Music

Average customer rating:

Pleasant weirdness
It surprised me hardcore
Pretty gnarly, dude
Wild Album, Best of the Early Years!
That's heavy, dude!

Telepathic Surgery
The Flaming Lips
Manufacturer: Restless Records
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD

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Similar Items:

Hit to Death in the Future Head
Hear It Is
The Day They Shot a Hole in the Jesus Egg - The Priest Driven Ambulance Album, Demos and Outtakes
Clouds Taste Metallic
Transmissions from the Satellite Heart

ASIN: B000003BGD
Release Date: 1993-07-01

Tracks:

Drug Machine in Heaven
Right Now
Michael, Time to Wake Up
Chrome Plated Sucide
Hari-Krishna Stomp Wagon (Fuck Led Zepplin)
Miracle on 42nd Street
Fryin' Up
Hell's Angel's Cracker Factory
U.F.O. Story
Redneck School of Technology
Shaved Gorilla
The Spontaneus Combustion of John
The Last Drop of Morning Dew
Begs and Aching

Customer Reviews:

Pleasant weirdness.......2007-07-13

Better than "Hear It Is", not as good as later work.

The first (approximate) half is better, it sort of tapers out at the end. "Drug Machine In Heaven" is a good freaky pop tune with a bizarre, 10-second, retarded-version-of-Snakefinger guitar solo in the middle. "Right Now" starts off with weird guitar feedback and a really dissonant riff (which reoccurs throughout the song) and becomes a good, thumping, propulsive number. Then there's a stupid 30-second interlude called "Michael, Time To Wake Up", which is, yes, an attempt to wake the band's bassist up with guitar feedback. "Chrome-Plated Suicide", if not for the feedback in the background and strange lyrics, would be just a good classic-rockish tune. It's still good, it's just weirder than it would have been otherwise. "Hari Krishna Stomp Wagon" is another good, strange-but-catchy propulsive tune. I realize I am using the same description over and over, but it's the only way I can think of to explain these songs. The subtitle, "F@#!@$@# Led Zeppelin", will always be a bit of a mystery, because the Lips obviously liked LZ. It ends with the sound of a radio being constantly tuned to different stations, which segues into the next song, "Miracle on 42nd Street", which is kind of quiet and pleasant-sounding. Another propulsive rock tune follows, "Fryin' Up". Possible drug reference?

Then, oh sweet mother of god holy jeebus graham cracker smorgasbord, we have "Hells Angels Cracker Factory". A 23-and-a-half minute jam with weird sound collages and stereo panning layered on top, it's weird, it's sprawling, it's awesome. The sounds on top include a motorcycle (duh), an opera singer, backwards guitar and drums, random samples of talking and such, and at the end, an answering machine. The jam is basically the guys rockin' out with the occasional guitar solo and drum flair. Pretty darn cool.

The second half, like I said earlier, is worse. I like "U.F.O Story". It begins with, uh, well, a U.F.O. story, then goes into a rousing rock song, then ends with a pretty piano coda. Almost a mini-epic at 7 minutes long. "Redneck School of Technology" is good too. After that, I lose interest. The songs aren't bad, they just don't hold my attention as much.

To sum it up, if you want some driving, rocking, crazy, weird, bonkers, awesome, revved-up, strange, weird, pleasant, dang good music, buy this album. If you don't, you are a fool who is doomed to be trampled by camels.

It surprised me hardcore.......2005-10-31

My whole life, people have always told me and reviews have always declared that the lips' early stuff was "trite" "inaccessible" "ridiculous" "the acid that acid eats" "impossible to listen to" ETC.

All during this time, I owned everything from Priest to present (with the present changing and new albums purchased as time went along). I never really liked Priest (I know THAT stepped on some toes) and figured that all these people were right about early lips stuff.

WHATEVER. I went out on a limb and downloaded a few songs off of this record to see if it was worth finding a place to buy it from. I downloaded "Begs and Achin'" "Chrome Plated Suicide" and "Drug Machine in Heaven."

I ordered the record in a matter of hours.

This record rawks, let no one deceive you. Priest and HtDitFH are steps down from this, though I enjoy the latter greatly. This record is raw, yet polished, insane, yet almost beautiful. It's nearly impossible to describe. It's noise, it's insanity, it's friggin' awesome. Nothing gets me up in the morning easier that "Drug Machine in Heaven" and it just gets better as the record goes on.

Easily half of the tracks on this record are instant classics.

Don't buy into carping reviews about this record. This album rules. And rules good and hard.

Pretty gnarly, dude.......2005-09-21

This was a pretty rockin' Flaming Lips album.. My brother first got it for me at a used record store. I had heard "She Don't Use Jelly" on the radio late at night in the 90's and I loved it. I wanted that song so bad but instead my brother found this album for me. After a few listens I decided that it was pretty damn good. It's not as magical and floaty sounding as their newer albums but it still has a lot of good stuff.

Wild Album, Best of the Early Years!.......2003-04-13

Not nearly as brilliant as Priest Driven Ambulance, but definatly a wild, heavy album. This is probably the bands best 80's album (although Oh My Gawd!!! comes quite close to earning that title). No Lips collection is complete without it. Hell's Angel's Cracker Factory is worth the price of admission alone!

That's heavy, dude!.......2002-04-24

The Lips continued their spaced-out journey with their 3rd album, Telepathic Surgery, in 1989. Next to Oh My Gawd!, this is definately one of the weirdest Lips albums. The cover is also priceless: a man standing in front of a barren field, holding a hubcap to his face.
The stand-out tracks include:
1. the brief but strange "Spontaneous Combustion Of John" and "Shaved Gorilla"

2. the hilarious "UFO Story" where Wayne tells the band about his encounters with UFOs as a kid, complete with a beautiful piano ballad stuck right in the middle.

3. "Chrome-Plated Suicide", which deserved to be a chart-topper

4. The 25-minute plus epic "Hell's Angel's Cracker Factory", which contains endless guitar and drum solos, backwards vocal samples, an opera singer, motorcycles revving, an answering machine, tape loops, and more. Worth the price of the CD alone. It also never appeared on the vinyl or cassette version, and never even was released as a single!

If you're looking to dive into the world of the Lips, here's a good place to start. Buy it, as Wayne would sing, "Right noooooooooooooooooooooooooooow!" :-)

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