Ok. Everybody, everybody. This is a fantastic record.
Fight Test kicks things off, seeming like an unconscious nod to Cat Stevens' Father & Son, both lyrically and musically (the fact that they can pull this kind of thing off should come as no surpise). Yoshimi... Part Two feels like the Lips wrestling in a bag with DMX Krew and Daft Punk. In the Morning of the Magicians and It's Summertime evoke the same kind of magic as the Floyd's A Pillow of Winds, or Marillion's Afraid of Sunrise, without using either of these as a reference point (the fact that they can pull this kind of thing off should come as no surprise). Do You Realise actually made me weep, a lyric touched by God, and yet again we're reminded how the Lips can touch subject matter in a way that no other band can without pouring on the cheese, in a way that will sit and smile with you at the transcendence and transience of life, knowing that all the worlds secret wisdom can be condensed into a couple of simple words. All We Have Is Now is a perfect marriage of lyric and music, "We're not going to make it" placed in a song that continually builds to... nothing.
It's breathtaking how many ideas the Flaming Lips can take and reprocess, from DJ Shadow to Timbaland style drum programming, from the squelchiest of hi-fi synths to the simplest strumming of acoustic guitars. This is no straight follow up to the Soft Bulletin, although there is a fairly close reference point (both lyrically and musically) in that album's Feeling Yourself Disintegrate. This is a far more restrained Lips... although for any other band it would probably be the height of their musical indulgence and excess. Not as immediate as some of their other records, certainly, but it's already totally captured me even on the second listen. As of the third, the Robot falls in love with Yoshimi. |
