hell, "Ma, I Didn't Notice"'s pseudo-industrial noise section is the loudest thing on the record. "Let Me Be It" has a good cheap organ sound, but the chorus feels muted. That's all.

And there's something for everybody! The dark acoustic numbers (especially "Stand In Line" and "Five Stop Mother Superior Rain") recall the Stones at their Sticky Fingers best, "Take Me Ta Mars" is about the grooviest Can rip-off ever penned, and "God Walks Among Us Now" - oh my. Oh HO my. Pump the bass way way way up and maybe, if you're really lucky, you'll be able to discern the melody through the buzz, static, and hiss that screech at you like a cat with his tail in my mouth - an unbelievably satisfying song. "Shine On Sweet Jesus" and "Mountain Side" are pretty much classic, too. Natural sounds created by Americans. Moods galore and splendid melodies to match. Beatles comparisons are possible. That's all I'm saying.

Reader Comments

bthom@turbonet.com (Ray Thomson)
Priest is saved by the two bonus tracks which aren't on the one you reviewed, so who knows how you gave it a nine. Notables on the first ten are "Shine on Sweet Jesus", and "Take Me ta Mars". Beyond that, you gotta be in the mood, but when you are, it works really well. 8.

azitelli@stevens-tech.edu (Andrew Zitelli)
best album of their indie schlock days, easy. a lot of this one is ungodly racket, but so catchy and crazy and silly. yeah, i also want to mention the two bonus tracks, one of which sounds to me a lot like their early hard stuff, and the other which is another piece of brainless pop. but waynes voice is so loopy and fun to listen to, so i give it a 9 -- a 9+ with the bonus tracks, just because it's 10 more minutes of the Lips!!!

ABRU9502@Mercury.gc.peachnet.edu (Adam Bruneau)
I agree with Andrew Zitelli here (tho I haven't heard Telepathic yet...) that this is the best album from their Indie days. At first, I only dug "Unconciously Screamin'", "Five-Stop Mother Superior Rain" and "Wonderful World" but after a few listens, I found that I really _really_ like just about every song here...except maybe for "Mountainside", which seems a little contrived. Oh, the CD bonus tracks both rock and the beautiful cover of "Wonderful World" had me in tears the first time I heard it. Yet another 9 from me!

richbunnell@home.com
Kind of formulative, though a lot of the album shows hints of the band's developing genius. Basically, I agree with most people that the first half of this album and the "Wonderful World" cover are fantabulous, but that the four remaining songs are all sort of ugly and dull. "God Walks Among Us Now" and "Mountain Side," to name a couple of examples, rock, but that's all they do - they rock without any sort of melodies. Unlike "Unconsciously Screamin'," which rocks with a HELL of a melody. Otherwise, "Shine On Sweet Jesus" is probably the most representative of the bouncy, anarchic joviality typical of the next album, "Take Me Ta Mars" is a great empty cold bass groove, and "Five Stop Mother Superior Rain" - hoot mon, acoustic bliss. On the whole, I give the album a seven.

Jcjh20@aol.com
Noisy as hey-ell when they rock, but beautiful when they use the acoustics. "5 Stop Mother Superior Rain", "There You Are", and "Stand In Line" are really good acoustic songs. "God Walks Among Us Now", wow is that a noisy song. But great sounding noise, with a good melody (may be buried under noise, but its there) and thats what i like about them. "Take Me Ta Mars" is a groovy bass/drum driven song. "Unconsiously Screaming" is actually a hint of the pop/rock they would later do in future records, and the "Wonderful World" cover is nice too. Good album, its great to hear a second guitarist finally. 9/10.

drazy@gatecity.com
The David Fridmann touch starts with this one, and he's helped reaffirm my belief in The Flaming Lips again. Maybe it had a little to do with the fact that I stopped dropping acid the year of this album's release, thanks to some nasty, post-hallucinogenic depression. Mike's hair stopped growing around the time this album came out. Oh, Wayne's there too, the l'il soldier, guiding his troops to another victory. Has this band ever recorded a bad album? Well, they came close with ""Surgery" and their first e.p., but I've come up with good, legitimate excuses for both of those releases. The Lips get their head outta their ass with this one and probably think they have a shot at signing to a major. That's some funny shit right there. The Flaming Lips on a major label?! Yeah, and the Butthole Surfers will have a hit on the Beatles' old label too. HA HA HA!! "There You Are (Jesus Song #7)" is about as beautiful as the beautiful songs on "The White Album." "Mountain Side" rocks harder than "Misty Mountain Hop." "Wonderful World" could've been a novelty, but it isn't; Wayne's too smart to fuck with one of the most recognized songs of the 20th century. feedback. He's just as sincere as Mr. Armstrong was, only with feedback for strings. "Five Stop Mother Superior Rain" is one of the best songs Wayne's penned. More songs about Jesus and babies. The Rosetta Stoned between the Lips of the eighties and the highs they reached during the nineties. Richard who? Ah, he's probably laying carpet in OK somewhere. Besides, he could barely keep time anyway, the fucking pussy...

galleyian@mac.com (Ian Galley)
Not much to report on this except it ROCKS. Can't fault it, twelve odd years old and it stills sounds fresh, visionary and poetic. 'Five Stop Mother Superior Rain' is somehow my favourite Lips song ever, (despite being told by a guitar player ex-friend of mine telling me it's the same chord sequence as, forgive me for uttering these words, four non blondes.)

'Take Meta Mars' is Can, nowt wrong with that at all. In fact, it's encouraged. 'God Walks...' scares the shit out of me every time.

stuart.goldberg@dechert.com
Just wanted to concur with Ian Galley - Five Stop Mother Superior Rain is the Lips' finest moment to date, including anything on Yoshi. Listening to it now, 13 years on, it's incredible how contemporary it still sounds. And it's got the perfect line, "All my smiles, getting in the hate generation's way". Genius.

walrus_ruckus@hotmail.com
10 of 10. I'll be the only one to make this claim but you can all take your pop gerbils to the altar of...well, somewhere. Shut up ye voices! Leave me alone! Kit the talking car YOU ARE NOT REAL! 'Priest is magnificent. "Used to be all right/but things got strange" God Walks Among Us Now! Wonderful World! how great is that? Best use of the song until the opening sequence of the PC game Fallout in '97. Acoustic or amped, there is a consistent sound through this album and there's nothing else quite like it. Fence of feedback without murkiness. Fuck: buy it!

Reader Comments

LSDiety@aol.com
The title of this album is a reference to the 1991 Bodycount/Ice-T/"Cop Killer" controversy.

lyabibrave@mindspring.com (Christian Smith)
The title is a reference to the punk dystopia movie "River's Edge." One of the kids says it when the nerdy suckup questions the validity of what the hippies did.

And my my, what a beautiful sound it is. Hissy distorted noise reigns supreme like some kind of bastard king until it is suddenly buried behind currents of lovely maturity that drift in and out of the mix, introducing dreamy melodies that would have been lost to the world forever sans the grace of amazingly strong production, thoughtful arrangements, and remarkably unorthodox rock 'n' roll instruments. I'd compare it to Sgt. Pepper's, but they don't just toss out the guitar rock like the Fabulous Foursome had done; they enhance it. Like, say, Bob Marley, if you work with me. If you don't, fuck off.

Just kiddin' about that "fuck off" thing. I meant to type "givl pgg," but you know these ornery keyboards.

The ten songs as a unit aren't quite as strong or immediate (whatever the hey that means) as the baker's three short of a dozen on the last slab of metal, but the production certainly doesn't let you down a teeny iota. And get this - somehow, to keep with the spirit of the proceedings, Wayne manages to sing every single note ON TUNE!!!! Buy it. Listen to it a few times. The songs can seem a little samey at first, but they'll catch up to you in a little bit. And for your info, my fave raves are "Hit Me Like You Did The First Time," "The Magician Vs. The Headache," "Frogs," and the mini-epic "Halloween On The Barbary Coast."

Say, you know what I just found out, ten years later? Jonathan wrote and sings a few of the songs! No wonder I thought Wayne was hitting all the notes!

Reader Comments

InMyEyes82@aol.com
Whoa, is this album great. So many FINE melodies this guy could put out, and the Beatles comparisons are actually plausible (unlike, say, with the Cranberries). Each and every song here is mindblowing, filled to the brim with ear candy like opera samples and violins, and such, and such. And the cool thing is that Wayne doesn't just rest on his laurels and say "Hey, look at all this stuff we got here!". He actually uses them to great effect, like on the eerie violins on "Gingerale Afternoon". Super stuff here.

khooper@incentre.net (Kristopher Hooper)
There's a part on one of the final acoustic-ish ditties on side two where a section of prerecorded orchestration starts-up. It is beautiful in a really fresh way because you have heard the sounds in question before and they are SOO familiar, yet the record snippet is totally out of synch, making this lush chaos in total contrast to the simple melody. I find, for me, that's what the Lip's are all about... a fresh spin on old hat.

dwhitwill@thegrid.net (Debbie Whitwill)
You know, this is the one I compare any other Lips product to. The first track is a loopy shoulda-been pop classic, "Hit Me Like The First Time" is a moving song you'd sing to your significant other, except is has tons of noise splashed on top. "Halloween On The Barbary Coast" is the pinnacle of Lips songwriting, soundscaping, and lyricism. "Well, the retards left when the evenin' came/Equilibrium makes 'em whole again" WHA?

richbunnell@home.com
This album rules. This is EXACTLY how I pictured the Lips when I was reading through this page for the first time-- anarchic fuzz-rockers who still somehow manage to throw actual melodies into the mix. "Hit Me Like You Did The First Time" is the best song, "Everyone Wants To Live Forever" is the catchiest, and the two acoustic numbers, though they don't immediately jump out at you, still have great melodies. "Halloween At The Barbary Coast" is magnificent; 5 minutes and 41 seconds of wonderful Lippitude.. The reason I didn't give a ten to the following three albums (Zaireeka not counted because I'm not sure if I'll ever hear that one) is because I KNEW that the Lips had to have an album that sounded like this. So the ten goes here, baby! I'm waitin' for the frogs to fall!

And yeah, the album ends with a hidden track filled with 29 minutes of speaker-shifting noise, so if I were to be some sort of objective technical nerd, the album would only get a six or seven, but that would make me no better than the people who give In The Court by King Crimson a really low grade just because "Moonchild" technically takes up a large section of the album.

hajjyuejw@hotmail.com (Kub)
Hit to Death showcases the mix between the Lips' earlier, hissier work and their gently somwhat flowing work. All the songs pack a nice, noisy punch. "Hold Your Head" is a psychedelic masterpiece. The song and the sounds cannot be described. By far one of the Lips' eeriest songs. "You Have To Be Joking" is a more serious approach to song making reminescent of the sweet, but Lipsy "There You Are". Ignore the 30 minute or so track of hidden noise at the end. "Halloween on the Barbary Coast" places them atop the hill of making one chord verses sound so nice. With layer upon layer of guitar, bongos, power tools, computers, and layers of guitar. Buy this album first, then move to more recent ones. Then collect the old stuff. Although, Priest is a nice album.

misterkite@mindspring.com (Adam Bruneau)
Good gawd...it's The Flaming Lips again! A lot of folks swear by this album, and I can definitely hear why. The songs all completely rock and more often than not Wayne actually hits the notes as he sings...a big plus.

The album's a bit too crowded in the pink haze an army of musical instruments but I still enjoy it on occasion. Only when I don't have a headache tho....

drazy@gatecity.com
The Flaming Lips sign to Warner Bruthas and sell out...And boy you've still got shit for brains! The Dubba Bee gave 'em a proper recording budget and the Lips made an album we all expected they could make. 'Bout time... Instead of other retards that would take the cash advance and spend it on heroin, the Lips spent it for studio time; to pay for those chellos, power drills, and licensing fees to Michael "I personally fucked up Floyd's 'The Final Cut'" Kamen for the "Brazil" sample. American heros with strong American work ethics. God bless the Flaming Lips. 9/10

galleyian@mac.com (Ian Galley)
Dive bomb the bass then "Doo Wop", a perfect way to start a perfect album. 10/10. No need for any further analysis

edm1213@msn.com
Well some album in the Priest Driven Ambulance to present era has to be the weakest link. Not a bad weakest link (actually the weakest link might be AWWTM), I like a lot of this, including the ones Jonathan sings. Also i love the title "Talking Bout the Smiling Deathporn Immortality Blues (Everyone Wants to Live Forever)" I have some lyrics for a song called "Talking Bout the Hammerin Hank Rollins Gun In Mouth Blues (Everyone Wants To Live Forever)" Whether anyone will get the joke from this derivative title or whether Rollins or Coyne will wanna sue if it makes it to tape I dont know, but it's all good. Also, "Frogs" has a video where Wayne's teeth are filmed way too close-up. Much like the UFOs at the Zoo DVD. The noise thing at the end is fun enough, if you're in that kind of mood. Donahue and the drummer quit after this and Drozd and Jones joined. Sometimes I wish Jones was still with them, but a five-piece Lips with both Drozd and Jones on guitar probably would be strange, although it may work just for a special appearance type thing. Don't think that'd happen. These guys arent reunion-era Maiden or Syknyrd or nothing. Some bands are just meant to be just 3 or 4 dudes.

Enough about me, let's talk about sex. 8/10.

Plus, they got on the radio! The hilarious and infectious masturbation ode, "She Don't Use Jelly," provided the Lippers with their first strong MTV support, boosted by the band's surreal guest appearance on Beverly Hills: 90210 starring Jason Priestley. "Turn It On" got a little bit of play, too, but not nearly as much as it should have considering that its melody is exactly the same as "Let Her Cry" by Hootie And The Blowjob. Elsewhere, "Superhumans" and "Chewin' The Apple Of Your Eye" are gorge, positive-sounding pop thumpers, "Oh My Pregnant Head" is weird enough to warrant about fifty listens in a row, and "Slow*Nerve*Action" (with its astonishingly John Bonhammy drum sound) is the sole hint of the dark underbelly that used to live in this beast we call Flamers. Eh? Yeah, even though some of the lyrics are a little melancholy, most of the tuneage on this discage is happy as garbage. Good though, unless you're one o' them G.G. Allin fans, in which case it's really faggy and they don't eat their own poop.

Reader Comments

bthom@turbonet.com (Ray Thomson)
Okay, Transmissions aas some beautiful tracks and some tracks that you just have to be in the mood for. It also has "When Yer 22", which is really boring, and "*******" which gets old after the novelty wears off. Umm... Notable for amazing songs "Be My Head" and "Turn It On", as well as beautiful ditties, "Chewin' the Apple in Yer Eye," "Slow Nerve Action", "Superhumans", and the infamous played-it-on-90201 "She Don't Use Jelly".

misterkite@mindspring.com (Adam Bruneau)
Definitely a 9! This one is just as good as Clouds and maybe even better. All the songs are simple crazy pop and brimming with studio effects. The Flaming Lips are an audio circus and they're the best in town! I really enjoy "Superhumans" and "Chewin' the Apple of Your Eye" as lost pop classics. "She Don't Use Jelly" and "Turn It On", of course, are some of the more popular songs and deserving of their fame, but there's some even better stuff here. "Oh My Pregnant Head" really reminds me of Pink Floyd and the "******" is a strikingly mellow prelude to the violent "When Yer 22". I just love this album. It's pizza for your ears. Can't wait for A Soft Bulletin!

InMyEyes82@aol.com
Man, I love this band. This album is the most "rock" of the Lips' albums, though it still has some melancholy acoustic stuff like "Chewing.." and "*****". "She Don't Use Jelly" is silly but has beautiful verses with the lilting guitars and what not. "Superhumans", "Oh My Pregnant Head", "When Yer Twenty Two" and "Slow Nerve Action" are all stupendously beautiful psycho-babbly rock and roll tunes. It's a terrific record but it's surpassed by "Clouds Taste Metallic", simply because THAT album is a godhead.

9/10

mprindle@nyc.rr.com (Rich Bunnell)
I found this used, among about seven other copies of the same album, for seven bucks, and all I can say is that the sheer number of used copies was just a fluke based on the band's commercial "one-hit wonder" status, because this is a GREAT album. It has a myriad of crunchy guitars and superb melodies. "Pilot At The Queer Of God" is just so apocalyptic and relentless-- why hasn't anyone mentioned it? Plus, you're right-- "Let Her Cry" by (ugh) Hootie has the exact same chorus melody as "Turn It On". And gee, which band's album came first? This one! Stupid generic boogie bar band AOR moron Hootie idiots. Oh yeah-- this gets a nine.

danzig9@hotmail.com (Daniel Lawrence)
I really like this record. It's creative, it's witty, and beats the hell out of anything the kids are listening to these days. Too bad they only were admired for "She Don't Use Jelly" and probably seen as one hit wonders. 8

Jcjh20@aol.com
Great record. Really a great record. The mellow sad acoustic stuff is achingly beautiful ("******" which is really called "Plastic Jesus", if i am not mistaken, "Chewing The Apple Of Your Eye") and the noisy rockers are totally awesome, "When Yer 22", "Slow*Nerve*Action", "Superhumans", "Pilot At The Queer of God" ("Shes Got HELICOPERS!"). Fuckin great stuff, i love these guys. And yes "She Dont Use Jelly" is a great song, very catchy and funny. A definate 9.

drazy@gatecity.com
I'm on a motherfucking quest to respond to every Goddamn Flaming Lips record that this website lists. Why embark on such a futile and trivial quest? Everyone who visits this site is part of the choir and the postings, no matter how stupid or inane they may be, only reflects how passionate about this community is about music...Except for that one dude who praised David Coverdale in an angry tirade on some other band's review. And it's passion that have kept the Flaming Lips on the radar for so long. With each subseqent album we see them advancing, improving, and challenging themselves (and their listeners) into new and exciting landscapes. T.F.T.S.H. continues this tradition; from the opening radio dials 'n feedback of "Turn It On" lead you towards another one of them tasty guitar parts you wish you'd thought of or, at least, wish you knew where the Lips lifted the chords from. Whatever the case, you wish within the first 50 seconds that all those other stations had the balls to do just what Wayne suggests. Sequing into "Pilot Can At The Queer Of God," which blantantly rips the drum intro of Floyd's "Take Up Thy Stethoscope And Walk," it becomes apparent that the Oakies have found a sympathetic ear with producer David Fridmann. Fridmann is the perfect producer for these oddballs; taking their feedback to a higher form and bringing new dimensions into their world. And the rest of the album is spot on, including that 90210 hit "Jelly" that caused the curly haired dude to exclaim the Lips' rocked per Spelling's script. They do, it does, and "Transmissions" is one of the high points of their career. The great thing is, the band proved they could do even better.

galleyian@mac.com (Ian Galley)
I can't really add any more to the debate, critically-wise (rolled a fat one in your honour, good, good piers). Except to say "Slow Nerve Action' is the greatest Lips song ever!

Ten out of Ten

clash@iglou.com (Chris Carrier)
I'm now a big fan of this album, but I'd not really examined it closely until I was DJing in Chicago, and a regular kept requesting Slow*Nerve*Action which... got into my head. Anyway, I was acting in this little independent film and there was this scene where I'm just supposed to be crying (like it's a child memory) out of nowhere... no lines, no preceding action, no getting hit with a bat. I was pretty straight forward about not being a "cry on cue" actor, but I guess the director changed his mind. So I asked for a bit of time and I went into my car and listened to Slow*Nerve*Action on the stereo. The song may be about lost youth, regret, rejection, whatever... it all works for me and that guitar lick kicks my fucking ass like no other. Anyway, I was able to do the scene, thanks to Paul the invisible dog. The song itself doesn't make me choke up, but it gets me introspective and well... I'm always moved by genius. It's my favorite Lips song.

walrus_ruckus@hotmail.com
9 of 10. Great test of the quality of yer speakers. Mucho fun-o. First and only release where the lyrics were maybe worth a moment's attention.

Re: She Don't Use Jelly Compact Disc Maxi-Single -- Nothing to see here folks, move along. Unless you...see below. The hit song, an indulgent dork rework of it, an itermittently amusing too long useless version of "Turn It On" (one of my favorite Lips songs), and a version of the Jesus song (the Satellite one, not one of the other five hundred Jesus ones) with no distortion. Track this down only if you want to see a blurry photo of a woman with big lips unable to see a plate of eggs. 5 of 10. For the blindfolded with ductape big lipped smelling egg but unable to see it crowd this is a 1000 of 10. You will NOT be disappointed.

matthewbyrd@hotmail.com
Pfffft, nice bunch of 60's-like pop-singles...... but I'd never give it a 9 or a 10. I'd give it an 8. Same thing for the next one. The two albums don't amount to much more than a collection of cutesy-tutesy little pop ditties, that's not bad, but not great. They're pretty damn GOOD pop songs though, hope I didn't sound too pessimistic there. *sigh* ok 8 1/2's for both of 'em just you know... for all the genius that went into 'em.

browningub40@peoplepc.com
I bought this one hoping this would be a good release from a good band. I aint getting anything from them again ever. Not that their no good or anything, but this album stinks to high heaven. It sounds horrible in my opinion, and the songs have no meaning whatsoever, which is a problem kinda. And especially since this is supposed to be one of their best ones...well if this is their best, maybe they should keep it to themselves. lol. And i have certain issues with their lead singer as well. Not only is he annoying, but on most of these songs it seems like he's trying to sing in the most annoying, lousiest way possible.I mean, even if you look at the song titles on this one it's easy to see why they don't take any of thier music serioulsly, or if they do they're keeping it a well hidden secret.

als66@case.edu (Adam L. Spektor)
Mark,

In regard to your review of The Flaming Lips' "Transmissions From the Satellite Heart":

I'm surprised nobody has mentioned "Moth in the Incubator" yet, which has always been one of my favorite Lips songs. The rousing slide-psych-guitar stomp coda is one of the most cathartic moments in the band's catalog.

edm1213@msn.com
this probably deserves a high 8, but still 8/10, just cause a couple songs like ****** dont do much for me. But "Turn It On" does (and should have gotten as much play as "She Don't Use Jelly"... cool video too. Girls rockin out at a laundromat). So should've "Be My Head." A lot of songs late in the album are great too. "Moth In the Incubator" "When Yer 22" and "Slow Nerve Action" are real good, as is "Pilot at the Queer of..." well, something like that. That title makes no sense to me. But the song rocks. And it's tuned to Drop D, though why I know that I have no idea. I really wish they played more of this album live than "She Don't Use Jelly" nowadays. Maybe next tour, though the next album will be out by then so who knows. Also Ronald Jones makes the neatest guitar noise this side of Kevin Shields (or maybe Steve Albini, though you know he's a tad more traditional I guess. I have no idea what's traditional or not as I can still barely play guitar after all these years. Still, I saw video on Youtube of a Lips show from 94 and Ronald Jones had the largest array of pedals I've seen in a long time. I hope he regularly checked out the batteries on those, i couldnt keep track of em all. Damn I've been writing in these () for a long time). I hope Ronald Jones comes out of retirement and does a solo album or something one day. I actually posted on a comment on the Myspace Ronald Jones fan page asking him too. Hey, he's still young and all.

OK, I've heaped an awful lot of praise on to an album I only gave 8/10 to. Of to listen to the Soft Bulletin again and watch the UFOs at the Zoo DVD like a good Soft Bulletin bandwagon jumper who dismissed this band as alterna-crap one hit wonders while I was still discovering death metal back in '94.

Here's a fun game; go around markprindle.com, try to locate all the albums you haven't made comments about yet, and comment on em at the random.

The most surprising thing about the buxom superstar's musical entre is exactly how much she sounds like obscure one-hit-wonders "The Flaming Lips." Some of my more "long in the tooth" readers might remember that band's whimsical early-'90s novelty hit "She Don't Use Jelly" from its many appearances on popular MTV program Beavis & Butthead. Somehow, the talented Ms. Lohan pulls off an EXACT COPY -- down to the very SECOND -- of that long-forgotten nugget from yesteryear! There are times when you could almost SWEAR that it's the original singer performing the timid warbles, but nope - it's just Lil' Miss Lindsay showing the big bad world what she can do!

Sassy Ms. Lohan continues the proceedings with a lively hoedown bluegrass version of a Flaming Lips rarity entitled "Turn It On," complete with instrumental assistance from former celebrities The B***hole Surfers and Firehose. Talk about adorable! Next up on Luscious Lindsay's soon-to-be-Billboard-chart-topper is a solo acoustic version of an aged hymn entitled "Plastic Jesus," and the magnum opus reaches its denouement with a genius piece of avant-garde cut-and-paste composition entitled "Translucent Egg," essentially a loud, brilliant reworking of "She Don't Use Jelly"'s master themes. Bravo, Lindsay! My compliments to the Chef! Girl go, you!

At a mere 20 minutes, the major label debut from America's Chesty Sweetheart may seem a mite brief, but sometimes you have to measure quality rather than quantity. And considering sweet Lindsay's lusty sensuality and dual artistic assets, it should be but a matter of months before we find her doing quintuple-anals in Max Hardcore's Crosby, Stills & Gash.

Reader Comments

EvilFrank@aol.com
Just so ya know The lips arent drug addicts.and there songs are not about drugs . (although "on Hit to death ,"That one song felt good to burn is questionable) But other then that -Provideing needles for yer ballons......"and marjuina?"....uh no.

Jcjh20@aol.com
Umm, i think he ment that as a joke meaning "Poppy". Nowhere do you see him mention about the Flaming Lips as drug users, do ya? I might be wrong (good Radiohead song) though.

drazy@gatecity.com
Yup, it's on Warner's and yup, it's warts-n-all Lips. God fucking bless them. You get an early incarnation of "Bad Days," lots of low-fi fuzz, and an awesome Smog cover recorded at a (now defunct) Minneapolis record store that is probably home to a Starbucks or some shit. The 8 eight is high but high is when you should listen to it. Smoke a bowl, and laugh at one of the best album titles of the decade. O.K., so it's an e.p. technically, but I'm baked half the time anyway.

edm1213@msn.com
From what I've read none of the Lips have been into drugs since the 80s except Drozd whose situation up to 2001 is well documented on the Fearless Freaks DVD. Though Ivins and a couple of ex-members were said to be tripping occasionally during the early 90s Priest/Hit to Death period, Wayne's always said he hasnt done anything since his early 20s, which may have even been before he formed the band in late 82/early 83 whenever.

Anyway I heard this once at a used store and didnt see much use for it except the early version of Bad Days. A couple of the covers were decent if I remember correctly. I guess this was teaser or holdever collection of some sort since She Dont Use Jelly was getting airplay and they were on Lollapalooza (Smashing Pumpkins headlining the mainstage, Lips on the second stage... the only question is which one would be headlining now. In case you havent noticed, the Lips grew to become the band Corgan always seemed to be hyping his Pumpkins to be. I'd like him more if he grew some of his hair back and wrote an entire album of decent to good songs again.)

Good if you wanna collect everything they've done, but hell i'm probably not even gone bother with the new Christmas On Mars DVD/CD and will probably only buy the next album if it's better than At War With the Mystics, so whatever. Decide for yourself if you can still find this one.

But after you listen to it a few times, it starts to sound much less like they're bounding about in Fairy Rabbit Patch, and more like they're just really worn out and depressed, but trying desperately to cheer themselves up. The songs are positive, but relaxed. And they actually aren't all the same. Most of them (especially the first five or six songs) are rilly memorable. Heck, wonderfully memorable, if I may be so supportive. At this point in time, I'm most likely to rave about the movie-projector-ridden "The Abandoned Hospital Ship" and the actually-different-from-the-others bass-driven "This Here Giraffe," but that's probably only because I haven't listened to it enough times yet to really pick out individual songs from the herd. It's awfully samey but, like Hit To Death, repeated listens reveal depth in the songwriting and arrangements that are just hard to notice at first.

Reader Comments

bthom@turbonet.com (Ray Thomson)
Ok, let's get one thing straight right now. Clouds Taste Metallic is awesome and brilliant. The other two I have, Transmissions and Priest Driven are less-so. In fact, I'd give Clouds a ten if it weren't for a few slow tracks on the first side. Namely, the fetus song, "Brainville", "This Here Giraffe", and "Headache". I don't know why you think the songs sound the same. Maybe you're crazy or something. 9.

WAYVED@aol.com
Man-this shit is intoxicating. This was the first Flaming Lips I heard-and just the bells at the end of "Abandoned Hospital Ship" are completely amazing...Perfect music to get drunk in a hotel room on a sunny day-staring out the window..awesome!

misterkite@mindspring.com (Adam Bruneau)
After looking all over the place for Clouds Taste Metallic, it finally popped up in a used CD shop and I snagged meself a copy. WOAH! These guys kick not amoeba, not even George Kennedy, but TED KENNEDY!!! It's like Syd Barrett-driven Pink Floyd was born in the eighties and survived the depressed crap put out by every other "rock" band since! Let's see...what do I like on here? Hundreds and hundreds of memorable tracks here: "Placebo Headwound" I really like; "This Here Giraffe" is cool and reminds me much of Piper at the Gates of Dawn; "Brainville" is levitating, amusement-park psychedelia at its finest; "They Punctured My Yolk" is like some guy just blasting off; "Lightning Strikes the Postman" is heavy absurdness at its best, like what John Lennon might have written if that sod Mark Chapman hadn't killed him; "Bad Days" was what got me into this and evem though it rocks, some of those other tracks rock even more! Well, at the very least it's still all entertaining and fun and at the best its a psychedelic modern-day masterpiece. I give it a 9 Man, these guys really deserve some credit! Until this record, I hadn't bought anything that was recorded past 1973, but I'm sure as hell gonna check out some other Lips offerings. Let's see, what were the big records of '95? Kiss from a Rose? Jagged Little Pill? Oh gawd, don't make me laugh.

InMyEyes82@aol.com
Now THIS is superb. Beautiful melodies, a kickass drummer, humor, and some ungodly rocking songs ("kim's watermelon gun", etc.), are all this music fan needs, thank you very much! Jesus, like Prindle, I wasnt sure about it at first, but it grew on me like kudzu on Kareem Abdul jabbar. I mean, listening to the album, you tend to think to yourself "My god, this guy is singing Sesame street stuff and he's unembarassed to do that! Heh heh! Cool", and also I tend to think, "My god, this guy is as big a genius as Brian Wilson or John Lennon!"

mprindle@nyc.rr.com (Rich Bunnell)
"Dukes Of Stratosphear happy. Gross."? Aah, bleep you. The Dukes had their share of dark, melancholy pastiches among the 16 songs they released ("25 O'Clock" and "The Mole From The Ministry" come to mind), and the happy songs wouldn't have been happy had the psychedelic movement not been basically the same sort of thing in the first place. The band was a joke, and an utterly excellent one at that. Besides, XTC's normal music is quite cynical most of the time, diametrically opposed to the music on the Dukes' masterpiece of an album.

This should be a verbal question on the SAT-- "Rich Bunnell is to XTC as Tim Eimiller is to The Who." Well, everyone has to have a favorite band. Sorry to seem off-topic -again-, but it needed to be said and I definitely do plan on venturing into the Flaming Lips' discography in the very near future (when I finally get some freakin' extra spending money for such matters).

richbunnell@home.com
...Anywaaaay... obsessive rabid drooling hero worship aside, I found this album (partially out of a desire to make up for the comment above, and also because I've been curious about this band for a while now), and I'm certainly glad I did. It's a very happy affair, true, yet a very pretty one-- just listen to that chiming guitar at the end of "The Abandoned Hospital Ship," or the pure, harmonic melody of "This Here Giraffe." Only once does the band deviate from the beautiful harmonies and completely rock out like on the last album, and that song, "Psychiatric Explorations Of The Fetus With Needles," is one of the best! Maybe the album's huge standout tracks are crammed onto the first side, but that doesn't mean the songs come even twenty miles CLOSE to bad. In fact, I'd give this a ten were I familiar with every other album (Zaireeka is gonna be costly and hard to find...arrrggggh...), but as it is I'm forced to settle with a nine. Frickin' one-ten system.

jcjh20@aol.com
Wonderful album. I love that kinda optimistic/happy yet lazy sound that Mark was talking about in this album. I do agree that the highlight songs are on-to the first side, but there is not even close to a bad song on here. Everyone i know seems to love "Bad Days" which is a better track for people to remember the Lips by then "She dont use Jelly", "Evil Will Prevail" is another favorite of mine, "Guy Who got a headache" is cute; and shows that the Lips have a sence of humor, "Kims Watermelon Gun" rocks.. Really no need to name any names.. Every track is good. I really wasnt too familiar with the Lips when i bought this, but i was easily impressed when i first listened. If Zaireeka was never relased, id give this a 10, but ill give this one a high 9.

drazy@gatecity.com
And here we have it: a band that has come from loving feedback, shitty amplifiers, and stoner-inspired lyrics (yeah, we know Wayne's sober) into a remarkable American rock band. David Fridmann officially became the Lip behind the curtain with this release and secured his place as one of our country's top producers. Never has a fit felt so right, but I'm willing to bet that David has more of a say in the Lips' sound that George Martin dreamed. It's a pity that this album didn't sell much (got my copy in the used bin) but it did manage to shake the come-latelys off of the bandwagon that jumped on after "Jelly." Does that make it worse than "Transmission?" Hell no. The album was out for, what, a year before some radio programmer thought "Jelly" was a novelty song and MTV blessed (or cursed) the song with Buzz Bin status. This album is a clear progression and, I'll be damned, continued the Lips tradition of having never released a bad album yet. Number nine indeed, and a hint at what sonic landscapes they would visit later. If you see it in the used bin, it's a bargain and you shouldn't feel ashamed at all if you have to buy it at full price.

galleyian@mac.com (Ian Galley)
I Love my Mam.

There are many reasons for this, but the reason I will divulge is this, the one that follows, now. I asked my Mam to get me Clouds Taste Metallic by The Flaming Lips around the Christmas Time of it's release.

Quite a challenge as the record shops in Sunderland only sell 'The Frogs Chorus' by John Lennon, (some ancient by-law passes by the ancestor of Jimmy Nail for to placate some moss); so it was to my great surprise that on Christmas Day I unwrapped this treasured disk, popped it on and very nearly shit me self as a drum roll tore apart the very foundations my live had been based on.

The house didn't fall down but the rafters were raised upon the heralding of the chimes of love, (the dog was driven mad by the clicky camera FX too!)

'When You Smile' is the best Lips song ever! Possibly the greatest beat ever! There is so much pop on display here I was always amazed at how little impact they made in the mainstream blah, blah, blah. But I never imagined seeing, (and HEARING), Wayne on Top of the Pops that.... t.b.c...

Evil will prevail and all our bad days will end.

Ten out of Ten

kevin.by@selby.no
great record!!! listening to the opener, "The Abandoned Hospital Ship", i thought it was gonna be something like "The Soft Bulletin" but it's not. there's hints towards that album here: like, the present use of percussion and the big lo-fi drumsound. unlike The Bulletin, this CD contain songs about watermellon guns, people with headaches who accidently saves the world and laughing giraffes set to lots of cool fuzzy crickle-crackely guitars. my favorite moment during the first half of the record is "Brainville" - the verse is sweet and melancholic the way only Mr. Coyne can do it but transformes into a humpty-dumpty happy song. excellent band, excellent humour. after this terrific start to the CD, things settle down with "they punctured my volk" before really taking off: "Lightning Strikes the Postman". that's exactly how i feel when that anthemic riff kicks off - like a lightning-struck postman...and what about "Christmas at the Zoo"? listen to those guitar-arrangments, and that playfull bassline!!! how the hell do they come up wit that? it sounds like a childrens song, like Ween's most playfull moments or the Beatles, "Obla-di-obla-da", "Bungalow Bill" and "Octopuses Garden" to name a few. the Bealtes got heeps of them and listening to the Flaming Lips from here on to Yoshimi and the Pink Robots, the Beatles sounds like a big influence on the Lips' songwriting but also Neil Young. hey, who am i kidding? this is the Flaming Fucking Lips one hundred percent!

walrus_ruckus@hotmail.com
8 of 10. Sorry folks, nothing wrong here but nothing grabs me either. Heck, I like Priest so much more I'm tempted to knock everything else down another notch. Sure, it is LSD Beach Boys with feedback but...dammit, I guess I just miss the guitars. Not just that I think but that's a start.

watta502@yahoo.gr (Akis Katsman)
I really, really like this album. It's the only Lips album I've heard so far and it's so beautiful. I didn't like it at first much, maybe because of the high vocals and the noise, but it really grew on me. They do that neo-psychedelic thing very well. I think I like all of the songs there, so many great melodies. My favourite has to be "Brainville", the melodies are excellent, both verse and chorus. I think I'd give this album a nine.

edm1213@msn.com
This album seems made for a 9 of 10. Many great songs, final album with Ronald Jones, and more consistent than Transmissions (8/10). Bad Days, Brainville, This Here Giraffe and Christmas at the Zoo are standouts. Any Lips is good Lips, and everything from Priest onward is essential, but this is their high point as a four piece rock band.

jschneek@yahoo.com
Well, it took some time..." Yeah, this album is definitely a grower. This is the one that gets the ten from me, just slightly edging out the brilliant-aside-from-a-few-missteps "The Soft Bulletin" and the wild classic "In A Priest Driven Ambulance." The "Oh My Gawd!!!" album is also kinda underrated as a messy burst of psychedelic-prog-punk that doesn't always work but is still very ambitious for a little indie rock band just starting out and "Transmissions" was the introduction of the classic lineup with some of the their all-time best songs ("Slow Nerve", "Pilot"). As for "Zaireeka," psychedelic masterpiece that it is, I guess I never got over the feeling of paying thirty bucks for it when it first came out and then bringing it home and thinking "What is this shit?" a la Greil Marcus. And I admit, it's pretty mind-blowing once you really get to know it, but the whole thing still seems kinda overblown and pretentious to me - your "Ummugumma" comparison was right on the money. "Yoshimi" is just so-so for me, with some great songs ("Fight Test", "Hypnotist") mixed with some underwritten, Eno-ish crap that never really grabs you.

So this is the one - "Clouds" is the best album with the definitive line-up that gave this band so much power and originality, with Drozd's Bonham-like drums and Jones's wild guitar stylings. Similar to "Transmissions," but more focused, with more complex arrangements and melodic sophistication. "Abandoned Hospital Ship" is a slow, druggy anthem that is so imperfect that it's the perfect way to start the album, and "Psychiatric" has a melody that's so great you swear you've heard before. (Cat Stevens? No, sorry, wrong album.) "Placebo Headwound" sounds like the Beach Boys if Syd Barrett had been allowed to join the band as he so frequently requested (I believe this is what led to his mental breakdown, if I'm not mistaken.) "Guy Who Gets A Headache And Accidently Saves The World" sounds like a 50's B-movie with that radio voice at the end. Cool song. "This Here Giraffe" and "Christmas At The Zoo" are just classic Wayne Coyne - goofy and melodic, but somehow meaningful, even if I still don't get why a tiger would rather stay in a cage being gawked at by crowds of fucking rubes than running around free ripping apart gazelles and gay magicians. Seriously, unless there's some kind of scientific preservation stuff going, the whole zoo thing is fucking arrogant on our part. And then "Kim's Watermelon Gun," which I think is about all those spooky gurus and new-age religions (Mahareishi, Scientology, Christianity, etc) that people cling to in order to feel more important - "And all the celebrities want permission." But then "She won't give it to them 'til they learn how to love" which is just saying "HEY ASSHOLE, THERE IS NO MEANING TO FUCKING LIFE IF YOU'RE JUST A SELF-CENTERED PRICK. ALL RELIGIONS ARE JUST PETRIFIED DOG SHIT. JUST BE KIND TO EACH OTHER. LOVE. THAT'S IT. CHRIST, DIDN'T LENNON ALREADY GO OVER THIS SHIT WITH YOU FUCKERS?" At least, that's what I think it's saying, but I might be projecting a little. "Evil Will Prevail" sounds like a late-sixties pop song with the a decidedly more pessimistic message and then one of my favorites, "Lightning Strikes The Postman," which literally sounds like a melodic ball of fire aimed directly at poor Mr. Postman's chest. And we all know "Bad Days" is from one of those fruity Batman movies, but c'mon - these guys had to make SOME extra money to pay for studio time and effects pedals and sheets of acid and stuff. I couldn't think of a better way of capping off the album than a poppy Brian Wilson arrangement with lyrics about blowing off your boss's head. Brilliant stuff.

Great band - very heady, stoner-friendly, catchy, quirky, etc. And "Clouds" is the pinnacle for me, before they started releasing albums that required a Circuit City showroom to be heard properly and songs with some fucking "yeah yeah yeah" bullshit going on every two seconds. No, seriously, I still love these guys, even though the new album kinda sucks.

And great site Mark - very stoner-friendly too.

matthewbyrd@hotmail.com
Argggh, this is a great "band" I know, I can tell, Wayne is far too talented for the Lips to be a mediocre band. I've listened to Transmissions and this and I loved them......... the 1st times around, I have both on my iPod now, and I gotta say, I skip ANY Lips as soon as it comes on, that's how fast they wear on you. Its almost unbelievable just how fast they got old, not just old, annoying. Myabe I'm the only one like this, if I am, then I have a terrible curse, because, for a little bit, I enjoyed every note of these 2 albums.

3dsunglasses@gmail.com
I bought this cd on a whim at newbury comics for 7 dollars. I had heard zaireeka before, which was amazing, and the soft bulletin, which was ok but never did match up to the MASTERPIECE that is their 2003-03-03 stockholm concert bootleg
its a SOUNDBOARD!!! and it was sooo amazing
RIDICULOUSLY ENERGETIC
it was the first thing i heard by the lips and was amazed. so anyway bulletin was pretty good but it just wasnt as energetic. i eventually lost the zaireeka cds (still have the booklet...) and i took a chance on this disc....AND HOLY FUCK!!! what a disc it is!!! sheer brilliance from end to end! i love how some songs start with 20 seconds of odd noise
I used to listen to this cd 3 times in a row and can gladly differentiate all the songs. I agree that it is a solid 9/10
the only problem i can see is some slight hints of that "90s alternative bullshit" sound but its just great

matthewbyrd@hotmail.com
my favorite Lips album, I think its better than the Soft Bulletin and Tranmissions. I don't get why people say its a grower.... its all Beatles-ey melodies and shiny happy instruments.... now Blonde on Blonde... THAT was a grower!

I have little else to say, but I want to continue raving anyway, okay? Now, I know it sounds like a dumb idea, but this octophonic thing sounds amazing in your house, mainly because these musicians are very smart and know how to really creep the thing up with spooky as hell sound effects and stuff. Just sounds that augment the melodies like no man. The sort of heavily freaky stuff we last heard on Hit To Death, but even more psychedelic, because, well, quite frankie, there are FIFTEEN different ways to listen to the CD without hearing it the same way twice!!! Now, granted, none of the CDs are all that great by themselves. They're interesting, I guess, but all fairly incomplete. However, even having TWO CDs going at once will blow your mind and give you an experience to tell your grandkids about for weeks, days and weeks on end. And three? Ohhhh.... Drool..... I had trouble running all four at once (it's too hard to keep all four in synch!), but three... man, three is the magic number.

Even if it weren't a groundbreaking experiment (which it is, more so than any rock album since the Ramones' debut), Zaireeka would still aim to please because the songs are wonderful. The lyrics deal mainly with madness and uncertainty, with only an iota of that happy jive you might have picked up on Clouds Taste Metallic. And the music deals mainly with art rock. Of the HIGHEST form. Like To Our Children's Children's Children or Ummagumma, but FOUR times as immersive and harrowing. If I took drugs, I probably would. Crack and AC/DC. Run out and buy this NOW. If you don't have two CD players, then tape the other CDs and play 'em on your boom box while jammin' a CD in your big ol' stereo system. That's all you need, baby doll sugar! And hey, don't call the Lips pretentious wankers. Honestly, what ELP album would feature a song called "The Big Ol' Bug Is The New Baby Now"?

Oh, okay, Tarkus, but I mean besides that one.

Reader Comments

blue_star@mail.geocities.com
dead on. deserves a ten just for the innovation.

by the way, didn't you read the liner notes? you're not supposed to try to keep the CDs in synch. the fact that the CDs won't stay in synch is the whole point (well, part of the point, anyway).

Jay@ndi.net (Jay Barnes)
This is probably the coolest musical experience i have ever had.. the only drawback of the whole deal is, my mom likes it too. Everyone go out and get this (provided it's not already unavailable). Better than 0-d4y w4r3z even!

Okay maybe i'm exxagerating.

Let the warez be with you.

jemorse@snet.net (John, Aging Kinks Kultist)
I'm too old to love this band but I do! I'm 38 and a family man but where were the Flaming Lips when I needed them?

IGotToes@aol.com (Willie Williams)
The coolest part about Zaireeka is song #6, "How Will We Know? (Futuristic Crashendos)." My girlfriend and I were listening to the album(s), and after that song, Jenny (my girlfriend's name is Jenny. Hi, Jenny. I love you!) started crying and laughing uncontrollably for about a half hour. See, Wayne put extremely high- and low-pitched frequencies on CD's 1, 3, and 4, and, as the label on the front of Zaireeka points out, they can cause people to become disoriented. It was really creepy and bizarre- I thought Jenny was getting really sick or hallucinating or something. She was fine soon after, though, and I suppose that's what Wayne intended to happen, so it's really cool. I've never heard about it happening to anyone else, though... I guess 'cause Zaireeka isn't very widely known...

susseddm@hotmail.com (Darin Mitchell)
Greatness has been had. Without a doubt.

jesska@msn.com (Mary Hughes)
i bought the last two records and thought they were great. i was looking forward to another installment in the beach boys smile worship series when i got this. ugh now as far as creativity etc. etc. yeah it's great something different but it really doesn't work first i don't have 19 stereos and i certainly don't have money to be buyin such pricey records. yeah to comment on an earlier comment that if like the smashing pumpkins did it it would be hailed as genius. you're probably right they like adore. losers. the lips will be back though. by the way the music on it sucks. 10/10.

totale@mail.utexas.edu
why would you need 19 stereos to listen to Zaireeka? oh wel, probably just a typo. that "4" key IS right in-between 1 and 9....

by the way, this is brilliant live. loud, though.

christian.smith6@gte.net
Hey there Mark. I'm coughing hard and keeping myself awake, so I thought I'd take a gander at your website. Just a quick comment or two about Zaireeka....

First, I thought the idea was pretentious and goofy when I heard it; then, as Boston encourages, I heard the album. It's really hard to explain to people how the gimmick doesn't *ever* sound gimmicky. That, to me, is what's most impressing. This experiment, about as highbrow art-fringe as you can get, seems perfectly normal in a rock setting. How'd they do that?

Plus, the liner notes are crucial. Sure, up until Zaireeka I had enjoyed both the beautiful languor and the anxious feedback of the Lips. But you read the liner notes here and suddenly you know, instead of just suspect, that Wayne Coyne has got his shit together. He sounds very smart, very dedicated, and full of ideas instead of full of himself. He can write a sentence like "What sort of music do you play for people whose civilization is coming apart?" and make it sound like he's actually considering the answer.

And then he made an album to show us the answer he came up with. Wow.

MisterKite@mindspring.com
I just had 20 simultaneous brain explosions. With Transmissions, the Lips were loading the ship. With Clouds, they were blasting off. With Zaireeka, they've reached the end of space and busted the barrier! Calling this a good album is like calling 2001 a good movie, or maybe The Big Bang a happening. Folks, this is way beyond the connotations of "album" and even "modern music". It's the most creative and well thought-out piece of music I have ever heard and Wayne Coyne is one of the most brilliant creative minds of our time. The "gimmick" is mindblowing and the songs-when they have them-are terrific (especially The Big Ol' Bug)! Sure, it's bound to catch some static for being "pretentious" and "overblown", but aren't the "pretentious" and "overblown" albums the ones everyone remembers?

And about getting 4 CD-players together: it shouldn't be that difficult! If you have a computer, a regular stereo, and a portable CD player, that's three right there. Plus the album makes for a great party piece. Invite some buds over, tell them to bring over their stereos, and let 'er rip! Christ, these guys just keep getting better and better! I really feel sorry for all those people who just know them for She Don't Use Jelly...

...Oh, and how about those dogs at the end of The Big Ol' Bug!!!

dstreb@neo.rr.com (Daniel Streb)
I know this may sound crazy, but Zaireeka is the greatest album I've ever heard in my life. If not the greatest, than certainly my all-time favorite. Final proof that rock isn't dead. (At least it wasn't in 1997...)The Flaming Lips have created a new way to listen to music. Fifty years from now in the rock hall of fame, 1997 will be marked as "The year that set the music world on fire... while no one was listening!" what with this and OK Computer and Dis Pepsi and, um, The Mollusk. I can't really say anything more than what has already been said. How come nobody else has tried this four CD experiment in the two years since its release? They CAN'T just let this album die as "a failed experiment that never caught on"!!! Besides, it's not just the four CDs that make it great, listen to the disorienting high pitched avant-garde noise during "How Will We Know?" or the technically flawless drum solo or the "no, no, no, NOOOO no (pause) no no no NOOO no no no nooooo"s or the dogs at the end!!!!

Better than Piper At The Gates of Dawn, even!

ajt114@york.ac.uk
Okay, now I'm really pissed off. Three years after the release of Zaireeka and I can't find it anywhere. PLEEEEESSSE HELP ME.

dstreb@neo.rr.com (Daniel Streb)
Hey y'all. I just wanna say that if you're lookn' for Zaireeka you'd better act fast because copies on Ebay go up to like SEVENTY DOLLARS!!!!! You should just buy it off of ebay. You'll never find it anywhere else. At least I haven't.

dopowell@startext.net (Rorschach)
they've got copies for sale through ubl.com and towerrecords.com, at least they say they have them. i got mine for 17 bucks last year. i also got a near perfect vinyl copy of trans europe express for ONE DOLLAR. one freaking dollar at 1/2 price books. i love capitalism.

richbunnell@home.com
For those of you (like me) who don't have four CD players, but DO have one DVD player, it seems that the Lipsters, realizing the auditory abilities of the medium, have decided to issue Zaireeka on DVD later this year!!! Apparently it's going to have psychedelic visuals to go with it, as well, in true Lips fashion. I'm definitely gonna be picking it up.

darrelld@globaleyes.net (Joel Dunham)
I don't need to say anything more than anyone else already has said. 10. There's usually a copy being sold on Ebay. Go now!

Jcjh20@aol.com
Amazing. Mind blowing. Ground breaking. etc.. Not enough great things to say about this. One of the only records that literally blew me fucking away. A masterpiece, no question about that. And yes its so incredibly misfortunate how unnoticed this album went and how rare it is to obtain now. So horrible. Every music lover, by any means, especially anyone who likes Magical Mystery Tour or The White Album at all should really track this town somehow, even on the internet by mp3s. Sure it would be 4 billion times better if you got the 4 CD's and listened to it that way, but the songs are still amazing, and you can at least imagine how mind blowing it would sound. Definate 10 here. That drum solo is really fuckin awesome too. I love the drum sounds the 'Lips get, even on Transmissions or Soft Bulletin the drums sound really raw.

drazy@gatecity.com
No argument: a flawless, brilliant album that brought the Lips from a level of acid-eaters to pure genius. How this thing was ever sold to the suits at Warner Bros is amazing in itself. A truly interactive album that doesn't need a computer: you mix the album and you never get the same results each time around. Album of the year.

iphinney@bmts.com (Matthew Phinney)
This album actually won me FRIENDS when I was in residence for my first year of University. Guess that was the ideal setting for this album because since that I've listened to it maybe oh... say... three times. But I must say, it is musically superior to The Soft Bulletin, probably because it's quite a bit more Floydian... especially in the perfect eerieness of 35000 ft of Despair. And Riding to Work in the Year 2525 is a vast and strategically melted palette of aural pigments. The whole story-song idea kinda makes you think about the mystical connection between acid, God and science fiction. Yes, this is their peak in every single possible way... because even though the concept is cool, it's also the album that lyrically and musically signals to the bloodshot, dilated masses that you are now supposed to take this band very seriously...

robsoncramer@hotmail.com (Jordan Robson Cramer)
So I was in my local record store with 45 dollars to spend. I was browsing through the Lips section and I came across Zaireeka. My mind was a tangle, sure it's ground-breaking but I've never heard it and I haven't really got into the Flaming Lips on past occasions. "What the hell" I thought. This record rarely comes to the store and it's only 41 bucks, sure I'll buy it. Now the problem when I got home was setting up the speakers. But I managed and arranged 8 stereos in a circle around me. I played cd's 1 and 2 at the same time and started the other two cd's at the ten second mark in unison, let's start this show.

HOLY FUCK!

I need to listen to this again! (And Again!)

Yes this is a genius idea and I hope some other band makes use of it as well...perhaps with only two cd's for the everyday music listener.

How Will We Know? (Futuristic Crashendos) made me feel like my brain was going to explode but I liked it anyway.

Marvelous!

scott@fabgorgon.com (Scott Ratinoff)
for all those folks buying Zaireeka on ebay for 70 bucks. You can just go to Amazon.com and buy it for 22

galleyian@mac.com (Ian Galley)
It took ages to find it but my mate picked this up on Ebay for something like Ģ20. Having heard about the legend for so long we DEVOURED it. Played it straight, played it skewed. Played different tracks together. Created a random sequencing order that lasted nearly two hours. It all fits together. Whatever you do. It works. Absolute Genius.

'Okay I'll admit it' has the greatest beat ever. I know! I ripped the track from disk one and that's only part of that album I posses. Don't need a mix down, don't need to get it or lend it. I know where it is and I have my memories, (how can you possibly explain this thing to anyone who hasn't heard it? I've heard people say they'd "imagined what I'd be like but never imagined it'd sound like THAT!!!" You've got to try "The Big Old Bug" totally stripped down!

The best Lips album, ever!

eatmycompleteass@yahoo.com (Dick Master)
ok, first things first... i don't smoke pot but i listen to a lot of music which has been influenced by dope and would probably sound sooper heeeavy on weed, but it's rough working for the DEA. i can only imagine that sweet paycheck as i hump boxes in this warehouse.

the last time i remember getting stoned before listening to an album for the first time was stoner witch by the The Melvins, which is fitting, don't you think? i mean, that whole "my lungs are fine" bit! it made me really paranoid, and it wasn't the weed!

so, back the flaming lips (no, not a gay rim job), i blew my load, purchased this hunk o' plastic on euphrates.com and waited for my sexy mailman to leave it out in the rain. then it came mumble mumble mumble...

i set up four stereos in my living room, not because i'm rich (see above) but because my name is not rich. i invited some semi-willing people over to listen and help me press buttons. said people barely knew who the spin doctors were let alone the flaming lips. ok, so they listen to entirely too much "math rock", but they will still go to heaven either way. so, shit is set up! GO! BAM! EXCLAMATION MARK!

good. very explicatively good. two points: a. i'm pretty ambivalent to the flaming lips up to this point and b. i'm not stoned up to this second point.

i would not say it lived up to expectations. instead, it completely skewed them... and this is only the first song... and the second and the third and fourth and the fifth! damn that's a tasty ear morsel... then the other two... annoying noise (yet poignantly so) and the dog song that i'm sure my neighbors loved as much as i did. in total: (i'll have to use spell check on this word) WOW.

to rapmetal it up, i spent a good two hours screwing around with different mixes of this album. i felt like i was in the studio drinking cocaine from wayne coyn's crystal capstan. track five! yeah baby (i've never seen austin powers)!

this ain't your momma's Spin Doctors!

spinaltomek@hotmail.com (Thomas Peters)
this idea is fucking amazing! i haven't heard the cd but reading about it makes me really excited to do so! and i will!
why doesn't everybody else release albums like this. imagine how great that would be!
every artist should split the different levels of their music onto 4 cds.
if you don't like overblown rock and just want the basics, you don't buy one or two of the cds (the one with the strings and other keyboard silliness, for example) if punk's too simple for you just put on the "extra backing vocals" cd and the one with the marimbas and stuff...
great thing for punk bands anyway...just record ONE basic punk record featuring drums & some chord sequences (there are only about 6 or 7 anyway) and then just release an endless bunch of extra cds featuring new melodies and guitar solos....
and if you play the thing at double speed and add some sick screaming you got your grindcore thingy.

what about movies? four screens, four movies at the same time?!!?!?!? imagine a good horror movie *surrounding* you...4 "blair witch project"s would be cool...so you're really IN THE FOREST

anyway...i'm going to buy this cd! hope the music is as good as the idea behind it!

walrus_ruckus@hotmail.com
Very much want to hear it. Cautiously optimistic in the feed me enough drinks this sounds like a good idea sense. 'Course, that's how I got THIS scar on my thigh and got THAT concussion.

opeth1213@yahoo.com (Eric D.)
so far i've only managed to listen to this one on three different boomboxes (actually two, along with a DVD player). I'm debating whether or not to get a third boombox so i can listen to all four. Yes sir, sequencing the CDs is a bitch, but it turns out to be worth it most of the time. Definitely a revolutionary listening experience, where you get more out of it with each listen. 10/10.

jhmusicman12@hotmail.com
I don't have this one, nor four cd players, but I found one interesting thing about this album: it got a 0.0 at pitchfork. 0.0. 0. Fucking 0! Jesus Christ! Are they sure that this album has absolutely zero musical value. I can't even say the same about Limp Bizkit. Two years later, they gave The Soft Bulletin 10.0. Same critic too. I don't know either.

johnnyalpha01@yahoo.co.uk
Just wanted to add more to the pile of applause this album has gained. I found a copy in a town just outside London for about Ģ23 (app. $33-36) and took it back to my girlfriend's house to have a go. She had a DVD player and a CD player, so I grabbed discs 1 and 2, and surprisingly, synched them up first time. Track 1 billows out and I am almost on the floor at the genius of it. The sound on disc 2 just oozes out and works in such a fantastic way - it's so simple and brilliant and perfect. I haven't heard more than two tracks properly - I've flicked through each disc - but I'm throwing a Zaireeka night where we're going to gather round and play this stuff. Truly a social, everybody come together indie rock record! 10/10.

wurlyburd@hotmail.com (MB)
So I bought Zaireeka about four years ago, with the intention of A) Having a party where we would put our stereos together and listen to this CRAZY THANG. Never happened. B) Putting it into my computer multitrack (I'm also a recording engineer) and making a compromised single disc composite. This I did. I know the music very well now. I played it for all my friends with a disclaimer that it was not in its intended form. Now, doing it that way with a single disc is great for listening to this juggernaut in your car, or wherever you do that sorta thing (NONE OF MY BEESWAX, ok?). But how is the record in its intended form? I had no idea until tonight. I have had this record all this time and haven't played with it, isn't that PATHETIC? I'd like to introduce you to my Asian friend Sosumi. It is AMAZING! ALL THAT STUFF THAT EVERYBODY ELSE SAID!!! GOOD! I'LL STOP YELLING! I had a bit of trouble at first getting things even remotely in sync, and I know it would be so much better if I had 4 matching systems. But for my purposes tonight, my computer, my home theatre system, a boombox, and a portable CD player with powered speakers did an OK job of showing me the colors of this album. I appreciate it so much more now. It's great. You need it. Buy it. 9/10.

So, taken in this context, what differentiates The Soft Bulletin from Mellon Collie and The Infinite Sadness? Ummmm... err.... ahhha..... Well, Steven and Wayne strike oil with their songcraft a bit more regularly than Mr. Corgan. But even in this capacity, they seem to be getting a bit tired. For one thing, although the instrumentation is different than before, Wayne sings all the songs the same way - high above his range with basically the same vocal melody line over and over - when there's really no need to do so. In doing so, all he does is make all the melodies sound the same (which they aren't). On the positive front, they're still out in fruity Brian Wilson popville, though this time around, they seem to be making an overly conscious effort to slip unpredictable breaks and changes into the bubbly chord sequences. And the songs themselves are mostly up to their usual standards, but, because all the songs are so slow, gentle and non-rock, about halfway through it becomes really hard to concentrate. Just like Pet Sounds!

So yeah, it's a really good album but if you buy it and hate it, don't assume that the Lips are a bunch of Billy Joel-loving pansies. Just buy some of their earlier work and give them another chance. This soft "experiment" is not indicative of the band's creativity so much as it is a sign that they're afraid of repeating themselves.

Reader Comments

misterkite@pop.mindspring.com (Adam Bruneau)
The Soft Bulletin is a minor disappointment for me, not so much because of the lack of guitar noise, but more for the lack of memorable material. On every previous Lips record from Transmissions on, all the songs were very memorable or at least extremely interesting. But here (and keep in mind that this is only after the first few listens) it seems like Wayne's lost and there is a lot of filler material here. Of course, if you like the Lips (and you should) it's still a good album because there are some nice tunes here. "Race For the Prize", "The Spark That Bled", "Buggin'" and "Waitin' For Superman" are all very good and up to the Lips standard. Another bizarre song, "The Gash", I really like, but past those much of the album is just there.

However, even the more forgettable material has got that great Lips' charm and there are some good songs that don't bother to draw attention to themselves but still make a good impression ("A Spoonful Weighs a Ton", "Slow Motion"). Overall, it's another incredibly artistic progression (how much more can they do?) but it feels a little bit lacking in terms of pop songfulness. If you love the Lips, you'll love it. 8/10.

dstreb@neo.rr.com (Daniel Streb)
Okay okay. So Wayne may be more serious this time around, but so what? They're still making great songs!! Wish I could say the same for R.E.M. Are you reviewing the UK version or the US version? The British music press is really loving these guys. New Musical Express called The Soft Bulletin the best album of the year.

e.h.olsen@arena.uio.no (Espen D.H. Olsen)
When a band I love a great deal release an album I often donīt find myself being as reflected and critical as I might have been towards any record of any band...... So when the Lips released The Soft Bulletin here in Norway I ran to the record store and back to my appartment and almost instantly threw the disc onto the CD-player. And from the intro with melting drums on Race for the Prize I was amazed. I thought it was unbelieveable.Not to say I didnīt need quite a few spins to catch melodies, sounds, structures and arrangements, but I loved it from the first moment I heard it. And why? Not because theyīre my favorite band! Because itīs such a beautiful record. Because Mr Coyneīs lyricism tackles the big themes of love,science and death in such a compelling and natural way. I donīt agree with the theory of him trying to live up to the genius thing. And the Corgan comparison? Well that is kinda far fetched I think! If you donīt like the album as much as most critics (i.e. NME) thatīs perfectly okay with me. But contest it on musical grounds, not by criticizing the persona behind it!

I also must say I get extremely bored by the Pet Sounds (thereīs a lot of them here!) and Deserterīs Songs comparisons. This is a unique album, I havenīt heard anything like it, still I redcognize the fact that it sounds sorta Pet Soundsy at times, but in my opinion most pop/rock music in the nineties is like hybrids of older music. Sometimes it is extremely obvious. Other times itīs like a band has created something really special and unique out of the old. Thatīs what the Lips have done this time around.

As Wayne Coyne states in his notes on the album at flaminglips.com:

No more enemies, no more friends....... just sounds.

milo@coho.net (Scott)
Mark, gimme a break. I know these things are subjective, creative expression being open to various avenues of assessment and evaluation, but The Soft Bulletin is the great album that every loyal Lips fan in his right mind has been waiting for. C'mon, Mark! You gave Telepathic Surgery an 8! That's fine and dandy and all, don't get me wrong, but I think you're really digging in your critical appraisal of The Soft Bulletin. Wayne's vocal range throughout the album? Really? If you ask me (which you're not, I understand), your review says more about the way you've come to regard this group than your reaction to the actual recording. The Lips are still doing what they've always done, releasing some really exciting psychedelic pop music. This is just the most recent venture, and there's more to come, especially after its success. I think the Lips have always released exceptionally strong material, and it's no different on this release. In fact, the songcraft and production is really just simplified from Zaireeka. The songs are cut from the same mould. No noisy guitar? Mark, you gave Zaireeka a 10, a very just 10, but you make no mention of missing the noisy guitar in the review. I think it's refreshing. And I think it's admirable and largely impressive that Wayne is all about wrenching emotional pathos from his lyrics while maintaining the humor inherent to the Lips output. He's trying to do interesting things well; does that make him a serious man with pretensions? Maybe, but in that case Zaireeka is no less "serious," while still a work of genius in your estimation. C'mon, Mark. You're into the Soft Bulletin as much as the rest of us. What's more, it's the real breakthrough the Lips have always deserved, balancing some intense studio trickery and pop songcraft to produce a piece of work that stradles experimentation and accessibility to such an extent, it can be nothing short of classic. They did it before on Zaireeka, sure, but here they don't use three other discs to help them out. And I don't think Zaireeka's only innovation was the format.

I'm just writing because I was actually surprised at the relatively lackluster review you gave the album. I was expecting something at least as exciting and generally positive as the earlier reviews. The Soft Bulletin needs no apology.

dstreb@neo.rr.com (Daniel Streb)
Mark your whole review trashes The Soft Bulletin, and yet you give it an 8? That's nuts! An 8, according to your Short Introduction To This Site, is a "very good" album. Well, the review sounds like you don't like the album at all, simply because they've changed their sound. You give The Beastie Boys' Hello Nasty an 8, and yet you call it "a very very good record". You give The Soft Bulletin an 8, and you call it "disappointing... about halfway through it becomes really hard to concentrate." Oh well...

And The Soft Bulletin doesn't sound a fucking thing like Billy Joel!

Stiple6107@aol.com
I saw the flaming lips in concert August 17th and 18th at tramps in NYC...up until then the only exposure I had to them was "she don't use jelly" and a few recommendations from friends...when they began playing "race for the prize" I was in awe...I ran out and bought the soft bulletin the next day...haven't stopped listening to it...It's changing the way i listen to, make and feel about music...I don't know much about the flaming lips, but if this is any indication of what they are capable of I will be a very happy person for years to come...I would recommend this record to anyone.

InMyEyes82@aol.com
Well I can't say that I agree with the previous posters' comments about how you "like the Soft Bulletin" as much as everyone else, because I hate tons of albums that other people love. Music is objective, and though your comments may have been a little questionable ("Billy Joel"? I think not! I'd love to see Billy come up with a song as movingly brilliant as "Feeling Yourself Disintegrate" or "Waiting For Superman"), I have to admit that I had the same reaction you did upon the first couple of listenings. But now I am completely sure that it is this band's masterpiece, and furthermore one of the greatest albums of the decade. I don't miss the guitar noise one bit, and I'll tell you why: it worked so well on Transmissions and Clouds that if I want to hear THAT era of the band, I can just pop those discs in. Maybe it's because I'm not a guitar noise freak, in fact I think the usage of it can destroy songs sometimes, but these songs seem light years more beautiful and catchy than anything I've heard in a long-ass time, and I've got so much damn Sonic Youth and Butthole Surfers music so that if I DO get the urge to hear guitar noise I can pop THOSE discs in. All I'm saying is that The Soft Bulletin is indeed Wayne Coyne's triumph, but if you don't think so, that's okay with me. I don't even like Pet Sounds that much.

misterkite@mindspring.com (Adam Bruneau)
Sorry to bother you and I know you might be busy, but I recently went to The Flaming Lips' Music Against Brain Degeneration tour and was totally blown away!!! If you ever get the chance to-you'd better do it!

But the thing I want to say is that the second act, a Japanese rock/pop group masterminded by Keigo Oyamada, was by far the second best thing to The Lips at the concert!!! It's called Cornelius, and he's got an album called Fantasma out in the US and I think it's the best album of the Nineties! Damn, it's sooooo amazing: it's like if you took Led Zeppelin, The Beach Boys, The Beatles, Disney World, Bach, and Moby and squeezed them into a tube and then fed it to a Japanese Einstein! I just want to say that as soon as you can find it, pick up Fantasma and tell me how you like it, it's sooooooo awseome!

InMyEyes82@aol.com
Have you heard Deserter's Songs by Mercury Rev? This album is one of the ones that are constantly keeping my faith in current music. It's incredible, kind of like The Soft Bulletin except earthier, more melodic, and...dare i say....better.

azitelli@stevens-tech.edu (Andrew Zitelli)
"race for the prize" is the greatest song of the decade. soft bulletin is a 10.

albracht@wins.uva.nl (Arthur Albracht)
My recently bought (well I got it for my 21th anniversary, 18-09-99) cd is Soft Bulletin by the Flaming Lips. I only know some things from their earlier work, but I must say this is e pretty special album. I like the orchestral experiments for it's not as all the other stuff you here nowadays. The squeeking voice of the singer what's his name isn't always that clear (to say it euphemistically), but it gives a certain feeling in combination with the melancholic sounds and it gripps you now and then. I have heard so many American rockbands etc. etc. but this is undoubtly better!

For me 8 stars!

bolgus@hotmail.com (Mark Humphrey)
With all respect, I think you've got this all completely wrong. In my humble opinion, you have reviewed the Lip's worst material as their best, and vice versa. And The Soft Bulletin is surely the best of the lot, Zaireeka included. If you want Wayne to stagnate in guitar-drenched noise for the entirety of his life, then you're following the wrong messiah. To want such is foolishness, after all, only the idiots complained that 'A Day In The Life' didn't rock as much as 'I want to Hold Your Hand'. Wayne sounds more mature here because he IS. 'Superman' is among the best songs he's ever written (Including 'Waterbugs' from Needles, and '35,000 of Despair', from Zaireeka; neither of which you've mentioned). And 'What is the Light', 'The Spark that Bled', and 'Suddenly Everything Has Changed' are all change-your-life experiencs. Sure they ain't the Ramones no more, but if Plato was a musician, this would be his opus. 10/10.

richbunnell@home.com
The entire album's slow, achingly sentimental, and full of loud, booming drums and pretentiously sophisticated production techniques, plus, Wayne explains the concepts of some of the songs in the tracklisting in the liner notes just in case we're too stupid to transcribe his lyrics, but even though this is as much of a calculated "mature" album as any band has ever put out, it doesn't really matter because these songs are really, -really- impressive. Take "A Spoonful Weighs A Ton" and "The Spark That Bled," for example. They're slow and grandiose, but they're also fascinating and multi-parted (particularly the latter one). The peppier songs are wonderful as well--"Race For The Prize" is a strong contender for the most downright gorgeous song I've ever heard, and "Buggin" and "The Gash" aren't too shabby either. "Waitin' For A Superman" doesn't really grab me though-- the normal version on the album just doesn't really stand out, though the alternate mix at the end of the album (which I think was the single mix) is far better. The "What Is The Light?/The Observer" eight-minute sweet is great in spite of the pulsing "dance" beats (which actually just serve to texture the song), and.....geeze. I give the album a 9, not a 10 because of a few isolated boring moments. Still very, very impressive. Mark, how could you let this band slip past me for so long?

In relation to this album, I took a gander at the Amazon.com reader reviews for it, and like usual for all newer releases, there were over 100 reviews; many five-star ones with some one-star reviews sprinkled throughout. That wouldn't normally shock me except for the fact that some of these one-star reviews were just unreasonably harsh. I saw a bunch of comments calling the album "mediocre, annoying, and derivative," "one to avoid, big time," and "boring, insular, pseudo-indie prog rock." Now, I certainly respect other peoples' opinions, and I have no problem at all with people not caring for certain albums (it's personal preference, after all), but why is it that some people feel so fit to act like certain albums are a complete disgrace upon human existence? I personally try to take a more optimistic view towards music, and with a few exceptions (such as King Crimson's "Discipline" album, which I really just can't get into), it makes the whole process of music-listening a whole lot more enjoyable. Why be a music fan if you're gonna be overly-cynical about it and treat certain albums like blemishes on the fabric of the universe?...Anyway, there're probably a lot of holes in what I just said, and I've certainly written reader comments where I've treated certain albums in the way that I just condemned (Whammy! by the B-52's for one), but I just had to get that off of my chest. This isn't directed at anyone on this page (since basically everyone here has nothing but praise for the Lips) but just to get it out: it's just music. If you don't like an album, that's your opinion and that's perfectly fine, but there's no reason to be unbearably harsh towards it just because forty-five minutes of your time was taken up by something which was less than satisfactory to you. Rant over, thank you, buh-bye.

savage1561@juno.com (Daniel Streb)
No. Not corny fake. Lovely and beautiful and Forever Changesesque. ESPECIALLY "Suddenly Everything Has Changed". I don't really know a lot about Yes to analyze Mr. De Fabio's comparison so I can't say much. Actually I think this also sounds a bit like OK Computer (you DO love OK Computer, right?). Overproduced? Nah. I think this is one of the best produced albums ever. Orchestral and symphonic, but with enough quirks to keep it in the underground (well, here in the US anyway. Over in the UK the Lips are like big stars!!!). Ever notice the stopwatch going off in "What Is The Light?" or the crack of sound at the beginning of "Suddenly Everything Has Changed"? Anyway, I thought this album was amazing and the best album of 1999, along with Prince Paul's A Prince Among Thieves and Moby's Play.

By the way, loved the message about overzealous music slamming.

mr_burble@hotmail.com (Chris Stabile)
Race For The Prize. Seeing that live was probably the best thing that happened to me in 2000. Just when I thought I was sinking into complete dispair, FL opened with that song. (BTW - I had never heard anything other than "She Don't Use Jelly" by them.) They started playing it, and my girl started kinda bouncing on her heels and she turned around and smiled this big "life is good" smile and to this day (we broke up ...sniff sniff..) whenever I hear that tune, I see Wayne smashing that gong and I think "gee, what the hell is for dinner?". Umm..anyways, yeah...I love that song, yup. Personal fave.

Jcjh20@aol.com
Slow, and mellow all the way threw but is very beautiful, and emotional and i do not think that it was Wayne being too serious this time around. They apparently lost their second guitar player Ronald in 1996, so ever since then, they've always been out to try new things (hence, the brilliant Zaireeka), and also stay a 3 piece (similar to REM losing Bill Berry). But i really like the album. The melodies are fantastic, and it shows here that Wayne really is a good singer, and the lyrics are more thoughtful and meaningful on here as well. Although i do miss the guitar noise and humor, this is a nice direction for the 'Lips. Some of my favorite songs are "Buggin'", "Race For The Prize" has a very nice melody, "Feeling Yourself Disintergrate" and "Waitin' For Superman" (the alternate mix at the end). Its amazing how underrated this band is, i really love 'em. 9/10.

kid_d36@hotmail.com (Donald Morgan)
you can't keep turning up the fuzz pedal forever. eventually it hits ten. then you gotta do something else. though there's a couple songs on here that don't do much, the rest is brilliant fusion of the Lips previous music and electronic ideas and concepts, but it's not an album that screams, "we are now electronica! let us make love to moby and worship at the temple of all things throbby and bleeping!" "feeling yourself disintegrate" is worth the price of admission alone.

drazy@gatecity.com
I first witnessed The Flaming Lips during their power trio line-up a couple of times: once after the Oh My Gawd! tour and once after Telepathic Surgery. I don't remember much from the first show other than they were awesome and I was tripping my balls off. The second show was also spot-on and my hallucinations were again fueled by a large quantity of illegal drugs. Ironically, my memory of the second show is more accurate. The story begins when our Okies travel to Cedar Rapids, Iowa, looking for a bar called "Steb's." The Lips cruise up and down Cedar Rapids, looking for this venue, the one they are scheduled to perform at 10:00 p.m. They finally spot a young lad walking the streets and ask him for directions to "Steb's." The young man explains to the Lips that Steb's is located in Cedar Falls, Iowa; a bedroom community of Waterloo, some seventy-five miles to the north. They hit the wrong fucking town. Meanwhile in C.F., the shitty opening band has more reasons to continue with their shitty songs, the owner of "Steb's" is freaking out because the Lips missed their soundcheck and is concerned that they are a no-show, and a nice African-American man offers me some cocaine. Suddenly, the back door to the venue bursts open, and in walk our heroes; road-dogs with mile-high hair fitted with amplifiers, smoke machines, and primitive laser lights. They played six songs that evening, one sequing into one another, interrupted by brief hints of "Nobody's Fault But Mine" and other soundbites of 70's rock. The nice African-American man offered the bass player a nice joint after the show ended. At that moment, while fog dissipated in the small venue, I thought that if this band could pull something like this out of the crack of their ass, imagine what they could do if they set their mind's to it. Wayne's mind drifted to the parking lot experiment, Zaireeka, and we began to question Wayne's mind. The Soft Bulletin changed that, it's so close to perfection that it couldn't be the work of some mad scientist; a man fueled by chemistry. From lost in a van in Cedar Rapids, to lost in the studios of New York state, the Flaming Lips have shown us that getting sidetracked can lead you to some pretty remarkable places. It's an album that you should own and a wonderful end-credit theme for the twentieth century. 9.5/10 or a perfect ten if you delete off the alternate mix bullshit at the end....save that kinda stuff for the English b-side, for Christsakes, don't tack it on the end of your fucking masterpiece.

o.caussat@ville-pantin.fr (Olivier Caussat)
"Feeling yourself disintegrate" and "The spark that bled" have to be the most wonderful songs ever written... This record is awesome, I have bought in 1999, and haven't stopped playing it since then.

The soft bulletin is a major achievement in pop music, taking elements from past pop records, and using today's technology to make it sound "unheard" and incredibly fresh (and I'm not too keen on previous Lips' records... except maybe "this here giraffe" from Clouds taste metallic...).

Do you American fans know that the European CD version has a track that is not on the US version ? It's called "Slow motion", and is one of the best tracks on the record (after the two tracks I have already mentionned...). Go and find it !

The only thing that bothers me, is how on earth will the Lips come up with a new album as good as this one ? Needless to say, I'm dying to hear it... Certainly one of the best albums in the whole decade (if not one of the best pop albums ever...).

Radiohead and Bjork are all over the media, here in France, and I just say that those two are just talentless soup mongers, compared to the Lips. Plus Dave Fridmann is certainly one of the most talented producers ever (along with Jim O'Rourke..). A record that will stay with me forever, and a major change in my approach to pop music (see, I used to think that most pop music is tasteless and dull...). Cheers.

galleyian@mac.com (Ian Galley)
Ten Out Of Ten

The Best Lips album ever.

Mark, the guitars you miss are there. True they're not screaming of freaking out, but they still twang in that country way I have no real foundation to speak about. Must learn though as it sounds pretty interesting (for a basshead anyway.) Sorry. Seems you all like the drums for 'Race for the Prize, me too, but the best beat is 'A Spoonful Ways a Ton' or maybe the break in "The Spark That Bleed', "Waiting for a Superman?. Difficult, it's chock a block.

I l