Find out what the CL Music Team is jamming this fine Monday to rocket launch the work week. Click here to check out previous entries.
Ray – The Flaming Lips, The Flaming Lips & Heady Fwends (Physical/digital re-release of RSD 2012 album, out tomorrow, 6/26)
There is no judgment that can be passed on The Flaming Lips. The band – along with their fearless leader, Wayne Coyne – truly don't care what anyone thinks. All that really seems to matter to these Oklahoma-based freaks is following the weird, wacky, and predictably unpredictable muse that guides their way. The band's Records Store Day release – Flaming Lips & Heady Fwends – was the third best selling offering of this year's edition of the indie-retail holiday (it was even released in super-limited edition blood-filled vinyl), and now the 13-track effort is seeing worldwide physical & digital release via Warner Bros. Records.
There are fantastic moments (the acid-folk buildup on the Lightning Bolt-featuring "I'm Working at NASA On Acid"), head scratchers (is the Bon Iver collaboration good or bad?), and even a complete "WTF were they thinking?" moment featuring Ke$ha and Biz Markie ("2012 (You Must Be Upgraded)"). Yet, all in all, the LP is an important milestone in the band's history as it finds them collaborating with a smattering of music's most important names (Yoko Ono Band, My Morning Jacket's Jim James, Nick Cave, and even Prefuse 73) on songs that feel purely experimental and often off-the-cuff. Call the Lips what you want, but don't dare call them cowards. [More after the jump.]
This article appears in Jun 21-27, 2012.