Psychedelic rock isn’t dead, or at least The Flaming Lips don’t think so. Last night, they pulled out all the stops in their enthusiastic performance of “There Should Be Unicorns” from their 2017 album Oczy Mlody. Frontman Wayne Coyne was mounted on a unicorn wearing angel wings, Steven Drozd wore a red cape and bassist Michael Ivins wore an Oklahoma City Thunder jersey, referring, of course, to the band’s hometown (“Do You Realize??” was once the official state rock song of Oklahoma, incidentally.)
With a psychedelic back-light and on-stage astronauts, the performance effectively circumvented the need for drug consumption to arrive at a hallucinatory experience. Still, though the band’s showmanship remained strong, critics might claim that this is only compensation for a weak album, at least compared to those of the band’s golden age. It’s worth wondering whether, by wholeheartedly sinking into psychedelic tropes, The Flaming Lips may be effectively losing touch with their overwhelming musical talent.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4GlQW06auw4
America’s wildest rock ‘n roll band ride onto the Late Show stage to perform a song off their new album ‘Oczy Mlody.’
The Fat Angel Sings 