Wednesday, April 26, 2006

Providing needles for your balloons

I went to see the Flaming Lips last night and was delighted to find that the support act was the Go! Team. Perhaps it is blasphemy to say it, but the Go! Team were a lot better than the Lips, whose set is creaking under the weight of so many gimmicks that it resembles an evening out at a novelty factory.

As the onslaught of glitter-cannons, pseudo-Billy Graham prosletysing, giant balloons and dancing scientologists threatened to overwhelm the evening, I couldn't help but wonder if we weren't witnessing a. some kind of emperor and b. his recently purchased clothes.

As much as I like and admire Wayne Coyne, the band could have played another four or five songs in the time he spent pontificating, messing about and expounding at length. I saw the Lips at Glastonbury on the Soft Bulletin tour, prior to their show becoming the out-of-control carnival it is now, and it was heartwarming, silly and transcendent. Lest we forget, they have 7 or 8 albums-worth of great songs. What a pleasure it would be if they deigned to treat us to some of them.

I don't want to be completely miserable about it. But the more I think about it, the more miserable I am. Because I am a miserable man.

Yours miserably,
John Allison

4 comments:

Jon said...

Much the same thing occurred at Coachella a few years ago when I went. Maybe he's gathering material for a spoken-word album, like that other dude whose name I forget.

John A said...

"Having Fun On Stage With Elvis?" or Bob Pollard's "Relaxation of the Asshole"? Two records you can spend a lot of time with (so long as you don't play them).

Stay powerful Jon!

Citizen Meh said...

I respectfully disagree with your opinions on this matter, good sir. Maybe it is because I've not been blessed to see the Flaming Lips' earlier shows (I am a young 'un, alas), or maybe because I standing right next to the stage but I thought it was the proverbial canine's gonads. The Go! Team were great (Hold Yr. Terror Close especially), but the Lips were the most part sublime to the point of transcendant.

But I do agree that some of Wayne Coyne's cod-Billy Graham preaching could have been curtailed for the likes of Waitin' For A Superman and suchlike. "More songs, less chatter" we should cry from the rooftops and maybe he will hear us.

John A said...

Mike, I think I'm just jaded because I've seen them several times. The stage show is really really great the first time you see it. I'm a bit worried that I might have become a "Brian Hurst - He Saw Them First" kind of character.