Artist : The Flaming Lips Venue : Opolis Location : Norman, OK Reviewed By : H.Barry Zimmerman Site : www.flaminglips.com

The line was down the street. The puddles on the street spoke in humid tones. The crowd was chatting and hanging cooly. People were drawing robots on a huge swipe of pink paper for a contest promising hip prizes. inside, through the garage type door of The Opolis ( at 113 Crawford ) you could see a huge gathering of balloons. There was something weird flashing and gyrating patterns on a wall hanging screen . What in the name of metal science was going on here? Why it’s The Flaming Lips listen-to-the-album-before-it’s-released party, cool.

I had heard the album ‘ Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots ‘, I’ve had it for about a week and a half now ( perks of the reviewists game ). I’ve worn it out, I love the album - Love It. The fans and alike are going to love it too - it’s great.

The first thing that happens is they ( The Lips people ) show a trailer for the up-and-coming Flaming Lips movie project ( due out Christmas 2003 ) ‘ Christmas On Mars ‘ . It was very professional looking, not slick but a real deal movie. Wayne ( Coyne ), the Lips front man, guitarist , music labtition and spokes model is playing Martian Santa . The movie looked slightly scary, bizarrely funny and weird ( go figure ).

Next up, the album. Wayne and Steven ( Drozd ), the co-pilot , co-gadgeteer and drummer of the group, had made a special disc for the nights event. The disc included discussions about each song preceding each
song, explaining the origin of ideas or the relevant happenings surrounding the creation of the piece or just interesting stories associated with the recording of the song, etc. - trivia for the rock geeks among us.
The crowd settled in, caught a slice of floor and the listening began - hmmm, cool.

After the album was done ( applause applause applause ) there were contests for prizes ( rare Lips singles, posters and the like ). First, there was a robot dancing contest. Then there was a robot sound a-like
contest. Then Wayne picked the winner of the robot drawing contest. The MC of this portion of the show was a man in a bear costume. There was cotton candy being made on stage and given to whom ever wanted some, for free - what a deal .

The atmosphere was that of a roadside attraction - Lipsland , where art rock is king and love is the answer. No one in this section of the galaxy stirs up as much excitement and amusement among the rock loving freaks, as The Flaming Lips , smiles, peace and robot love all around, oh yeah / the world as it should be.

Afterwards I had a brief chat with Wayne. He said that they had just returned from playing shows in Scotland, Ireland and The UK, and that they were getting on a plane the next morning and heading for Los Angeles to do some promo appearances and to play some gigs.

The Lips are on the runaway rocket of the big rock’n’roll dream. They will be touring for the next two years. The world is a long round town, and they plan on seeing most of it ( again ).

As the crowd exited, sweaty and tired ( The Opolis was so packed that it came with it’s own brand of hot - body heat meets July in Oklahoma, shewwwwwE hot ), the buzz was good positive wow’s ( the disc is really great, swear to T-Rex ). The balloons chased the people out into the street , dodging the leaving traffic, resting in the thinning puddles . The party was over and Saturday night had been spent among the joy that only accompanies a good vibing robot oriented scene ( beep beep flash ). All hale The Flaming Lips, good hosts and one mega cool rock band, cheers.

H.Barry Zimmerman