FLAMING LIPS At War with the Mystics Warner Bros *****
After vanquishing the pink robots, Wayne Coyne, Steven Drozd and Michael Ivins have set their sights on the evil minds who control America's electorate, the self-styled mystics who are leading the world into the abyss. But since our three superheroes lack conventional weapons, they're just gonna have to use folksy campfire tunes, squelchy electronics and an array of avant-gardening tools to freak out the enemy. It's fitting that At War with the Mystics sounds a lot like a psychedelic protest album from the '60s, somewhere between Love's Forever Changes and Spirit's The Twelve Dreams of Dr Sardonicus, along with a little Sesame Street, Star Trek and lessons in biology, chemistry, astronomy and quantum physics added in.
Mystics is the third in a loosely conceptual trilogy which began with 1999's daring The Soft Bulletin and continued with 2002's brilliant Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots. Coyne & co's concerns revolve around the eternal question of how to keep human connection through the impenetrable wall of media, military and corporate artifice, and how to free your mind without losing your ass. "If you could rope the world with the flick of a switch, would you do it?" asks opening track The Yeah Yeah Yeah Song, then spends the next three minutes proving you can do whatever you want if you've got the imagination. But lest you think we're heading for hippiedom here, Free Radicals kicks armchair protester ass with a Prince-like funk edge, and The Sound of Failure/It's Dark . . . Is it Always Dark?? sends Alice down a very scary tunnel indeed.
Like a comet blazing a trail through the musical cosmos, At War with the Mystics often explodes into a supernova of melodic brilliance. If Vein of Stars, The Wizard Turns On, The W.A.N.D. and My Cosmic Autumn Rebellion had appeared on a Yes or Genesis album, punk would probably never had to happen. This is the album that America - and the world - needs to listen to right now, to spike the lemonade of callous self-interest that has poisoned our souls. www.theflaminglips.com
