After the symphonic majesty of The Soft Bulletin, the Flaming Lips return with Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots, a sublime fusion of Bulletin's newfound emotional directness, the old-school playfulness of Transmissions From the Satellite Heart, and, more importantly, exciting new expressions of the group's sentimental, experimental sound. While the album isn't as immediately impressive as the equally brilliant and unfocused Soft Bulletin, it's more consistent, using a palette of rounded, surprisingly emotive basslines; squelchy analog synths; and manicured acoustic guitars to craft songs like "One More Robot/Sympathy 3000-21," a sleekly melancholy tale of robots developing emotions, and "In the Morning of the Magicians," an aptly named electronic art rock epic that sounds like a collaboration between the Moody Blues and Wendy Carlos. Paradoxically, the Lips use simpler arrangements to create more diverse sounds on Yoshimi, spanning the lush, psychedelic reveries of "It's Summertime"; the instrumental "Approaching Pavonis Mons by Balloon"; the dubby "Are You a Hypnotist?"; and the barely organized chaos of "Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots, Pt. 2," which defeats the evil metal ones with ferocious drums, buzzing synths, and the razor sharp howl of the Boredoms' Yoshimi. Few bands can craft life-affirming songs about potentially depressing subjects (the passage of time, fighting for what you care about, good vs. evil) as the Flaming Lips, and on Yoshimi, they're at the top of their game. "Do You Realize??" is the standout, so immediately gorgeous that it's obvious that it's the single. It's also the most obviously influenced by The Soft Bulletin, but it's even catchier and sadder, sweetening such unavoidable truths like "Do you realize that everyone you know someday will die?" with chimes, clouds of strings, and angelic backing vocals. Yoshimi features some of the sharpest emotional peaks and valleys of any Lips album -- the superficially playful "Fight Test" is surprisingly bittersweet, while sad songs like "All We Have Is Now" and "Ego Tripping at the Gates of Hell" are leavened by witty lyrics and production tricks. Funny, beautiful, and moving, Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots finds the Flaming Lips continuing to grow and challenge themselves in not-so-obvious ways after delivering their obvious masterpiece.
One of the few musical acts whose members continue to push the boundaries of their music thirty years into their band's tenure, the Flaming Lips have only started to realize the level of their rock stardom. The Lips' popularity has grown since 2002's Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots, and their '02 tour opening for Beck and acting as his supporting band introduced them to a whole new audience that would've completely missed the depth of 1999's The Soft Bulletin (every hipster's favorite Lips album) and their previous releases. With so many more ears eagerly awaiting a taste of At War With the Mystics, Wayne Coyne, Michael Ivins and Steven Drozd know they probably could fart on record and still get hundreds to line up to hear it. Instead, they put out another solid album that represents their unadulterated ingenuity and continued pursuit of sonic experimentation.
Sure, the production on At War With the Mystics isn't anything overly complex, but its attention to catchy funk rhythms ("The W.A.N.D.") and tweaked sounds ("Free Radicals") keeps each song fresh and interesting. The album's biggest fault is in its song order. It opens with two energetic and catchy songs ("The Year Yeah Yeah Song" and "Free Radicals") before going into nearly twenty minutes of mellow psychedelics on the next three songs. But like most Flaming Lips albums, At War With the Mystics takes a little time to truly appreciate and is probably best suited for headphones listens.
Sonically, the album picks up exactly where the Lips left off with Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots: heavy on the pop psychedelics, occasionally odd without being inaccessible. Lyrically, it's the same game, too. Coyne pulls out all the stops with almost forcefully ironic lyrics ("Yeah Yeah Yeah Song") juxtaposed against stories of life and death ("Mr. Ambulance Driver").
With their more recent popularity, many have shoved the Flaming Lips aside as musicians willing to do anything for success. But the band continues to prove that it's more worthy than most at the top of the ladder. The Flaming Lips' music has been licensed everywhere from commercials to shows such as Charmed or Smallville, and that excessive commercialism has left a bad taste in the mouths of many. But this band isn't new to the world of cashing in; remember the Lips' appearance in '94 on Beverly Hills 90210?
And when separated from all that baggage, this is a solid collection of musicians striving to make great music, and At War With the Mystics is a worthwhile token of their talents.
So where does a band go after releasing the most defiantly experimental record of its career? If you're the Flaming Lips, you keep rushing headlong into the unknown -- The Soft Bulletin, their follow-up to the four-disc gambit Zaireeka, is in many ways their most daring work yet, a plaintively emotional, lushly symphonic pop masterpiece eons removed from the mind-warping noise of their past efforts. Though more conventional in concept and scope than Zaireeka, The Soft Bulletin clearly reflects its predecessor's expansive sonic palette. Its multidimensional sound is positively celestial, a shape-shifting pastiche of blissful melodies, heavenly harmonies, and orchestral flourishes; but for all its headphone-friendly innovations, the music is still amazingly accessible, never sacrificing popcraft in the name of radical experimentation. (Its aims are so perversely commercial, in fact, that hit R&B remixer Peter Mokran tinkered with the cuts "Race for the Prize" and "Waitin' for a Superman" in the hopes of earning mainstream radio attention.) But what's most remarkable about The Soft Bulletin is its humanity -- these are Wayne Coyne's most personal and deeply felt songs, as well as the warmest and most giving. No longer hiding behind surreal vignettes about Jesus, zoo animals, and outer space, Coyne pours his heart and soul into each one of these tracks, poignantly exploring love, loss, and the fate of all mankind; highlights like "The Spiderbite Song" and "Feeling Yourself Disintegrate" are so nakedly emotional and transcendentally spiritual that it's impossible not to be moved by their beauty. There's no telling where the Lips will go from here, but it's almost beside the point -- not just the best album of 1999, The Soft Bulletin might be the best record of the entire decade.