You can’t escape death, so you might as well dance (Flaming Lips concert review)

It’s easy to write off The Flaming Lips lyricism as absurdist stoner spacetalk, if you’re an absolutely boring square of white bread.

Yes, it’s nonsense. Glorious, entertaining, neon nonsense. But amidst the sunny synths and whimsical candy balloons, there’s a deep well of contemplative existentialism to this memorable slice of the Lips catalog. Their universal verses on love, death and reflecting on the passage of time ring as true as they did when they were written.

The Flaming Lips cycled through every song from their most successful and well-known 2002 album, “Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots,” then generously returned for a confetti-laden, Wonka-flavored wonderball of a second set at Beak and Skiff on Tuesday night.

When The Lips kicked off their show at 7:30 p.m. on the dot, showering the crowd with streamers and wobbling their jumbo pink robots onstage for the opening track of “Fight Test,” it felt delightful yet baffling.

Where does one go when you’ve set the performance bar this high, this soon? Why use up your toys and streamers in broad daylight, on Song #1? But it was foolish of me to worry. Bandleader Wayne Coyne and his crew had many, many more tricks up their sleeves.

Singer/guitarist Coyne, 63, handily captained this bonkers ship of weirdos, while seamlessly ushering around the show’s blobby prop department. Whether he was crooning happily in a floppy flower suit for “Flowers of Neptune 6″ or swinging his light like a lasso, Coyne kept the crowd entranced with admirable energy and an increasingly bizarre parade of giant balloon toys.

“It’s f--king amazing being here,” Coyne shouted. “This night is so beautiful... Maybe it’s the hill or maybe it’s you guys, but you sound so loud. So loud! Don’t stop. Keep it going. Don’t get too lost in the apple fields.”

Lights and toys aside, Coyne’s high, supple voice has held up well since The Lips burst into existence in 1983, but his contagious joy for the art of performance captivated fans for the full three hours. The show moved dreamily through the lusty Technicolor spectacle, feeling so otherworldly that even a perfectly sober viewer can feel a little stoned.

The sweetly poignant “Do You Realize??” remains a satisfying showstopper, made extra lovely by Coyne prompting the crowd to tell the people they came with that they loved them.

(It’s a lyrical reminder worth repeating here, “Everyone you know, someday, will die,” so tell them you love them for crying out loud! Hug your friends, you cowards! If you can, call your mom!)

Coyne talks a lot, but his speeches feel less like monologues, and more like earnest appeals to love your people. In typical Lips fashion, they preach the power of ‘doing dumb s--- together’ with people you care about.

Later in the night, Coyne twice donned his signature Space Bubble suit, bouncing lightly onstage like a provocative gumdrop. Dumb? Yes. Fun? Yes! I turned to my friends and confirmed all three of us were grinning like toddlers.

It’s been a while since I’ve thought of Yoshimi, the little girl who’s been workin’ for the city and fighting those evil pink robots for over two decades. The Flaming Lips provided the dreamy backdrop to many a late-night study session or dorm room hookah circle on my old university stomping grounds, circa 2011.

With a soft cushion of time between now and those hazy college years, that version of myself feels long gone. But that heady cocktail of innocence and teenage invincibility can rush back in mere seconds, upon hearing Yoshimi’s familiar opening chords and bass thumps.

In The Lips’ second set, Coyne bookended that nostalgia with winking wisdom of how fast time flies: “Suddenly Everything Has Changed,” indeed. One minute you’re graduating, then in a flash, you’re 35, folding laundry, fighting your own evil pink robots in the city. But that’s OK.

Just keep putting Vaseline on your toast, and you’ll be fine.

The Flaming Lips at Beak & Skiff

Tuesday, July 23, 2024

Okie From Muskogee (Merle Haggard song)

Set 1:

Fight Test

One More Robot/Sympathy 3000-21

Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots, Pt. 1

Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots, Pt. 2

In the Morning of the Magicians

Tripping at the Gates of Hell

Are You a Hypnotist??

It’s Summertime

Do You Realize??

All We Have Is Now

Approaching Pavonis Mons by Balloon (Utopia Planitia)

Set 2:

She Don’t Use Jelly

Flowers of Neptune 6

The Gold in the Mountain of Our Madness

What Is the Light?

The Observer

The Yeah Yeah Yeah Song (With All Your Power)

Suddenly Everything Has Changed

Pompeii Am Götterdämmerung

Encore:

The Spark That Bled

A Spoonful Weighs a Ton

Race for the Prize

Katrina Tulloch is the editor of This is CNY. She also writes stories for Syracuse.com and The Post-Standard. Contact Katrina: Email | Instagram | Facebook