Flaming Lips, NXNE: Wayne Coyne Talks Ke$ha, 'Yoshimi' + the Band's Mid-Life Crisis

The Flaming Lips are approaching their 30th birthday, an almost unfathomable age for a non-nostalgia act. They were already veterans when they took their weirdo shtick to Beverly Hills, 90210's Peach Pit After Dark. ("I have never been a big fan of alternative music," said the show's preppiest prep Steve Sanders, "but these guys rocked the house!")

In the 2000s, Flaming Lips became one of the biggest bands in the world thanks to the one-two punch of critical landmark The Soft Bulletin and commercial juggernaut Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots. They cemented their status by becoming one of music's best live acts, too, eschewing the downcast indie rock approach for a technicolour explosion of dancing furries, giant hamster balls and confetti cannons.

Though they'd been off the map for a while -- or, more accurately, in the middle of it keeping a low profile in their Oklahoma City hometown -- over the past year bandleader Wayne Coyne and the Lips became a near-daily pop-cultural presence collaborating with Ke$ha and Chris Martin, pressing celebrity blood samples into their vinyl, releasing a 24-hour-long song in a human skull, writing an anthem for the OKC Thunder NBA team, and tweet-beefing with Erykah Badu over their NSFW music video.

Before The Flaming Lips headline AOL Spinner's free NXNE concert on Saturday, June 16, Coyne explained just what the heck is going on with the band, reached out to Feist, described their next album as "religious music from the future" and defended Ke$ha's artistic honor.

I read a hilarious comment recently that wondered if the Flaming Lips are going through a mid-life crisis and doing every single thing they ever wanted to do. Well?

[Laughs] I suppose that's kind of true. Maybe that's why the "mid-life crisis" has so much power. Suddenly, you feel like, "Well, there's nothing to lose. Why don't we just do what we want?" Or maybe it's out of desperation: I just want this, why can't I have this? I mean maybe there's something to that.

But part of it is that our contract with Warner Brothers Records, this long, long contract we've had since 1990 finally ran out and before we were going to find a new one, we wanted to have some time where we could explore how we could do things. They said, "Why don't you do some things for a year or so and let's see what happens?" So that sort of set of me free.

Say I wanted to release a 24-hour song inside of a human's skull, I would do it. But I would also agree that plays perfectly into the mid-life crisis, saying, "I've always wanted to put a 24-hour song inside a human's skull! Goddamnit, why won't you let me do it?"

Although at the same time, it feels like you guys almost more than anyone else have been given almost unlimited freedom within the major label system.

Well, I think that it looks that way. I think a lot of it is that we've been very lucky with the things that seemed to be very radical were also successful. I would say a lot of that is just luck. I mean, I would say even our first big single that we had with Warner Bros in 1994, "She Don't Use Jelly," did you know it took almost two years for that to happen? I think we just don't give up on things.

I remember when you guys played that on 90210 and it's fascinating to see how you've maintained a career that has never had anything to do with nostalgia; it's just kind of constantly moved forward.

Well, thank you. That's a great compliment. But I think we're not above nostalgia. It's a matter of going into the unknown. I think we're curious and we're drawn to it for better or for worse. I mean, I think sometimes that if we made more records that were like Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots, we would probably be more successful, but it wouldn't be the success we want. There are a lot of artists who are successful, but don't have the success that they want.

Do you think the success of Yoshimi bought you a lot of freedom to experiment?

Yes, it totally did. Anytime that you have this kind of popularity or monetary backing, all that lets you go "fuck! Let's try this" because it gives you the freedom to fail. Without the success of the Soft Bulletin, I could go back to the very first EP that we put out. If we were to put it out and everyone that heard it said it was horrible, we probably wouldn't even be the Flaming Lips now, but we made it and almost the very first review we got was the greatest review we could ever get and it made us think "look at that, we're cool, fuck it, let's just go for it." And I think, if you're lucky, you get enough moments like that that keep you feeling like it's working, because there are plenty of moments where you feel like it doesn't work.

What did it feel like to reach out to such a diverse group of artists for Heady Fwends, and have them all want to work with.

To me it's just music, I don't think music as being that diverse; it's just music and if you like it then who cares? But I can understand where people could think "you're working with Chris Martin, and then you're working with Lightning Bolt, what's up?" Well, I like all music. I don't like all of it that's put out, but I like all types of music. Luckily, I'm friends with Chris Martin and he's a very sweet, normal dude. And I'm also fans of the Lightning Bolt.

Apparently Feist has been going around telling everyone she wants to work with you. So now it's going to be easier.

I know! I knew that even a while back, but she's a motherf---er to nail down, because she's always so busy doing stuff, and she does a lot of stuff with people as well. I'm sure I'll make it happen. I love her and it'd be great to have her voice and her way of phrasing be a part of something we do. So let's say it right now, let's make the motherf---er happen!

When I've told people I'm talking to you, everybody keeps wanting me to ask you about Ke$ha. What do you think people are so surprised about that collaboration?

It's because she has this image. She wants people to think she's crazy, and that she's a party girl. A lot of her is like that. But I know that she listens to a lot of sorts of different music because she has shown interest in us working with her. I think most people think the Flaming Lips come from this sense of you know, we're self-made, we're experimental, we're indie, we're punk rock, and people think she's all pop, and she's all fake. But in truth, she's not at all.

This isn't putting anybody down, it's just a mark of how crazy she is. Almost more than anybody I worked with, she's going at the same speed I am, whenever I said "let's do this," she's like "f--k yeah, let's do this." She would work all day, all night to make some thing work and it would be fun and it would be creative and it would be full of this vital spark that happens between people. I kind of knew from the very first conversation I had with her that we were on the same trip. I think there's an image of her versus the way she really is.


I don't think people realize she writes her own music and other people's.

Exactly. I think people put her into this category which is a category that she wants to be in, she's in the category of the Britneys and the Rihannas and stuff like that, but she's a great songwriter, she's good. I mean, I don't know what else to say, she's just good. She tries and tries and tries. There were some things not even on the record, but we've done a lot of music since then and perhaps it will be music on her new record and I've seen her try and try and try.

Because, hey free toe tattoos for everyone.

Well, it shows. When I showed up with that song for Ke$ha I didn't know what she was going to think because I really just went as radical as I wanted to go. And the second I played it for her she was like "f--k, that's wicked. I can't wait" and I was like, "cool."

That song sounded very much like her guesting on a Wayne Coyne song, or Flaming Lips song. The other stuff that you've done, does it sound more like her pop genre with you kind of being the guest there?

I don't really know that much about her genre. Since I've gotten to know her, I will hear Ke$ha's music and think "Who is that?" and people will say "That's Ke$ha" Oh, well I don't know if I care about that too much. I like her but I never really felt that much about all the music that she's done. So you know I don't purposefully think I'm going against what she's about, or that I'm doing something new. I just think that this music is something exciting for her, myself and the group to do together, something we all think is interesting, so I don't think of it like "oh this is going against what her fans would like."

A lot of her fans on Twitter will tweet me and say how great they think this music is that we're doing. She's so loved by her audience that I think that if she's doing the music, people will love it. It doesn't really matter what the music is, but she cares about what the music is, so the things we've done together, I can honestly say that I think they're wicked, and she takes direction from me and we work on something together, and it's powerful and good. I think it's wonderful.

The new album is largely done. What we can expect from it?

Big songs, big arrangements, big productions, big mixing. It feels to me like religious music from the future that's like this distorted melody coming from somewhere else in the universe and we're just sort of collecting them, and I think it's almost exclusively this new record is about an internal fear, and an internal sadness about living/oblivion. When I hear it I can't quite describe what it is. It's like I almost have to hear it, and go "oh I know exactly what you mean." it's not something that can be spoken about without the music -- it's about fear, and it's about love, and it's about this idea that the more you embrace something, the more that you have to lose if it isn't there. What we're saying is that if we don't embrace our life, or the things that we love, or the things that we care about, if we don't embrace them all the way, we're not going to have this great life.

But if we embrace them all the way we run the risk that they may not be what we thought they were and they may not like us or we may lose them and we're despairing. So we're in this quagmire, this is what this music's about, this quagmire reaching all the way, that the risk involved is the downfall of reaching all the way as well.

I would say I think it could be the best Flaming Lips records that could ever be made.

Flaming Lips play Spinner AOL's free concert at Yonge-Dundas Square in Toronto at 9:30 p.m. on June 16.


View The Flaming Lips & Fwends NXNE 2012 Gallery

• Flaming Lips' Wayne Coyne Takes A Timeout
• Flaming Lips' Wayne Coyne Gets Foggy
• Flaming Lips' Wayne Coyne Grabs Balloons
• Flaming Lips' Wayne Coyne Gives Peace Sign
• Flaming Lips' Wayne Coyne Prepares To Shout
• Flaming Lips' Wayne Coyne Escapes Hist Hamster Ball
• Flaming Lips' Wayne Coyne in a Dark Moment
• Flaming Lips' Wayne Coyne Gets Dramatic
• Flaming Lips' Wayne Coyne Smiling
• Flaming Lips' Wayne Coyne in His Ball
• Flaming Lips' Wayne Coyne Streaming Music
• Flaming Lips Fans
• Of Montreal
• Of Montreal
• Of Montreal
• Of Montreal
• Of Montreal
• Art vs. Science
• Oberhofer
• Oberhofer
• Portugal. the Man
• Spinner's NXNE Block Party Artists
• Flaming Lips
• Portugal. the Man
• Of Montreal
• Oberhofer
• Hollerado
• Art vs. Science
• Ceremony
• Parlovr
• Brasstronaut
• Burning Boyz
• 10 Great Moments in Flaming Lips History
• Flaming Lips Alley
• Beverly Hills 90210 Peach Pit Appearance
• Christmas on Mars
• The Flaming Lips and Stardeath and White Dwarfs with Henry Rollins and Peaches Doing The Dark Side of the Moon
• The Hamster Ball
• Ke$ha Will Bleed For Flaming Lips
• "SpongeBob and Patrick Confront the Psychic Wall of Energy"
• "Watching the Planets" Naked Video
• 'Zaireeka' Requires Four Stereos to Play
• "7 Skies H3," the 24-Hour Song in a Human Skull

See All Spinner Galleries »

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