The Flaming Lips Debut Two New Songs at Pitchfork Festival

Posted on Jul 20th 2009 2:00PM by Jason Cohen
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The Flaming Lips were late arrivals to the Pitchfork Music Festival's "Write the Night" concept, in which ticketbuyers voted on what songs the band would play on Sunday in Chicago's Union Park (Built to Spill, the Jesus Lizard, Yo La Tengo and Tortoise also played request sets Friday). It turns out that they didn't have to bother.

While Pitchfork's indier-than-indie reputation had longtime Lips fans -- including band biographer Jim DeRogatis of the Chicago Sun-Times -- dreaming of their favorite '80s album track or something off of the experimental four-CD 'Zaireeka,' this was, after all, a popularity contest.

"Part of the demand of playing the Pitchfork Festival is that the bands 'write the night,'" frontman Wayne Coyne told the sold-out crowd, brandishing a scroll-like sheet of paper with a list of all the songs. "[But] as much as we love Pitchfork and as much as we love the concept, we play 'write the night' every night. We know what our fans want to hear. We already knew what the (most requested) songs were."

So the set was not too different from a normal Flaming Lips show -- including, of course, Coyne in his trademark hamster ball, the Jon Stewart video intro of 'She Don't Use Jelly' and a full complement of dancing furry animals, confetti and balloons. Opener 'Race for the Prize' came in at number nine on the request list, while numbers one through three were, respectively, 'Do You Realize,' 'Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots Vol. 1' and 'Fight Test,' all of which are from 2002's breakthrough album 'Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots.' 'Do You Realize' is also the official state rock song of Oklahoma; bassist Michael Ivins was decked out in the same hammer-and-sickle t-shirt that offended members of the Oklahoma legislature.

With the fans demanding hits, Coyne and the band still changed things up by taking matters into their own hands, including the unveiling of two ominously dissonant and rockin' new songs from the upcoming album 'Embryonic': 'Silver Trembling Hands' and 'Convinced of the Hex.' There was also a fifth person in the lineup -- joining Ivins, Coyne, multi-instrumentalist Steven Drozd and drummer Kliph Scurlock for the first time Sunday was longtime compadre Derek Brown on guitar and some percussion.

The Lips also dusted off mid-'90s favorite 'Bad Days' (dedicated to DeRogatis) even though the voters only had it at number 25, and the band worked up a true obscurity that was personally requested by two rabid fans: 'Enthusiasm for Life Defeats Existential Fear,' which was included on the companion CD to Bradley Beesley's documentary film about the band, 'The Fearless Freaks.' "This will be the only time we ever play this song," Coyne promised. The die-hards also got a roaring dose of 'Mountainside' from 1990's 'In a Priest Driven Ambulance,' which featured Coyne on double-neck guitar and, briefly, trumpet. Its place in the "Write the Night" pecking order? 66.