Flaming Lips Ride The Success Of "The Soft Bulletin"
Riding the commercial success of its ninth album, "The Soft Bulletin" (Warner Bros.), the Flaming Lips have pulled up the stakes of their noise psychedelia/space rock circus tent and will present their newly found "mature" sound during a March tour of theatres and halls, with more dates for April coming.
The Oklahoma City group--now in a less wantonly experimental, more mass-appeal phase-- will tour in its current configuration: Wayne Coyne on vocals, theremin, large gong and hand-puppet orchestration; Steven Drozd, once mainly a drummer, now working with prerecorded tapes, keyboards and guitar; and Michael Ivins on bass.
The tour will include material from ''The Soft Bulletin'' and older material, set in the band's keyboard-centric context, which it developed following the departure of guitarist Ronald Jones. Though the Lips' no longer favor massive amounts of guitar effects and rock-music-type sonic hysteria, the 12-by-14-foot video screen, confetti and fake blood are still part of its live show. (It is not likely that the band will bring Coyne's "Parking Lot Experiment" installation, consisting of forty cars, each blaring specially-composed music on their tape decks simultaneously.)
Fans and newcomers can experience the band's current phase by checking out a live webcast of a Feb. 5, 2000 Oklahoma City show. The webcast was supposed to end on Feb. 24, but it has been held over.
''The Soft Bulletin,'' released seven months ago and inscribed in many critics' top-ten albums lists for 1999, has seen unexpected commercial success. Overseas, the tracks ''Race for the Prize'' and ''Waitin' for a Superman'' have been hit singles, pushing album sales over the 100,000 mark. ''Waitin' for a Superman'' has just been released as a U.S. single in the hope that it will enter the Top 40 charts, as ''She Don't Use Jelly'' did in 1994. A CD-ROM version of ''Waitin'...'' (including extra tracks, remixes of "Zaireeka" material and videos) was also recently released.
Beyond the spring outing, the Lips will tour again in the fall, according to the label. It is possible that the band will resurrect last year's ''International Music Against Brain Degeneration Revue'' with new acts, though groups are still being discussed.
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