Monday 6 May 2013

The Wall Of Sound A-Z: The Flaming Lips: Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots

The flaming lips are one of a kind, a band who seem just to make music based around the things they came up with on a drunken night out, those exciting no holds barred ideas, and as a result they are one of my favourite bands.

Picking up Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots, it's an interesting record, good first couple of tracks, particularly the strings at the end of the second, the sound of feeling in love, then comes Yoshimi, parts 1&2, and what a difference the 2 parts are, first is a beautiful song about these robots - Perfection. The second, effectively a playing of scales up and down, squishy sounds and not really up to much (it's more interesting live with the full experience as I will expand on below).

In the morning of the magicians, is back to a wistful, beautiful song Wayne Coyne crooning in his ravaged voice with beautiful tunes around. Then spacey sounds and it sounds like what flying in a spaceship would sound like universe rushing past, then back to the gentler element again.

Ego tripping at the gates of hell, is an average pleasant canter through 4 minutes, no short tunes on this album. Similarly are you a hypnotist? And it's summertime, these three songs have all been building up to one of the greatest songs ever written.

Do you realise?? Not only is it a beautiful, beautiful song, every line makes you think about something, Do you realise that everyone will someday die being the one that really gets me every time, probably because I have been relatively sheltered to this in my life. It's a song I could stick on repeat, lie back and close my eyes to.




The last couple of tracks basically rattle through basking in the glow of Do you realise.

So overall the album has 2 of the greatest tracks on it, and takes you on a trip for the rest of the album, brilliant stuff. The music mags loved it too, as the sticker on the front of my cd states:


"...even by their standards, Yoshimi is astonishing. The greatest album released in uncuts lifetime" *****

"The bands most delicate and sophisticated work yet" ***** the times

"The Flaming Lips are out there on their own : there is no one quite like them" Daily Telegraph 

"Outstanding" Sunday Times
It's not the songs though that make the Flaming Lips a phenomenal band but the live experience, I've seen them 3 times and each time it's been a draw dropping performance, whether it's the big plastic ball that Wayne walks over the crowd in, or the numerous green balloons into the crowd bouncing them around, or the big hands, random cam, dancing Santas or Aliens, streamers and confetti guns - it's a party not a gig!




The final word for me would probably be linked to the robots, as around this time me and Mrs P had come into the possession of 2 big black wind up robots, which we would then hide around the house, behind the curtains, in the fridge, in the bed etc to surprise each other whenever we could. They are in the loft now, so may be time to bring them out of retirement.



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