ALBUM REVIEW - The Flaming Lips - At War with the Mystics

My good friend Shawn “Root” Keller just had an email exchange about this new Flaming Lips album “At War With the Mystics”. The upshot of the conversation was that although we really enjoyed the disc, the sounds that were present were somewhat dissimilar to the canon of tones that we had expected – the expectations built on the fanatical listening of the previous two discs (The Soft Bulletin and Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots). The conversation ended when someone overhearing Shawn’s music said “That sounds like Prince!” or something to that effect, I am paraphrasing here. That changed the listening right there. “Whoa!” was said and I wrote back some gibberish because my mind was blown by that comment (something about listening in purple and then an insular reference to a college classmate that liked Prince). That comment made me sit down and listen again. But this time I was not listening to a Flaming Lips CD. This time I was listening to the music, performance and sonics minus the expectations. (By the way, I am sharing this story without Shawn’s permission – hope he doesn’t mind ☺!) Also, there is a review coming too.

So right away we have an album that is pretty cool. Anything that is from a group that I know I like and confuses me this much on the first few listens is usually good. It is a layered and beautiful. Some of the tones annoy me, but others are big and rich, some of the organs synth and guitar tones are miraculous. Also it is best listened to straight through. Bouncing around gives the impression it is an album full of singles and it doesn’t really work too well that way.

I am not going to pretend I get the whole thing or understand some of the choices (like Wayne singing in a much lower register of his range for a good deal of the record for example). I am also not going to pretend I liked it on the first spin. But thanks to the person who told Shawn that it sounded like Prince I was able to step back from my expectations and find the brilliance inherent within. It’s a great disc, but give yourself time to listen…and appreciate the whole rather than the parts. You’ll be glad you did! Why’d you end with that? That’s stupid! – ed.

Gaito says: Buy it and don’t unwrap it until you have a few hours. Then sit down, when you’re ready and don’t analyze. It’s worth the wait.

Favorite Tracks:

The Yeah Yeah Yeah Song

The Sound Of Failure / It’s Dark … Is It Always This Dark??

The Wizard Turns On … The Giant Silver Flashlight And Puts On His Werewolf Moccasins

Haven’t Got A Clue

Goin’ On