Boombox Experiment No 3

In short, let me say it was a success. This was my first ever Lips concert, and I was completely blown away. I was really surprised to see the numbers of people that showed up. The Flaming Lips have a strong contingent of "native" (Oklahomans, that is) supporters in what they do. My friend Race and I were the first through the door of the Hollywood Theatre that night. We showed up around 8:00, paid our money and picked up one of the flyers. You could tell something special was in the air. The Hollywood Theatre is this old movie theatre which used to have rock concerts back in the early nineties (The Smashing Pumpkins reportedly played there on some occasion before their "massive success"). Now the building just says, "Have your next event here" on the marquee. But, last night, it said "Flaming Lips Boom-Box Experiment No. 3"

I estimate about 250-300 people showed up for this event. We were let into the main area at 9:00 or so. Race and I sat at a table near the front of the theatre. All the movie seats and carpet were removed, making it seem almost like a cave. Most of the people stood throughout the show or else sat on the ground. There were forty boomboxes on as many chairs near the front, split into two sections of twenty, each facing each other. There was a backdrop of Christmas Lights, and two big speaker cabinets on either side of the floor facing out toward the audience. In the middle was a mixing board, tape player, and Fender Amp which Michael operated. This played the main music that was used as a backdrop for the boomboxes.

Wayne was dressed in the same yellow raincoat/jacket I've seen him wearing in pictures of these events. He spent the first several minutes talking to some of his friends that showed up for the concert. When it began, Wayne explained that they weren't really sure how it was going to go. He described the setup of chairs as looking somewhat like a talk show and once the particpants sat down in their seats, I could see he was right. Wayne directed most of the proceedings through a microphone to get everyone set up. He was very cordial and spoke in an efficient manner. His intructions reminded me of someone at an amusement park describing how the ride was going to work. He asked for forty volunteers, who quickly desended on the boomboxes (this time, I declined to participate). With all the volunteers in place, we were ready to begin.

On top of each boombox was a ziploc bag full of tapes. He asked everyone to get out the one marked "Test". He explained that he had picked all these up at "pawn shops-for real cheap" and that even though he had rigged them up, he wanted to make sure they operated well. Test was basically what you hear at the beginning of each track on Zaireeka, but instead of the tape-altered voice saying "This is CD number one..." it said "This is tape number one..." etc. The funny thing is, number 27 was first, which prompted a look of amused shock from Wayne and the others. The little boombox eventually "fell in line". Wayne went around with his mike, making sure the audience could hear each boombox individually. It took about five minutes to get from "This is tape number one" to "and tape number 40."

For the next number, A winter days car accident, both Wayne and Steven directed the boomboxes. They conducted them in terms of volume. All the way to the ground meant volume knobs turned all the way down, vice versa for arms stretched to the ceiling. Before Wayne began his shouted "1-2-3-GO!" intro, he remarked to Steven, "You're more of a 1-2-3-4 type of guy, and I'm a 1-2-3-go type of guy". Wayne instructed that the volume knobs be turned down, then they started. Steven would bring up his twenty boomboxes to full volume then down again in a split second, while Wayne slowly bulit. This piece was really freaky, with blasts of discordant noise and seemingly thousands of ambulance sirens. I really like the way Wayne will take an incident from his life and turn it into something so unique. This one got a lot of applause. (well, they ALL did though).

The "Speed of Life" was very similar in "Style" to some of the things on Zaireeka, a very simple acoustic guitar piece and a short, repeating vocal line laden with sound collages. Particularly moving was the end of the one which crescendoed into forty babies wailing simultaneously, then dropped down to silence with a little bell ringing.

The Christmas piece was cool. It was a pastiche of neat bells, noises, and several Chritmas melodies. Halfway through the piece all the Christmas lights came on. It was fantastic.