It was Tim's 21st birthday today, so how better to spend it than a day's shopping in London and a completely different aural experience in the evening! Tim organised the hire of a spacevan which I duly offered to drive, as everyone else got drunk the night before! So, after a trundle up to Kentish Town, we parked near the Forum at 1-ish and went off to Camden! I did some shopping then watched the FA Cup Final in a pub, Arsenal beating Newcastle 2-0. We then met up back in Kentish Town, and were first in the Forum at 7, gaining good vantage points by the mixing desk for this very strange musical experience. 40 chairs occupied by beatboxes were laid out onstage, and by 9 pm, they became occupied by guest operators, including Miki of Lush, Martin Carr of the Boo Radleys, 18 Wheeler's Sean Jackson, and Wannadies' bassist Frederick! The Flaming Lips vocalist Wayne Coyne, our "compere" for the evening, then explained the procedure for this event; he and Steven Drozd of the Lips would "conduct" pre-recorded tapes played by the beatboxes to the operators, for an experiment in sound!
Coyne was a very personable and entertaining compere, as he conducted proceedings with a, "1... 2... 3... G... Go!" to cue in each musical "piece". Following the test, the first musical piece was a huge and awesome cacophony of white noise, which with various sounds resembling screaming angels and earthquakes, sounded like the soundtrack to a planet being devoured! Galactus in the house? Other "songs" were less cacophonous but no less intense, as Wayne and Steven took on the roles of conducting one half of the operating participants each, creating as visual a spectacle as the sound was awesome. Some of the "pieces" were a little repetitive, and the sound, pushed through 40 tapes on 40 old beatboxes allegedly procured from Oklahoma City pawn shops, was a little fuzzy and impure, but as a sonic experience it was unusual, unique, nothing less than intriguing and at times very enjoyable and even emotionally moving. At the end, after which we ran into some other Wannadies for a brief but nice chat outside the venue, Wayne Coyne thanked us, "for coming along with open minds." That summed it up really - a great way to spend anyone's 21st!
2010 recollections - it's quite interesting to look back on this gig, given how these "Boom Box" experiments contributed to the changes the Flaming Lips subsequently made to how they produced their music, resulting in the massively influential "The Soft Bulletin" CD in 1999. A significant step along the way!
Showing posts with label Flaming Lips. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Flaming Lips. Show all posts
Friday, 27 August 2010
Thursday, 29 July 2010
402 THE FLAMING LIPS, Merz, London Camden Electric Ballroom, Thursday 22 April 1999
First time back at The Electric Ballroom for some 14 years! Since then it's been closed down and re-opened, but is still easy to find, so after a good trundle down, Rachel and I met up with Tim and Claire in the venue at 8, and heard about their Elliott Smith gig the previous night, whilst ignoring the painful techno doodlings of Merz, a band who make "music" best described as the soundtrack to a migraine. Also indulged in some star-spotting, noting Miki Berenyi, ex of Lush, and also James Bradfield of the Maincs, obviously out to hear a real cutting-edge band! (miaow!)
Gathered near the front as the Lips soundchecked, and ran into Colleen Browne (my favourite tall red-haired Canadian bassist, and formerly of The Parachute Men, The Heart Throbs, Pale Saints and Warm Jets!). She gave me a flyer for her new band White Hotel and recommended I catch them. "We've got some history, you and me," she said; she's not wrong - see above!
Anyway, now onto The Flaming Lips. Now a trio, with bass, keyboards/ guitar, and a bloody huge "rank" gong being the "live" instruments, this promised to be a very unusual show. However, the new songs were no less than utterly astonishing, with layers of taped sound augmenting the live performance but never dominating it. In addition, projected images of fetuses, plane crashes and aerobic girls, amongst other crazy stuff, made for a unique visual spectacle. However, vocalist Wayne Coyne was the main visual focus throughout, playing the gong with gusto and producing rubber glove puppets of chameleons, geckos and nuns (!).
Meanwhile the ears were doing damn fine too! They've taken the best elements from their "Boom Box Experiment" idea, and have developed their wired and slightly-delic sound into lush sonic landscapes, with few contemporary comparisons other than the excellent and equally reinvented Mercury Rev. Of the old numbers on offer, only the sublime singalong "Jelly" stood comparison with some unearthly sounding new numbers. One bemused punter shouted, "you used to be so good but then it all went strange," to which Wayne Coyne agreed. However, for "strange", read, "other worldly and beautiful". As one of their numbers stated, "their potential has arrived". And how! No less than awesome. They're playing together with The Rev in a couple of weeks. I'm already counting the seconds until then!
Gathered near the front as the Lips soundchecked, and ran into Colleen Browne (my favourite tall red-haired Canadian bassist, and formerly of The Parachute Men, The Heart Throbs, Pale Saints and Warm Jets!). She gave me a flyer for her new band White Hotel and recommended I catch them. "We've got some history, you and me," she said; she's not wrong - see above!
Anyway, now onto The Flaming Lips. Now a trio, with bass, keyboards/ guitar, and a bloody huge "rank" gong being the "live" instruments, this promised to be a very unusual show. However, the new songs were no less than utterly astonishing, with layers of taped sound augmenting the live performance but never dominating it. In addition, projected images of fetuses, plane crashes and aerobic girls, amongst other crazy stuff, made for a unique visual spectacle. However, vocalist Wayne Coyne was the main visual focus throughout, playing the gong with gusto and producing rubber glove puppets of chameleons, geckos and nuns (!).
Meanwhile the ears were doing damn fine too! They've taken the best elements from their "Boom Box Experiment" idea, and have developed their wired and slightly-delic sound into lush sonic landscapes, with few contemporary comparisons other than the excellent and equally reinvented Mercury Rev. Of the old numbers on offer, only the sublime singalong "Jelly" stood comparison with some unearthly sounding new numbers. One bemused punter shouted, "you used to be so good but then it all went strange," to which Wayne Coyne agreed. However, for "strange", read, "other worldly and beautiful". As one of their numbers stated, "their potential has arrived". And how! No less than awesome. They're playing together with The Rev in a couple of weeks. I'm already counting the seconds until then!
405 MERCURY REV, THE FLAMING LIPS, Oxford Brookes University, Thursday 6 May 1999
2 gigs in 2 days, yeah, but this one was not to be missed! Road works in Oxford city centre delayed matters further, but we hit the Uni campus in good time. Let's face it, I would have got out and ran to get to this one!
Got into the nice venue at 8, to see head Flaming Lip Wayne Coyne dashing around in front of the stage making last-minute checks before the "test" audio-visual loop and the haunting soundcheck song. They re-emerged at 8.15 to the expectant (me) and curious (everyone else), and kicked off another bizarre, brilliant set with "Race For The Prize", a wondrously, other-worldly sounding yet utterly catchy number, an early lock for Single Of The Year! The same gongs, tape loops, stunning visuals and odd hand puppets were again in evidence, but the songs, on second listen, sound even better. This band, from Oklahoma City in the middle of USA's "Tornado Alley", are pushing the envelope harder than any other band currently operating, and are producing some quite other-worldly and awesome music in the process. My one-word conversation with Wayne Coyne afterwards (as he took the gong frame down with a vicious looking set of pliers) confirmed this; "extraordinary!"
Taking their old mates The Flaming Lips with them, in their current incarnation and utterly inspired form, is either a decision of extreme foolhardiness, or an expression of supreme confidence in your own abilities and new-found status. For the Rev, tonight, thankfully it proved the latter, as they were once again magnificent. A more conventional sound and line-up than The Lips (but hey, that'd be everyone then) The Rev's set nevertheless occupied the same other-worldly territory; sweeping, majestic and heavenly. "Frittering", 3rd number in, lasted over 10 minutes and could have gone on forever, as far as I was concerned! Live, their songs take on an added dynamism, and vocalist Jonathan Donahue is a riveting and effortlessly cool frontman for this band of sunglasses-clad musical heroes. Mercury Rev manage to sound as if they're rediscovering their American rock roots, yet soaring forwards and upwards to the heavens and infinity at the same time. A brilliant double-header!
Got into the nice venue at 8, to see head Flaming Lip Wayne Coyne dashing around in front of the stage making last-minute checks before the "test" audio-visual loop and the haunting soundcheck song. They re-emerged at 8.15 to the expectant (me) and curious (everyone else), and kicked off another bizarre, brilliant set with "Race For The Prize", a wondrously, other-worldly sounding yet utterly catchy number, an early lock for Single Of The Year! The same gongs, tape loops, stunning visuals and odd hand puppets were again in evidence, but the songs, on second listen, sound even better. This band, from Oklahoma City in the middle of USA's "Tornado Alley", are pushing the envelope harder than any other band currently operating, and are producing some quite other-worldly and awesome music in the process. My one-word conversation with Wayne Coyne afterwards (as he took the gong frame down with a vicious looking set of pliers) confirmed this; "extraordinary!"
Taking their old mates The Flaming Lips with them, in their current incarnation and utterly inspired form, is either a decision of extreme foolhardiness, or an expression of supreme confidence in your own abilities and new-found status. For the Rev, tonight, thankfully it proved the latter, as they were once again magnificent. A more conventional sound and line-up than The Lips (but hey, that'd be everyone then) The Rev's set nevertheless occupied the same other-worldly territory; sweeping, majestic and heavenly. "Frittering", 3rd number in, lasted over 10 minutes and could have gone on forever, as far as I was concerned! Live, their songs take on an added dynamism, and vocalist Jonathan Donahue is a riveting and effortlessly cool frontman for this band of sunglasses-clad musical heroes. Mercury Rev manage to sound as if they're rediscovering their American rock roots, yet soaring forwards and upwards to the heavens and infinity at the same time. A brilliant double-header!
Tuesday, 20 July 2010
428 THE FLAMING LIPS, Spectrum, Bristol University Anson Rooms, Friday 12 November 1999
Just 3 happy travellers (Ady, Rachel and myself), as Dave blew us out at the last minute to go see Swindon Town play. His loss; financially as well, as we couldn't shift the spare ticket! We arrived just as the support band took the stage; Spectrum, former Spacemen 3 mainman Sonic Boom's new charges, who followed the same druggy droney noise-rock route that made me avoid Spacemen 3! Monotone, irritating and headache-inducing, I'm afraid, so I repaired to the bar, although Ady stuck it out!
Went back to watch The Flaming Lips set up, which is always fun in itself. As Wayne Coyne toyed with a toy alien ray-gun, I shouted, "shoot me now, Wayne!" at him - so he did! Just before their by-now standard soundcheck, they asked the crowd to provide them with a huge welcome, so after going off, once again took the stage to rapturous applause!
This is the 4th time this year I've witnessed this extraordinary live experience, but it's still not getting old or tiring! In any case The Flaming Lips revamped the set tonight, drawing more heavily from delicious new CD "The Soft Bulletin", and also including "Lightning Strikes The Postman", and an unexpected "Somewhere Over The Rainbow", with Judy Garland on the big screen providing the background visuals. Apart from that, the humour (extensive use of the fake blood, the gecko hand puppet and toy dog, the confetti blasts, and of course the ray-gun!), extraordinarily rich musical depth and range, and visual spectacle (especially the new video for the brilliantly emotive "Waiting For A Superman", undoubtedly the highlight of the set) that characterised all the previous gigs was once again much in evidence.
We even got an encore this time! "The Spark That Bled" was followed by Michael Ivins standing on his chair and hurling confetti over Wayne Coyne, who sung "White Christmas" through his bullhorn. A bizarre yet entertaining finish to another brilliant Flaming Lips evening. This band are producing the most "out there", unorthodox yet lushly melodic music of anyone today. Long may they astonish and inspire!
Went back to watch The Flaming Lips set up, which is always fun in itself. As Wayne Coyne toyed with a toy alien ray-gun, I shouted, "shoot me now, Wayne!" at him - so he did! Just before their by-now standard soundcheck, they asked the crowd to provide them with a huge welcome, so after going off, once again took the stage to rapturous applause!
This is the 4th time this year I've witnessed this extraordinary live experience, but it's still not getting old or tiring! In any case The Flaming Lips revamped the set tonight, drawing more heavily from delicious new CD "The Soft Bulletin", and also including "Lightning Strikes The Postman", and an unexpected "Somewhere Over The Rainbow", with Judy Garland on the big screen providing the background visuals. Apart from that, the humour (extensive use of the fake blood, the gecko hand puppet and toy dog, the confetti blasts, and of course the ray-gun!), extraordinarily rich musical depth and range, and visual spectacle (especially the new video for the brilliantly emotive "Waiting For A Superman", undoubtedly the highlight of the set) that characterised all the previous gigs was once again much in evidence.
We even got an encore this time! "The Spark That Bled" was followed by Michael Ivins standing on his chair and hurling confetti over Wayne Coyne, who sung "White Christmas" through his bullhorn. A bizarre yet entertaining finish to another brilliant Flaming Lips evening. This band are producing the most "out there", unorthodox yet lushly melodic music of anyone today. Long may they astonish and inspire!
Friday, 16 July 2010
440 THE FLAMING LIPS, Built To Spill, Wheat, London Royal Festival Hall, Friday 12 May 2000
Two gigs in one evening! Rachel and I had just seen Seafood play an acoustic set in Borders bookshop in Oxford Street, and we then tubed it over to Embankment and crossed the Thames Bridge, passing Michael Palin (!) on the way. Into the Festival Hall, a rather grand (and huge!) venue, accompanied by tannoy pips denoting the 5 minute warning. So we took our seats in the auditorium at 7.30, just as Wheat took the stage. Despite the half full hall, they played a blinder. The sound was note-perfect, and these Boston boys totally did it justice, with a strong and passionate performance of their deliciously slow-burning and haunting mood music. They "rocked out" as much as their slow-fi material allowed, with the final crescendo to new single - and candidate for Top Single of 2000 - "Raised Ranch Revolution", a particularly absorbing highlight. Some banter with the crowd, in which I, of course, participated (!), also highlighted a superb performance. If they sound this good in large venues, then Wheat really should be playing them all the time!
Hit the bar during the interval, meeting up with travelling evening gig-goers Dave, Ady and Peej. Rachel got the drinks in - which took 25 minutes and created some frayed nerves! - while we chatted and also bumped into Ady's old Uni mates Keiron and Alison. Popped into the hall for the last 3 numbers of Built To Spill's set. Odd for this seated venue, they actually had a merry moshpit, which all but absorbed our stage-right seats, 4 rows back. BTS are a highly respected US "Alternative" rock act, but, like Guided By Voices, their forced cleverness and cerebral approach, at the expense of good tunes played with some passion, left me cold. In fact, their best number was a lumbering grungified version of "Mr. Crowley", an old HM song by Black Sabbath... or Hawkwind... or Led Zep... or some such... Back to the bar then, failing to bump into the Wheat guys, having spoken to guitarist Ricky at the end of their set and offered to buy him a drink. No such luck - I guess Rachel and I will have to gatecrash his party in Boston next Friday!
Took our seats again for the Flaming Lips set at 9.30. This time, however, there was no on-stage soundcheck, just psychedelic circles projected onto the by-now familiar screen to placate the restless crowd. The 3 Lips took the stage at 9.45 and burst straight into "Race For The Prize", last year's No. 1 Single by miles, and as usual rendered even more epic and other-worldly "live", with Leonard Bernstein conducting the apocalypse as visual accompaniment. Peej turned to me at the end of it and said, "that was one of the greatest things I've ever seen!" I can understand; this is my 9th time of seeing The Flaming Lips; my 5th with this set-up, and it awes me every time. This time, slightly rejigged films accompanied the moody yet magnificent set staples such as "Riding To Work In The Year 2025" and "Feeling Yourself Disintegrate", which itself fair brought a lump to the old throatie.
Wayne then captured the celebratory mood of the evening with a preamble about Record Label City Slang's 10th anniversary, prior to flooding the moshpit with balloons during the ludicrously happy "She Don't Use Jelly". The usual features - the gong, the glove puppet, Wayne-as-confetti poster boy for the new Millennium - were in evidence, and the night was overall yet another Magical Mystery Tour courtesy of The Flaming Lips!
Monday, 1 March 2010
569 THE FLAMING LIPS, Bob Mould, London Astoria, Wednesday 10 July 2002
Barely the end of the first week back in Blighty, and we're on the gig trail again! I travelled up with friends, parking at Shepherd's Bush and tubing into town, queuing up to get into this sell-out show at 8.15. By then we'd totally missed first band Goldrush, but bumped into Rachel (in London on business today) on the already-heaving floor, stage left, with a good view for an intriguing (for us) opener!
Bob Mould, one of my all-time guitar heroes, returned to the scene of his triumphant 1989 "Workbook" tour show (gig 146 for me, Pop Kids!), on the back of possibly his worst ever recorded output, "Modulate", a mish-mash of electronics and tape loops, with Bob's distinctive vocal howl and sheet-metal guitar buried so deep in the mix as to be indistinguishable. We honestly didn't know what to expect from this show! However, Bob came on, possibly 50 pounds lighter than the "Last Dog And Pony Tour" monolith, and "treated" us to a set initially drawn from this album. Thankfully, the voice was much more prominent than on the record, and we had backing films for each track, invariably featuring some homo-eroticism, to distract us from the relatively sub-standard material. Thankfully, he threw us a bone towards the end, climaxing the set with Husker Du's "Makes No Sense At All" (which he could play backwards on a glockenspiel and it'd still be addictively immense) and "Celebrated Summer", and the titanic Sugar number "Man On The Moon" to round off an uneven but occasionally brilliant set.
Once again, Lips mainman Wayne Coyne joined the roadies setting up the stage for the Lips' performance, although he didn't need to get the spanner out this time, as 3 giant mirror balls had replaced the gong! The Lips' entrance, at 9.15 to an uncomfortably packed venue, really got Rachel excited, as Coyne came onstage accompanied by 2 giant pink rabbits! They quickly divested the rabbit headgear to reveal fellow Lips Stephen Drozd and Michael Ivins, and Drozd's frantic acoustic guitar sawing heralded the anthemic new number "Do You Realise", a soaring, life-affirming track so feelgood-making, that you fail to, erm, realise, that it's all about death! D'oh!
Coyne expounded his gig theory to us, citing a Husker Du gig he'd attended, expecting to hear "New Day Rising" and hearing all new numbers instead, then proceeded to play a mix of familiar numbers from the out-there psychedelic masterpiece "The Soft Bulletin", and the more unfamiliar, ambient and electronically experimental material from "Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots". An unnecessary cover of Kylie Minogue's "Can't Get You Out Of My Head", which admittedly they transformed into a death dirge, was followed by my personal set highlight, a brilliantly hooky "She Don't Use Jelly". An earlier "Feeling Yourself Disintegrate", which was accompanied by a monkey hand puppet, also hit the spot, as did the touching closer "Waiting For A Superman". After that, we didn't need an encore, but got a couple - a short unfamiliar song requiring audience participation, and an overlong "What Is The Light", proving you can get too much of a good thing. No encore and no Kylie, and this gig would have been just about perfect!
Bob Mould, one of my all-time guitar heroes, returned to the scene of his triumphant 1989 "Workbook" tour show (gig 146 for me, Pop Kids!), on the back of possibly his worst ever recorded output, "Modulate", a mish-mash of electronics and tape loops, with Bob's distinctive vocal howl and sheet-metal guitar buried so deep in the mix as to be indistinguishable. We honestly didn't know what to expect from this show! However, Bob came on, possibly 50 pounds lighter than the "Last Dog And Pony Tour" monolith, and "treated" us to a set initially drawn from this album. Thankfully, the voice was much more prominent than on the record, and we had backing films for each track, invariably featuring some homo-eroticism, to distract us from the relatively sub-standard material. Thankfully, he threw us a bone towards the end, climaxing the set with Husker Du's "Makes No Sense At All" (which he could play backwards on a glockenspiel and it'd still be addictively immense) and "Celebrated Summer", and the titanic Sugar number "Man On The Moon" to round off an uneven but occasionally brilliant set.
Once again, Lips mainman Wayne Coyne joined the roadies setting up the stage for the Lips' performance, although he didn't need to get the spanner out this time, as 3 giant mirror balls had replaced the gong! The Lips' entrance, at 9.15 to an uncomfortably packed venue, really got Rachel excited, as Coyne came onstage accompanied by 2 giant pink rabbits! They quickly divested the rabbit headgear to reveal fellow Lips Stephen Drozd and Michael Ivins, and Drozd's frantic acoustic guitar sawing heralded the anthemic new number "Do You Realise", a soaring, life-affirming track so feelgood-making, that you fail to, erm, realise, that it's all about death! D'oh!
Coyne expounded his gig theory to us, citing a Husker Du gig he'd attended, expecting to hear "New Day Rising" and hearing all new numbers instead, then proceeded to play a mix of familiar numbers from the out-there psychedelic masterpiece "The Soft Bulletin", and the more unfamiliar, ambient and electronically experimental material from "Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots". An unnecessary cover of Kylie Minogue's "Can't Get You Out Of My Head", which admittedly they transformed into a death dirge, was followed by my personal set highlight, a brilliantly hooky "She Don't Use Jelly". An earlier "Feeling Yourself Disintegrate", which was accompanied by a monkey hand puppet, also hit the spot, as did the touching closer "Waiting For A Superman". After that, we didn't need an encore, but got a couple - a short unfamiliar song requiring audience participation, and an overlong "What Is The Light", proving you can get too much of a good thing. No encore and no Kylie, and this gig would have been just about perfect!
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