The Flaming Lips' Flying Audiophile Circus

By Brian Charest

A Flaming Lips concert is part carnival, part circus, and part theater of the absurd. Talking with front man Wayne Coyne about the band's evolution to its current state is like being guided through a minefield of entertainment possibilities and arriving at a place that is organized but unpredictable. Coyne's greasy black hair, his mustache, grey slacks, dark blue button-down shirt, suit vest, and the dirty tennis shoes he wears so casually compliment his personality perfectly. Coyne is an interesting juxtaposition of savvy business man and eccentric artist, even while he describes his life as "pretty normal."

Speaking with Coyne before the bands second performance in San Francisco since the release last July of The Soft Bulletin the feeling back stage is that this is a band that has finally arrived. At the bottom of a quiet stairwell behind the band's elaborate stage set-up complete with a giant video screen, a gong and two ready-to-wear bunny suits, Coyne talks about the current tour and band's well-known use of headsets at its concerts. "I think it's important to accommodate the audio-philes and the high-fi weirdos in the audience as well as the guy who wants to hang out and get drunk."

After taking two years to complete The Soft Bulletin it's not surprising that the band wants audience members to hear the music in all its glory. I ask Coyne why the Flaming Lips don't play venues with the kind of sound-quality the band would be happy with, to which Coyne replies, "Venues are made to hold a bunch of drunk people, and the fact that music is played in there is just a byproduct."

Coyne seems quite conscious of this aspect of touring, and he says that part of why they do the headphones is that it's "just one more thing that we can do for our audience that's different from a typical show." Headphones, dancing groupies in rabbit suits and a sock-puppet have all become staples at Flaming Lips shows. "These are the things people remember. After we introduced the rabbits for the first time that's all people would talk about," he says.

The band's long history of experimentation seems to be gaining more momentum. "Ultimately, we would like to build our own venue and bring it with us, or build a venue where people would come to see us that's acoustically perfect for the things we want to do. It's something we've thought about for awhile." And just like the headphone shows and the boombox experiments, "The idea isn't so hard to think about. The things that I think of are probably the kinds of things that a lot of people think about. But actually doing these things is hard."

As for experimenting with Internet technologies Coyne says the band is not interested. "It's just not that big of a deal and it's a big production, it takes a lot of money. People think because the Internet is so available it's automatically great. It's the production itself that makes something worth watching. People think you can throw anything on the Internet and it's great, because it's free. It's not true. Radio has been free for a long time. It's the quality that matters."

If quality is what matters for Coyne then fans may really have something to look forward to. The next project that Coyne sees on the horizon, besides a traveling venue, is a symbiotic album and film production that will develop simultaneously from the band's music and visual shows.

I get the sense for Coyne it has always been about making music that is truthful. He says his music comes from his everyday life, and his music is an extension of that life. Apart from the rabbits and sock puppets, which Coyne admits have a certain audience-friendly quality, Coyne is quick to recognize that today it's his music that is drawing the crowds. "Before people used to come to our shows just to see what the Flaming Lips were up to." Today it's different. "What's new is our acceptance and our popularity," he says, "This album seems to grow on people the more they listen to it, and on this tour people are coming to hear the songs they know."

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