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Rating: It takes courage (and also quite a bit of audacity) to make an album titled "Hit in the Head of the Future," with the subtitle "Ten Solipsistic Soundtracks (1) by the Flaming Lips," and hide a song like "Gingerale Afternoon (The Astrology of a Saturday)" (2) inside.
It's the kind of thing that would immediately send running those lacking Jungian cognitive psychology.
It takes courage (and also quite a bit of audacity) to make such an album, put a technicolor toilet on the front page, and hide a song like "You Have To Be Joking (Autopsy of the Devil's Brain)" (3) inside.
It's the kind of thing that would immediately send away those with weak stomachs who don't love pop-art, even if they are saddened.
It takes courage (and also quite a bit of audacity) to make such an album, include a booklet like its (censored) and open it with a song like "Talkin' 'bout The Deathporn Immortality Blues (Everyone Wants To Live Forever)" (4).
It's the kind of thing that would immediately send running those lacking secular feelings and spirit.
It takes courage (and also quite a bit of audacity) to make such an album and include the killer notes of a song like "Halloween On The Barbary Coast" (5) (5bis).
It's enough to raise from the grave, in terms of musicality, the ghost of Marc Bolan (RIP) and his T-Rex.
It takes courage (and also quite a bit of audacity) to make such an album, include a melancholic song like "Felt Good To Burn" (6), and bombard, from beginning to end, the first notes of every beat with the (extremely unpleasant) sound of a toxic, polluting diesel engine that refuses to start.
It's the kind of thing that would immediately bring neighboring environmentalists protesting for disturbing the public peace.
It takes courage (and also quite a bit of audacity) to name your daughter Yoshimi, blow your nose with magazine pages, and write yet another set of notes on an American band unknown to most...
But I'll give it a try.
Frank Zappa, who loves his children (I'm just a fan, usually), approves from Heaven.
(1) Solipsism refers to, as opposed to panpsychism, the belief that some consider themselves the only bearers of consciousness in the universe. All children under the age of one, as well as many Monday morning motorists I find myself behind on the road while rushing to take my daughter to school, suffer from this condition.
(2) This track is a good example of the purely punk-psychedelic side of our band. Here, the introduction of violins (not at all, remarkably, out of place) is especially appreciated, highlighting the very insistent simple rhythm.
(3) This "ballad" is, in my humble opinion, one of the "artistic" peaks reached by the Flaming Lips. The arrangement of synthetic strings, presumably by Dave Fridmann, is something sublime that further enriches the melancholy of this song.
(4) This track, in addition to featuring a great "melodic" noise (echoes of Sonic Youth are present throughout the album), also prominently includes a church choir, especially in the final part.
(5) The guitar solo at the beginning (but also repeated in the middle section) of this song will be borrowed in the following years by Beck in a track from Mellow Gold (the title of which escapes me). The military march of the main verses is a classic from the "satirical" repertoire of the FL. The chorus is one of the most engaging they have composed.
(5bis) I almost forgot, the solo is by Johnathan Donahue, current leader of Mercury Rev, former FL member.
(6) The song talks about depression and is of an exacerbated melancholy, made even more intense by the change of atmosphere represented by the arrival of the next track ("Gingerale Afternoon"). The "broken diesel engine" noise running through the track is perhaps a reworking/reprise of the idea of the Harley Davidson engine "simulated by an electric guitar" used in "Hell's Angel's Cracked Factory" (from "Telepathic Surgery").
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