The Flaming Lips Trivia PageHere's a some stuff which hopefully answers the questions I tend to get asked quite a bit. And some other things which you probably never wanted to know in the first place.
Is Wayne's Favourite Number A Million?You, like me, may have noticed the prolific incidence of the word `million' in the songs of the Flaming Lips. I asked Wayne if it was his favourite number and all he said was, "I do like a million.... I do."
Who Writes What?The Flaming Lips all write the music on the records. Like any good band, what tends to happen is one person has an idea for a song and then they all add their own bits. Wayne and Steven apparently write most of the main stuff between them. But Wayne writes pretty much all of the lyrics. Seems to work doesn't it?
Home ComfortsThe Flaming Lips organisation as a whole have a generally low opinion of English food. And German food too. In fact, quite a lot of European food.... or even most things they don't eat at home normally.
Who Can Play What?Well, all the band sing and play guitar. Mike and Steven have both played piano on Lips records and the Warners debut credited the band with playing all sorts..
Steven Drozd: Comedian.Steven finds English and Irish accents particularly amusing when certain key phrases are uttered by the owners. He delights in requesting said phrases from these ethnic groups.
Covers Of A Bygone AgeBack in the days of the 'original' three-piece, the band was known for their prolific Led Zeppelin covers. Perhaps less well known was the occasion they went on-stage and played a sizeable chunk of Tommy.
Stage Shows Of A Bygone AgeNot only that, but they often had crazy images being projected onto them while they did a show... The most interesting has to be the occasion they went on-stage to the Exorcist... with Richard dressed as the devil, Michael as the preacher, and Wayne in a white dress as the little girl!
Where Are The First Four Jesus Songs?One of life's great unsolved mysteries is the whereabouts of Jesus songs one to four. You might have come across tapes of various songs from that era, some possibly labelled as Jesus Songs, but none of these are in actual fact offically Jesus Songs. Your guess is as good as mine.
Whitney RocksWhile driving the van on tour, Wayne has been known to sing along with full voice to the radio playing Whitney Houston full blast. Michael Ivins usually prefers to keep awake by having a nice heavy philosophical conversation.
"Oh no... apple pie and fries please.."While on tour in Japan, Ronald Jones had great difficulty getting what he really wanted in a certain International hamburger chain. While asking for a cheeseburger without the meat, the finished product would invariably arrive before the latter part of his request could be uttered. As this happened almost daily, Scott Booker ate a lot of cheeseburgers on that particular tour...
Hair Of A Bygone AgeAt the turn of the decade, Wayne had some seriously bush-like dreadlocks.
Baseball CapsThe band did indeed once have a whole bunch of caps made, bearing the legend, "the FlAminG lipS"
Sell A Kidney Too?Wayne and Dingus used to give blood to raise money, when they were trying to record In A Priest Driven Ambulance. It is said that Dingus once passed out during the procedure...
Whatever Happened To Nathan Roberts ?I always wondered why Nathan left the band after recording Hit To Death In The Future Head (Jonathan, of course, went off to concentrate on Mercury Rev). It's been said that Nathan had decided to leave to concentrate on being married to a girl he fell in love with. Nathan, however, says that there was a little more to it than that....
What's going on in Ode To CC??It's a backwards piece of music (obviously) which allegedly has a voice over it that says, "Ma, you fucked up when you raised me.."So I'm told.
The high voice on Oh My Gawd..Following on from the above, I had always wondered who sang the high parts on Oh My Gawd.. Then someone told me:"I believe it's Richard you hear singing on "Can't exist" and "Thanks to you." I vaguely recall some creative friction between Richard and Wayne during this period. I've heard that Wayne found "Ode to C.C. pt One" silly and that it was actually the brainchild of Mike and Richard. I've also heard that Richard was frustrated because he wanted to write and sing more. I've never discussed this with Wayne directly so i can't confirm. It is also Richard who plays the piano on telepathic complete with missed note." So there you go.
Some fans' anecdotesOver these past few years, I've received many emails recounting tales of strange encounters with the band. These are a couple of interesting ones: 'Fire' from Todd Nelson and a mail from Bob about his street side encounter with Wayne in LA.
Rattle and KnockThe knocker on Wayne's front door is loose.
More Than You've Actually SeenSupposedly, the Lips have tried out with a variety of guitar players between people actually leaving and joining... some for quite a little time. Still, they'd never get someone in for the sake of it - it would have to work. Properly.
Why The Flaming LipsThere's always a whole lot of stories flying about explaining how this band got it's name. Wayne, though, says that there was never a story - they just made it up.However, some of the myths are pretty cool little stories. It's definitely true to say that the Flaming Lips inspire some the imagination in some people. My own personal favourites follow (but I can't remember who told me them): (1) Wayne had a dream where the Virgin Mary spoke to him in the back of a taxi cab and fire came from her mouth as she kissed him. (They made that up for a press release...) (2) There was this cinema showing skin flicks they were passing one day, and they took the name from one of the porn flick titles on the front of the cinema. (3) It comes from a fictional film in another film.... It's a long story so I'll let Jonny Hutchens explain.. (4) It's some kind of a drug smoking reference.. Eh?
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