The Flaming Lips - The Teardrop Throbs The Flaming Lips

Few bands have the legacy, continued insistence on innovative impact, cultural mainstay potency, and the staying power that the Flaming Lips have accrued over their 40 plus years as a group. Given their status in the cultural zeitgeist, it’s hard nigh-on-impossible to believe it’s already been 6(!) years since the band's last studio album (2020’s deftly executed American Head ).

Teardrop… finds the group issuing a stark reminder to the public of what made them mandatory listening for the better part of the last half century: lush arrangements coupled with exquisite production and songwriting that's been distilled over time and has achieved fully optimized power. The band's leader Wayne Coyne darts from poignant and direct on “Every Teardrop Cried” to more melancholy and somber notes on tracks like “The Trees Are Getting Their Leaves”, painting with a brush and palette so wide in breadth that they take generations to curate if they ever come at all.