The Flaming Lips 'Embryonic' (Warner) Released 12/10/09

When you approach ‘Embryonic’, it’s not totally unfair to approach it with haste. This is after all a band who, 26 years into their career, pride themselves on gutsy flings with previously unapproachable genres and combinations of sound. Rightfully, they have no fear, no limits.

Holding that thought, The Flaming Lips’ twelfth release could go either way: Its nineteen tracks could consist of loose ends, limitless ideas that only go so far in charm and accessibility. Or, this could be the band’s tour de force; an escape from verse-chorus, a euphoric, twisted extreme of psychedelia that makes for not just 19 tracks, but a single journey. You guessed it – it’s the latter.

Wayne Coyne and co.’s exploration into the depths of experimentation is what won them critical acclaim in the first place. But this is a step even further. ‘Embryonic’ isn’t devoid of melody, nor is it intentionally provocative and pretentious the whole way through. It represents a merging of terrifying, stimulating turns of pace and mood with more blissed-out, retrospective reprisals.

Thoughtful declaratives such as “See the grass, it’s dying again” and “That’s the difference between us” are just some of the few bold words to come from Coyne, who takes a more shadowed stance in this album when compared to 2006’s ‘At War With The Mystics’. Here, you imagine him away from the stage prop of a giant hamster ball. He spills over, chanting and yelling in response to the hectic, active atmosphere that so dominates the instrumentals. He comes out of his cage in ‘Evil’, the most melodic song of ‘Embryonic’; mid-tempo, spacious ambience near overwhelming Coyne’s whimpering cry of “I wish I could go back in time…”

All that lacks from ‘Embryonic’ is a centerpiece. The band have previously declared the desire to make this record a “a free-for-all” and interestingly, this denies convention of surrounding a stand-out track with all the abstract, trivial craft that so teases the listener. The unpredictability of this album almost gives way to the feeling of no need for its own ‘Idioteque’. But without it, the album does eventually give in to its longevity and admittedly, becomes tiresome. That’s where the repeated listens come in handy. That’s when the pensive, sample-ridden instrumentals of ‘Sagittarius Silver Announcement’ and ‘Gemini Syringes’ blossom and come to life. For they are what truly makes ‘Embryonic’ a special record; had this been a “free-for-all” that only went bold, that didn’t allow beauty to seep through, it would have collapsed as an erratic failure.

It’s quite telling when guest appearances on an album don’t set the agenda: Karen O’s animal noises, intimidating as they may be, make up a vital revitaliser of the record, ‘I Can Be A Frog’ coming just after gung-ho, edgy ‘The Ego’s Last Stand’. And MGMT’s appearance on ‘Worm Mountain’ almost goes unnoticed. Flaming Lips are at centre stage because they are somehow, veterans still trying new things. Aside from one or two other anomalies, no other band is achieving what Flaming Lips can. Overwhelming but all the better for it, ‘Embryonic’ breaks boundaries that nobody considered breakable.