More Flaming Lips Love

or Redundancy Is Only Possible When Not Talking About Great Music.

You want to read something interesting? Go here to check out a song-by-song notes by The Man Himself, Mr. Wayne Coyne about the new Lips album, At War With The Mystics.

Some of the things he mentions are incredible. This goes back to my endless wondering about the definition and direction of indie rock, what makes it "indie," what makes it different. This kind of forethought, pre-planning, and ability to experiment and be completely, unshamefully, radical is the very definition of what it means to be Indie Rock.

Musically, the new Lips album is beyond words. It is picture perfect in terms of instrument placement in sound space (on headphones, it practically glows), every chord and note is nessecary, clear, powerful. Choatic tracks like "The W.A.N.D" make so much sense amidst the aural chaos. Quieter tracks like the sublime "Mr. Ambulance Driver" and the heartbreaking "The Sound of Failure" take on a clean genre-less sensibility, as if the various instruments were played by classical musicians in glass booths in million-dollar Upper East Side studios. And songs like "The Yeah Yeah Yeah Song" and "Free Radicals" embrace the gleeful Lips spirit that is unescapable to the listener (especially at a live perfomance).