I was only vaguely aware of this group from their hit “She Don’t Use Jelly” ten years ago. So I’m cruising around Yahoo Launch and I go through the several vidoes available. The song “Do You Realize” was in a commercial, perhaps more than one, and the song “Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots” also sounds very familiar. And I can pretty much guarantee no Flaming Lips song has been played on local radio except for “Jelly”. So, where have I heard then before?
Well, “Do You Realize” was used in a VH1 promo, I know that much.
Interesting that songs have been licensed from “Yoshimi…” - it’s a decent album, but nowhere near as good as 1999’s “The Soft Bulletin.” Many people think “The Soft Bulletin” is the best album of the 1990’s hands-down, and I can honestly and without hyperbole say that it’s one of the 10 best albums of the 20th century.
I love “Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots”. I think “Fight Test” was used in a TV show I don’t watch and my local college radio station plays the title track in pretty heavy rotation, and it was playing “She Don’t Use Jelly” about as frequently before I’d ever heard of the band.* I know I’ve heard “Do You Realize” on that station, too, and possibly in TV-related contexts as well.
*(The college station is massively understaffed and is usually just a CD player set on ‘shuffle’, which means that it’s entirely possible for you to hear a song every day for a long time without ever hearing who does it or what it’s called. There are songs in autorotation I can’t find on Google and none of the DJs has ever given the names of.)
Now I’ll have to track down “The Soft Bulletin”. The Flaming Lips is one of the few bands from the last decade I am really interested in.
I really enjoy finding new stuff like this, music, movies, books, etc., but, and this is probably telling about my personality, it makes me almost sad, certainly disapointed, to realize that, for instance, The Flaming Lips have been around for 20 years, they had a hit 10 years ago, and here I am just finding out that I like them. All the wasted years!
Of course, music that I really liked 10 years ago I’m often not that fond of right now, so who knows. I tend to be a glass half full kind of fellow and I’m working on it. Anyway, The Flaming Lips is on my “buy” list now.
“Do You Realize” was used for a Pentium commercial, also featuring the immortal Abe Vigoda.
“Do You Realize” was also used in a Mitsubishi commercial, and has been featured on at least one movie soundtrack.
There’s been a promo on PBS for a while using a song that I’m pretty sure is Flaming Lips. Part of the lyric is “follow the day and reach for the sun.”
Naw, that is Polyphonic Spree - Reach for the Sun. Look up the band on Amazon and I believe you can download it.
Curses! I meant Section 9; Polyphonic Spree - Section 9.
Sorry for the double post.
The Polyphonic Spree took their entire sound, almost note-for-note and schtick-for-schtick, from “The Soft Bulletin.” Not to bash them for copying an incredible record as much as to say “go to the source material.”
I guess that explains why I thought it was Flaming Lips. Sure fooled me. Thanks for clearing it up.