Poptarticus

Last night I watched The Fearless Freaks, the documentary about the Flaming Lips. It was at the top of my Netflix queue, but it had a “very long wait” so I was pleasantly surprised to find it in my mailbox yesterday, for what better Saturday night viewing could there be than a cool rock ‘n’ roll documentary?

Let me say right now that the Lips are far from my favorite band. I like Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots, but I don’t have any kind of handle on the rest of their stuff, and I sold The Soft Bulletin a long time ago. (I know it is a cult masterpiece, but I couldn’t get into it.) I’ve seen the Flaming Lips twice. Once was at a festival at the Santa Barbara Bowl. Cake was suppose to headline, but instead Cake came on before the Lips, who were last. I love Cake, so I was like, huh? The Lips show was crazy, with rotating balls of weirdness and people in bunny suits and confetti everywhere, including in my cup of wine. And we all know what happens when someone throws confetti in my wine. My feeling was that Lips frontman Wayne Coyne, who is an attention whore, got Cake to let them go on last by talking to them relentlessly until they finally said OK just to get him to shut up.

The second time I saw the Lips they opened for Beck, just a few months after the Santa Barbara show, in December 2002. The show was in Long Beach and somehow I walked right past security and into the pit, instead of having to sit in my seat. Then I was stuck in the pit because I didn’t want to leave and have to get past security again. So I saw the same exact Lips show, with the same balls, the same bunny suits, and the same confetti toss. Been there, done that. Yawn. I was totally there to see Beck.

Beck came out and the other two Lips who aren’t Wayne Coyne backed him on the first few songs, all from Sea Change, and I must say it was quite impressive. But then Wayne Coyne came out and started taking over Beck’s show. Poor Beck - he had little energy, and seemed totally over it all. I think that was the last night of this tour, and he seemed completely wiped out. Probably from being with the Lips that whole time. So Mr. Attention Whore comes out and tries to steal Beck’s thunder. I was pissed. After that I just sort of ignored the Flaming Lips because Wayne Coyne seriously bugs.

But I still wanted to see the documentary. And I really enjoyed it. Wayne Coyne is a seriously freaky guy. One of those freaks who makes being freaky seem normal. He just hangs out in Oklahoma City, making freaky movies and freaky music. The story is a good one - a band that probably shouldn’t have made it does make it, mostly because of their freakiness. Mercury Rev’s Jonathan Donahue was in the Lips for a while, so he is in the movie. His freakiness is downplayed so as to not interfere with Wayne’s. (I think.)

Wayne Coyne would probably be King of the Freaks if he could. I think he would be happy with that title, Attention Whore that he is. Sadly for him, there is another rock documentary making the rounds. Sorry, Wayne, but Anton Newcombe wins.

Dig is the story of two bands, The Dandy Warhols and the Brian Jonestown Massacre, and their early friendship and later rivalry. The Dandy’s get big enough to play festivals, and the Brian Jonestown (as they were then) sort of self destruct. It’s a great documentary, and I can tell you right now that almost every guy in the Brian Jonestown Massacre is a bigger freak than Wayne Coyne. And Mr. Massacre himself, Anton Newcombe, takes the title of King of the Freaks. That band is just insane. Fighting onstage, fighting offstage, insane quantities of ingested drugs, wacky outfits, and totally killer music. I love the Dandy Warhols but they seem like the Osmonds compared to BJM.

I feel kind of bad calling Anton Newcombe the King because I think now he has kicked drugs and is pretty pissed off about the way he was portrayed in the film. But you know what? Once a freak, always a freak. We all know this to be true.

Anyhow. I am going to buy both these films… just for those rainy nights when I have to kick back with some freakiness. Check ‘em out.

This entry was posted on Sunday, May 29th, 2005 at 2:27 pm and is filed under Adventures in Rock and Roll. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.