First posted on Mark Is Cranky:

OK...so last night I'm just about to click everything off and head off to bed when I stumbled upon the beginning of Austin City Limits. It's the Flaming Lips. Hmmmm. I really loved The Soft Bulletin because it took such a long time to digest. Just what the heck was this stuff? Pop? Classic rock? Art rock with Led Zeppelin traces? The answer would be: "Yes".

So on the tube they first play "Race For The Prize" (from The Soft Bulletin) followed by "Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots, Part 1". Stage left and right is populated by "dancers" in furry animal costumes. To add to the weirdness, there are also a couple of folks in "smily sun" outfits....sort of like the suns we used to draw with crayon back in school (or continue to draw now in the margins of our notepads during particularly boring meetings).

Then... lead singer Wayne Coyne introduces quirky sorta-folk singer Cat Power. Coyne pours some fake blood on his face before the whole ensemble launches into a nasty-if-sloppy cover of Black Sabbath's "War Pigs".

At this point my mouth is slightly agape.

A partially psychedelic cover of "Somewhere Over The Rainbow" is then played with Vernan Drozd, Steven Drozd's dad, on saxophone. The whole crazy mess ends with the Lips 'oldie', "She Don't Use Jelly".

I tell ya, this is what's great about music. I'm all a-fricken-tingle.