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Artist:

The Flaming Lips

The Flaming Lips

Formed:
1983 in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma

Representative Songs:

"Fight Test," "She Don't Use Jelly," "Do You Realize??"

Representative Albums:

Transmissions from the Satellite Heart, The Soft Bulletin, A Collection of Songs Representing an Enthusiasm for Recording...By Amateurs

Similar Artists:

Influences:

Followers:

  • Genre: Rock
  • Active: '80s, '90s, 2000s
  • Major Members: Wayne Coyne, Mike Ivins, Steven Drozd, Ronald Jones, Jonathan Donahue

Biography

Even within the eclectic world of alternative rock, few bands were so brave, so frequently brilliant, and so deliciously weird as the Flaming Lips. From their beginnings as Oklahoma weirdos to their pop culture breakthrough in the mid-'90s to their status as one of the most respected groups of the 2000s, the Lips have ridden one of the more surreal and haphazard career trajectories in pop music. An acid-bubblegum band with as much affinity for sweet melodies as blistering noise assaults, their off-kilter sound, uncommon emotional depth, and bizarre history (packed with tales of self-immolating fans and the like) firmly established them as true originals.

The Flaming Lips formed in Oklahoma City in 1983, when founder and guitarist Wayne Coyne allegedly stole a collection of musical instruments from an area church hall and enlisted his vocalist brother Mark and bassist Michael Ivins to start a band. Giving themselves the nonsensical name the Flaming Lips (its origin variously attributed to a porn film, an obscure drug reference, or a dream in which a fiery Virgin Mary plants a kiss on Wayne in the backseat of his car), the band made its live debut at a local transvestite club. After progressing through an endless string of drummers, they recruited percussionist Richard English prior to recording their self-titled debut, issued on green vinyl on their own Lovely Sorts of Death label in 1985.

When Mark Coyne soon departed to get married, Wayne assumed full control of the group; in addition to remaining its lead guitarist, he also became the primary singer and songwriter. Continuing on as a trio, the Lips released 1986's Hear It Is, followed a year later by Oh My Gawd!!!...The Flaming Lips. While touring in support of the Butthole Surfers, they played Buffalo, NY, where they were befriended by concert promoter Jonathan Donahue; after a jam session with Donahue's nascent band Mercury Rev, he and Coyne became close friends, and Donahue eventually signed on as the group's sound technician.

After recording 1988's difficult Telepathic Surgery, English exited, reducing the Lips to the core duo of Coyne and Ivins; after adding drummer Nathan Roberts, Donahue adopted the name Dingus and became a full-time member in time to cut 1990's stellar In a Priest Driven Ambulance while simultaneously recording the brilliant Mercury Rev debut, Yerself Is Steam. Following a series of hopeful phone calls to Warner Bros., the company signed the band in 1991, and in 1992 their oft-delayed major-label debut, Hit to Death in the Future Head, appeared to little commercial notice; Donahue soon exited to focus his full energies on Mercury Rev, followed by the departure of Roberts.

With new guitarist Ronald Jones and drummer Steven Drozd, they cut 1993's sublime Transmissions from the Satellite Heart, which they supported by playing the second stage at Lollapalooza and touring the nation in a Ryder truck. Initially, the album stiffed; however, nearly a year after its initial release, the single "She Don't Use Jelly" became a grassroots hit, and against all odds the Flaming Lips found themselves on the Top 40 charts. They took full advantage of their requisite 15 minutes of fame, appearing everywhere from MTV's annual Spring Break broadcast to an arena tour in support of Candlebox to a memorably surreal lip-synched performance on the teen soap opera Beverly Hills 90210, where supporting character Steve Sanders (portrayed by actor Ian Ziering) uttered the immortal words, "You know, I've never been a big fan of alternative music, but these guys rocked the house!"

After the 1994 release of a limited-edition sampler of odds-and-ends titled Providing Needles for Your Balloons, the Lips returned in 1995 with Clouds Taste Metallic, a strikingly mature and diverse collection highlighted by the singles "Bad Days" (also heard in the film Batman Forever), "This Here Giraffe," and "Brainville." Despite the inclusion of the remarkably melodic "Psychiatric Explorations of the Fetus with Needles," "Christmas at the Zoo" (rumored to be under consideration for inclusion on an upcoming John Tesh holiday record), and the epic "Guy Who Got a Headache and Accidentally Saves the World," the album nonetheless failed to live up to the commercial success of Transmissions, and the band was once again relegated to cult status.

In 1996, the Lips' world went haywire; first, Jones disappeared to undertake a spiritual odyssey from which he did not return, then Drozd's hand was almost needlessly amputated after he was bitten by a spider. At about the same time, Ivins was the victim of a bizarre hit-and-run accident after a wheel came off of another vehicle and slammed into his car, trapping him inside. Ironically, Coyne was having car problems of his own when rumors of his latest sonic foray -- conducting an orchestra of 40 automobiles, all with their tape decks playing specially composed music at the same time -- prompted fan discussion of his possible psychological collapse. "I would try to tell people what I was doing and found that I couldn't explain it very well," Coyne later remarked about the project, dubbed the Parking Lot Experiment. "Plus, I had a sore on the side of my tongue for a week and it made me talk kind of weird. I'm sure they thought I was retarded."

By the following year, the Flaming Lips (who continued as a trio, opting not to attempt to replace Jones) were back in the studio, recording an album that, according to Coyne, would be "so different and exciting it will either make us millionaires or break us" -- in short, 1997's Zaireeka, a breathtaking and wildly experimental set of four discs designed to be played simultaneously. A previously unreleased track, "Hot Day," also appeared earlier that year on the soundtrack to Richard Linklater's film SubUrbia. A Collection of Songs Representing an Enthusiasm for Recording...by Amateurs, a retrospective of their Restless label material, followed in 1998, and a year later the Lips returned with a breathtaking new studio effort, The Soft Bulletin. After a three-year absence from the shelves, 2002 brought several new releases, including the new record Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots and a two-volume retrospective of the Restless years. Yoshimi won the group even more popular and critical acclaim than The Soft Bulletin, which the group maximized by spending half of 2002 appearing with Beck on his Sea Change tour as both his opening act and backing band. The Lips kept busy over the next two years by touring in support of Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots and working on their movie Christmas on Mars. They returned to the studio in 2004 and spent much of 2005 recording; that year, the Flaming Lips documentary The Fearless Freaks and VOID video collection were both released, whetting fans' appetites for the band's 2006 album, At War with the Mystics. ~ Jason Ankeny, All Music Guide
 
 
Wikipedia: The Flaming Lips
The Flaming Lips
Origin Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, United States
Genre(s) Alternative rock
Psychedelic pop
Psychedelic rock
Space rock
Years active 1983 – present
Label(s) Warner Bros.
Website FlamingLips.com
Members
Wayne Coyne
Michael Ivins
Steven Drozd
Kliph Scurlock
Former members
Mark Coyne
Dave Kostka
Richard English
Jonathan Donahue
Nathan Roberts
John Mooneyham
Ronald Jones

The Flaming Lips (formed in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma in 1983) is an American alternative rock band.

The band is known for their lush, multi-layered, psychedelic arrangements, spacey lyrics and bizarre song and album titles (for example, "Pilot Can at the Queer of God", "Free Radicals [A Hallucination of the Christmas Skeleton Pleading with A Suicide Bomber]" and "Yeah, I Know It's A Drag... But Wastin' Pigs Is Still Radical"). They are also acclaimed for their elaborate live shows featuring costumes, balloons, puppets, video projections, complex stage light configurations, giant hands, large amounts of confetti, and frontman Wayne Coyne's signature man-sized plastic bubble with which he traverses across the audience. In 2002, Q magazine named The Flaming Lips one of the "50 Bands to See Before You Die".

The group recorded several albums and EPs on an indie label in the 1980s and early 1990s. After signing to Warner Brothers, they scored a hit in 1993 with "She Don’t Use Jelly". Although it has been their only hit single in the U.S., the band has maintained critical respect and, to a lesser extent, commercial viability through albums such as 1999’s The Soft Bulletin (which was NME Magazine's Album of the Year) and 2002’s Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots. They have also had more hit singles in the UK and Europe than in the U.S.

Despite press coverage for the band being quiet in comparison to recent years, they were nominated for a BRIT Award in February 2007 for the "Best International Act" category.

History

Early history and releases (Debut EP to Priest Driven Ambulance)

The Flaming Lips formed in Oklahoma City in 1983 with Wayne Coyne's brother Mark singing lead vocals and Michael Ivins on bass guitar. The band debuted at Oklahoma City's own Blue Note Lounge. After going through a host of different drummers, Richard English joined the band in 1984. That same year they recorded their only release with Mark Coyne singing lead vocals - The Flaming Lips.

After his brother's departure, Wayne assumed the vocal duties and the band released their first full-length album, Hear It Is, on the small independent label Restless Records in 1986. This line-up recorded two more albums; 1987's Oh My Gawd!!! and 1989's Telepathic Surgery, the latter originally planned to be a thirty minute sound collage.

Nathan Roberts replaced English and Jonathan Donahue (also a member of the alternative rock band Mercury Rev) joined in 1989. In a Priest Driven Ambulance, their first album with producer Dave Fridmann, was recorded at the State University of New York in Fredonia for $5 an hour on a $10,000 budget.[1] The album was host to a marked expansion in the band's sound and their previous experiments in tape loops and effects were given a more prominent role. This was also the period of the band in which Coyne made his transition to a higher, more strained vocal style akin to Neil Young, which he first utilized on Telepathic Surgery's "Chrome Plated Suicide" and has employed ever since.

In 1990 the band caught the attention of Warner Bros. Records and were signed promptly after a representative of the label witnessed a show at which the band almost burned down the venue (American Legion Hall in Norman, OK) with the use of pyrotechnics.[2]

Signed to majors (Hit to Death through Zaireeka)

In 1992, the band released their major label debut Hit to Death in the Future Head after the recording of which Donahue left the band to concentrate on Mercury Rev. Roberts left the band as well, citing creative differences. They were replaced by Ronald Jones and Steven Drozd respectively.

Music sample:

The Flaming Lips "She Don't Use Jelly" (1993)

22 second sample from The Flaming Lips' "She Don't Use Jelly". noicon

Problems listening to the file? See media help.

In 1993, they released Transmissions from the Satellite Heart. This was the only studio album since In a Priest Driven Ambulance to date in which Dave Fridmann has not been involved. Due to it - as well as the success of the single "She Don't Use Jelly", the band was featured on two popular television series Beverly Hills 90210 and Beavis and Butt-head. The success of this record led to long stints of touring, opening for bands including the Red Hot Chili Peppers and Candlebox.

Clouds Taste Metallic was released to much critical fanfare in late 1995, though it did not achieve the commercial success of its predecessor. The strain of the year-long Clouds tour added to the stress from the three years touring in support of Transmissions was a major factor in the departure of Ronald Jones in late 1996. He was said to be suffering from a severe case of agoraphobia, although the documentary Fearless Freaks states that he left due to growing paranoia over Drozd's drug use.

The departure of Jones and a general dissatisfaction with standard "rock" music led to the three remaining members of the group to redefine the direction of the band with the experimental Zaireeka (1997), a four-CD album which is intended to be heard by playing all four CDs in four separate CD players simultaneously. The music incorporated both traditional musical elements and "found" sounds (as in musique concrete), often heavily manipulated with recording studio electronics.

As part of the development of this project, the band conducted a series of "parking lot experiments" and then later, "boombox experiments". In the parking lot experiments up to 40 volunteers were given cassettes created by the band to be played at a parking lot in their cars' stereo systems simultaneously. In the "boom box experiments" an orchestra comprised of up to 40 volunteers with modified "boombox"-type tape players was "conducted" - directed to vary the volume, speed or tone of the tape they were playing (again composed by the band) - by Wayne Coyne.[3]

In the meanwhile, a series of strange incidents (recounted in the 1999 song “The Spiderbite Song”) beset the band. Drozd's arm was almost amputated needlessly due to what he claimed was a spider bite (it turned out to be abscessed as a result of Drozd's heroin use), Ivins was trapped in his car for several hours after the wheel spun off of another vehicle into his windshield, and Coyne's father died after a long battle with cancer.

Artistic breakthrough (The Soft Bulletin and Yoshimi)

Though their experimental endeavors received some press coverage, their real breakthrough came with the massively acclaimed 1999 release, The Soft Bulletin. Marrying more traditional catchy melodies with languid synthetic strings, hypnotic, carefully manipulated beats, booming cymbals and oddball but philosophical lyrics (sung much more strongly than on earlier releases), the album quickly became one of the underground hits of the year, even widely considered to be one of the best albums of the entire decade.


Compared by many to The Beach Boys' Pet Sounds due to the addition of harmonies and orchestrated sounds, The Soft Bulletin also featured greater use of synthesizers, drum machines, sound effects and more studio manipulation. After this album was released, Coyne stated that, "if someone was to ask me what instrument do I play, I would say the recording studio." Realizing that an attempt to recreate this complex album live solely with additional musicians would be prohibitively complex and expensive, the group decided to tour as a three-piece and make extensive use of pre-recorded music to fill out the parts not being performed live by the members of the band. Perhaps most notably, this led to the decision to have Drozd (ostensibly the drummer, but a talented multi-instrumentalist) play primarily keyboards and guitar live instead of the drums. This, in turn, led to a decision to utilize video recordings and projections of Steven playing the drums for some of their older, more "standard rock" songs.

Wayne Coyne in concert in January 2004.
Enlarge
Wayne Coyne in concert in January 2004.

In a further attempt to enhance the live experience for the audience and to more accurately reproduce the sound of The Soft Bulletin live, the Lips devised the concept of the "Headphone Concert". A low-powered FM transmitter was set up at shows, and the concert was simultaneously broadcast to small Walkman-style receivers and headphones available for free to audience members. This would, in theory, allow the audiences greater sonic clarity while still feeling the power of a full live P.A.. This concept was debuted in Dallas, Texas and at the South by Southwest conference in Austin, Texas in March of 1999, and was subsequently used on the International Music Against Brain Degeneration Revue tour.

Three years later, in the summer of 2002, The Flaming Lips joined bands Cake and Modest Mouse on the Unlimited Sunshine Tour. They also released the full-length Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots to much critical acclaim. Demonstrating more use of electronic instruments and computer manipulation than The Soft Bulletin, Yoshimi is widely considered to be The Flaming Lips' first critical and commercial success after nearly twenty years of existing as a band. The final track on the album, "Approaching Pavonis Mons by Balloon (Utopia Planitia)" earned a 2002 Grammy Award for Best Rock Instrumental Performance, and the album was certified gold on April 10 2006. In March 2007, the band revealed that they have recently teamed up with screenwriter Aaron Sorkin to produce a Broadway musical based on the album.

Both The Soft Bulletin and Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots have been released on DVD-Audio for an enhanced listening experience.

Recent activity (At War with the Mystics and beyond)

Shortly after Yoshimi, The Soft Bulletin was estimated to have sold 300,000 copies in the United States[4], and The Flaming Lips released two EPs in the same vein of their previous album's robotic theme and containing remixed songs from Yoshimi, Fight Test and Ego Tripping at the Gates of Hell. They also appeared on the track "Marching the Hate Machines (Into the Sun)" on the Thievery Corporation album The Cosmic Game. In addition to their EPs, The Lips have been working for several years on a feature film entitled Christmas on Mars. Filming for the movie ended in late September 2005 and it is now in post-production. [5]

In 2002, they performed as the opening act, as well as the backup band for singer Beck on his Sea Change tour. In the summer of 2004, it was announced that The Flaming Lips would appear among the headliners on the 2004 Lollapalooza tour, alongside such legendary artists as Sonic Youth and Morrissey; however, the tour was canceled due to lack of revenue. Following the concerts' cancellation, the band entered Tarbox Road Studio with producer Dave Fridmann and began work on their eleventh album, the more organic-sounding At War with the Mystics. The record, aimed to be a more guitar-based and heavier effort than recent albums, featured more politically-conscious lyrics than any of their previous releases, and was released in April 2006 to a mixed yet mostly positive reception. Also in 2004, the band recorded the song "SpongeBob and Patrick Confront the Psychic Wall of Energy" for the soundtrack of The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie.

In 2005 the band was the subject of a documentary called Fearless Freaks, featuring appearances by other artists and celebrities such as The White Stripes, Beck, Christina Ricci, Liz Phair, Juliette Lewis, Steve Burns, Starlight Mints, and Adam Goldberg. In that same year, The Flaming Lips contributed a version of "Bohemian Rhapsody" to the album Killer Queen: A Tribute to Queen. Also in this year, The Flaming Lips released the DVD VOID (Video Overview in Deceleration), which chronicles all of their ventures into music video that have been produced since they signed with Warner Bros. in 1991. In October 2005, The Flaming Lips recorded a cover of "If I Only Had a Brain" for the soundtrack of the video game Stubbs the Zombie, which features modern rock bands covering songs from the 1950s and 1960s. Additionally, the band released one new song, "Mr. Ambulance Driver", for the soundtrack of the 2005 film Wedding Crashers (a slighly edited version of the song found its way on the new record). In October of 2005, the band performed a concert with several other acts, including Medeski Martin & Wood, Particle, and G Love & Special Sauce onboard a Carnival cruise ship in the Pacific Ocean in a music festival called Xingolati.

The band released two singles from At War With the Mystics: "The W.A.N.D.", which was featured in a Dell commercial and which was originally put out as a download-only single in early 2006, and "The Yeah Yeah Yeah Song", which became their highest-charting single on the UK Singles Chart, peaking at #16. A 4-track EP, entitled It Overtakes Me, was released later in the UK that year. The only instrumental on the album, "The Wizard Turns On... The Giant Silver Flashlight and Puts on His Werewolf Moccasins," earned a 2006 Grammy Award for Best Rock Instrumental Performance [6], making it twice in a row the Lips have been nominated in that category and won.

Following the April 4, 2006 release of At War with the Mystics, the band began a tour to support the album in the United Kingdom, including a finale at the Royal Albert Hall and performances at the 02 Wireless Festival. At the Leeds England date of the festival, the band opened for The Who, whom they are long standing fans of. A tour of the US with Sonic Youth, Ween, and other artists followed. They also played at the Wakarusa Music and Camping Festival in Lawrence, Kansas in June 2006, the Hedgpeth festival in Twin Lakes, Wisconsin, Chicago's Lollapalooza festival, Austin City Limits Music Festival in September 2006 and Voodoo Music Fest in New Orleans in late October. In November 2006, they returned to the UK for a short tour.

Flaming Lips (Dfest - July, 2007) It's Tulsa, OK?
Enlarge
Flaming Lips (Dfest - July, 2007) It's Tulsa, OK?

The band continued to tour throughout the fall of 2006 stopping in Montreal, the Virgin Festival on the Toronto Islands, Atlantic City's House of Blues, The University of Vermont in Burlington, their hometown Oklahoma City, Austin, Texas, and New York City, NY as well as several other cities. The homecoming show in Oklahoma City was performed at the Zoo Amphitheater and included the unveiling of a new UFO stage prop, and would provide footage for the U.F.O.s at the Zoo concert DVD.

On December 5, 2006, Oklahoma City honored the band with a downtown alley named after the band. Vince Gill and Charlie Christian were also given street names by the city.

In the spring of 2007, The Flaming Lips went on a tour of the southeast, specifically Florida. Cities played were Pompano Beach, Orlando, St. Petersburg (Janus Landing), and a free show in Gainesville (University of Florida) in which over 4,000 students attended. On April 18, 2007 they performed to a sell-out crowd in Raleigh, North Carolina and outdoors at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island on April 21, 2007 along with other veteran rockers Mission of Burma and Yo La Tengo. The Soft Bulletin and At War With The Mystics went Gold in the UK in May 2007.[citation needed] Their most recent festival appearance was at Bonnaroo 2007 in Manchester, Tennessee on June 17, 2007 (where they played a full-version "War Pigs" 90 minutes prior to their midnight show, which they told the audience was "just a sound test" but was seen as a continuance of their oddity and love of their audiences). They are scheduled to play the Cactus Festival in Brugge, Belgium on July 9, 2007 and the Monolith Festival at Red Rocks Amphitheatre near Denver, Colorado on September 15, 2007, as well as, a special engagement at The Palms Hotel Pool in Las Vegas, NV, on September 16, 2007, presented by Miller Lite. In addition, the Flaming Lips' single "The W.A.N.D" was featured in a new Dell Inspiron commercial that aired this summer. The Flaming Lips also recorded the song, I was Zapped by the Super Lucky Rainbow, for the 2007 comedy, Good Luck Chuck.

Awards

  • Nominated: (2007) for Best International Act.

Members

  • Current
  • Former
  • Mark Coyne – vocals (1983-1985)
  • Dave Kostka – drums (1983-1984)
  • Richard English – drums, vocals, piano (1984-1988)
  • Jonathan Donahue – guitars (1988-1991)
  • Nathan Roberts – drums (1988-1991)
  • John Mooneyham – guitars (one month in 1991)
  • Ronald Jones – guitars (1991-1996)

Discography

Footnotes and references

  1. ^ DeRogatis, Jim. Staring at Sound: The True Story of Oklahoma’s Fabulous Flaming Lips. Broadway Books, 2006. ISBN-13 978-0-7679-2140-4
  2. ^ Part 4: Exploiting the major label, retrieved 8-2006
  3. ^ flaminglips.com; retrieved 8-2006
  4. ^ http://www.philadelphiaweekly.com/view.php?id=4042&highlight=
  5. ^ http://www.flaminglips.com/content/film/
  6. ^ Flaming Lips Win Two Grammies!. Retrieved on 2007-03-04.

External links

Official sites

Photo galleries

News

Interviews

Videos


The Flaming Lips
Wayne Coyne | Michael Ivins | Steven Drozd | Kliph Scurlock (Touring Only)
Inactive members: Mark Coyne | Dave Kostka | Richard English | Jonathan Donahue | Nathan Roberts | Ronald Jones
Discography
Albums: Hear It Is | Oh My Gawd!!! | Telepathic Surgery | In a Priest Driven Ambulance | Hit to Death in the Future Head | Transmissions from the Satellite Heart | Clouds Taste Metallic | Zaireeka | The Soft Bulletin | Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots | At War with the Mystics
EPs: The Flaming Lips | Wastin' Pigs | Providing Needles for Your Balloons | The Southern Oklahoma Cosmic Trigger Contest | Fight Test | Ego Tripping at the Gates of Hell | It Overtakes Me
Compilations: A Collection of Songs... | Punk Rockers Are Taking Acid | Jesus Egg | Shambolic Birth | Late Night Tales | 20 Years of Weird | iTunes Originals
Singles: "She Don't Use Jelly" | "Do You Realize??" | "Fight Test" | "The Golden Path" | "The W.A.N.D." | "The Yeah Yeah Yeah Song"
Films and Videos: Fearless Freaks | Christmas on Mars | VOID | U.F.O.s at the Zoo
See also
Killer Queen: A Tribute to Queen | Dave Fridmann

 
 

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