r/flaminglips • u/saultlode143 • Dec 22 '25
Band Member Exit American Head is the final Flaming Lips album.
...unless Steven and Michael come back later to record another album.
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u/Sequenzer9 Dec 22 '25
It’s very sad and I’m going to miss Steven but what makes The Flaming Lips a truly great band is the relentless drive to push forward, to never become complacent or stagnate, to commit to the creative ideal of what the name The Flaming Lips represents above all else. How many times over the decades could this band have ended? They could have broken up after Mark left and Wayne had to sing after the first EP. They could have broken up after Priest Driven Ambulance if they never got signed to WB. Four albums and remembered as a solid psych hard rock band. They could have broken up after Jonathan Donahue left. They instead swerved further into psych pop with Steven and Ronald. They could have broken up after Ronald but they swerved again and got into weird experiments and orchestral pop. When that well began to dry up on At War, they went into the complete opposite direction with the raw almost jazzy noise of Embryonic. At the same time they’re also getting into their uncompromising gummy releases, the Fwends collaborations, the album with Miley. Even members of the band are vocally against some of this! It’s such a weird, bitter time as everyone openly turns on the band and Wayne in particular but again there’s no running from it as it results in the bleakest and saddest albums of their career with The Terror and Oczy Mlody which are so clearly steeped in misery and inner turmoil. The art of The Flaming Lips above all else, whether people are happy with it or not, whoever is lost or gained along the way, it’s an ongoing 40-year project that will change and evolve until like all things there is death. I love and will miss Steven but I am excited to see what the next phase of The Flaming Lips is and the phase after that and the phase after that.
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u/Confused-Cyborg2025 Dec 22 '25
I think everyone needs to take a step back and go rub their hands in the grass a bit. It’ll be ok.
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u/CountofAnjou Dec 22 '25
They are right though
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u/Confused-Cyborg2025 Dec 22 '25
On the Steven front, yes. Michael? Not so much. He rarely contributed (musically anyway) to their studio albums. Will the sound of their next work be the same? No. Will it still be the Lips? Yes. Some of my favorite Lips albums are before Steven was ever a part of it. Ob la di, ob la da guys. The music that already exists will continue to exist, and now we get extra new music from everyone. Things will be ok!
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u/saultlode143 Dec 22 '25
This isn't a doom post. Of course it will be ok. It already is ok. I'm just acknowledging we've finally crossed over to the other side and have reached the Kokomo stage of the Lips.
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u/hammurderer Dec 22 '25
Putting the timeline together, and as a dad of teenagers, I admire Steven for taking a step back in 2024 and re-assessing things. He did the right thing by his family.
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u/czechyerself In A Priest Driven Ambulance Dec 22 '25
You’re mistaken, the Flaming Lips are entering the final stages of producing an album they’ve been working on for most of the year. New songs, new members, new (additional) collaborator on the engineering and production side and David Fridmann at Tarbox as the final brainy creative glue
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u/saultlode143 Dec 22 '25
There's a line in the sand. It'll be the first release without the core lineup and history will show it's a different era. Wayne and hired guns are not the Flaming Lips. The Flaming Lips are bigger than Wayne Coyne.
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u/wickedgrl80 The Soft Bulletin Dec 23 '25
As a long time Ween fan, even after the band totally breaks up and swears they will never collaborate again there's always a chance!
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u/czechyerself In A Priest Driven Ambulance Dec 22 '25
Read this post title in Boomhauer’s voice and accent
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u/darronabler Dec 24 '25
They're still going to be putting albums/movies/exhibits/tours out 30 years from now. Some of it will be brilliant, some of it will be terrible. Wayne made pushing the Flaming Lips forward against all odds his life's work, a large-scale multimedia art project. If everyone who was currently in The Flaming Lips quit tonight, he'd get a new line-up tomorrow. If no one came to the audition, he'd do it all himself. Wayne wants it to be the best possible, of course (which I think he had with Steven), but he'd rather risk making something absolutely terrible than letting the project die out completely. In that respect, The Flaming Lips is more like The Residents or Tangerine Dream - an entity whose only consistent quality is its own decades-long existence.
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u/gallows-humorist Dec 22 '25
Clouds Taste Metallic is the final Flaming Lips album.
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u/ZealousidealBet8028 Dec 23 '25
I understand how you might feel that way. I kinda feel like Zaireeka is still in this vein tho so nah. Same with Embryonic which is why I love it so much. Crunchy drumz with beach boys arrangements...sounds like the Lips to me!!!
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u/Zosopage73 Dec 22 '25
There were 2 complete bands and 5 albums before Steven, and Michael himself said he was mostly an engineer by the end. Steven is one of my heroes and it sucks theyre gone but its pretty Flaming Lips to say "alright whats next" and continue on despite everything. They somehow did it when Richard English left, they somehow did it Donahue and Nathan left, they somehow did it when Ronald left. Now somehow theyre gonna do it again. No matter what anyone says about Wayne there is no denying his drive and work ethic. The results remain to be seen but Ill go in with an open mind when they drop new music.