I need to hear this again one of these days.
If you're not familiar with the gimmick of Zaireeka, it's a four CD release which is meant to be played simultaneously on four different sound systems. This would be only so much post-quadrophonic folderol if the end results didn't work out, of course, and I'm admittedly glad U2 haven't decided to do something like this. Yet.
But this works and works so very well, and it makes me glad that somewhere in Oklahoma is something in the gene pool -- or the water or whatever -- which creates people like Wayne Coyne [and Tyson Meade for that matter, but we'll get to him later]. Tagged neo-psychedelic almost from the start, the genius of Wayne is that he just does his thing, and that he does so at his own internal clock pace and sense of rightness. The Lips tangled and twisted and turned over the years in ways that make me feel so very good, and the Elephant 6 collective as a whole owe their entire existence to him, and should be kissing his feet and trimming his beard regularly if they're not already. Just wanted to make that clear.
So I've only heard Zaireeka once, but it's still the fave Lips record of mine from these last ten years, because damn if it doesn't just want to sink and stick in the memory. If you've ever wanted to be honestly surrounded in sound, this is it outside of a club situation, because your sound system only faces you part of the way and at live shows it's almost always stacked up front. So this brings to mind the truly goofy memory of me in the hallway of my house listening to the sounds coming from my room and my various housemates coming together in a big bizarre and lovely mess.
I remember little in the way of specifics -- the airplanes taking off, the shaggy dog stories, the wiggy lyris and the barking dogs that rush through all the systems and herald the end of the piece. I just remember being at peace and happy as all heck, glad that I could hear this great stuff, its value not increased by its difficulty to hear without the proper setup, but just by being so damn good. If a guy can create car-horn symphonies, and Wayne does, so why not this indeed?
I shudder to think what Eric Clapton would have done.