A good place to start (Telepathic Surgery - Flaming Lips)

Member Name: DoctorDee

Product:	Telepathic Surgery - Flaming Lips
Date:	28/05/01 (50 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Good

Disadvantages: None

1999's Soft Bulletin woke a lot of people up to the Lips, which is a good thing. But a bit frustrating for those of us who've been telling anyone who would listen about them for the last ten years... It's bizarre to have people ask you if you've heard that new band who sound like Mercury Rev, without realising that Lips predate Rev by seven years. But I digress.

This is where I came in as far as the Flaming Lips are concerned. I found the LP for 99 pence in EGS records in 1989 (because that kiddies is when it came out, despite DooYoo's misinformation). I bought it for the cover, which is a bizarre fish-eye image of a guy stood in a field, apparently created by photographing the reflection of a hub cap...

The music is wild. Bizarrely shambolic psychedelia fused with noise-core experimentation. But mixed in there is a fabulous pop-sensibility that gives a hint of what the band were to later deliver. This shows itself best on the stand-out track, Chrome Plated Suicide.

This album might come as something of a shock to those who discovered the band via The Soft Bulletin. That record, from a later, slimmed-down, line-up of the band is far more accesible than Telepathic Surgery. Those who found its inventive and innovative musical approach and oblique lyrics appealing might be better advised to travel reverse-chronologically through the Flaming Lips back catalogue. But should they get as far as 'Hit to Death in the Future Head' without losing the faith, they can safely travel on to Telepathic Surgery, and its predecessor Oh, My Gawd without fear.

Buyers of the Telepathic Surgery CD should look out for Hell's Angel's Cracker Factory, a 25 muinute wig-out of weirdness that wasn't on the vinyl version for reasons of space.

Summary: