At War with the Mystics

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At War with the Mystics
Studio album by The Flaming Lips

Publication
(s)

2006

Label (s) Warner Bros. Records

Format (s)

CD , LP , DVD

Genre (s)

Rock , psychedelic

Title (number)

12

running time

54:56

occupation

production

The Flaming Lips , Dave Fridmann, Scott Booker

Studio (s)

Tarbox Road Studios, Cassadaga, New York

chronology
Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots
(2002) 		At War with the Mystics Embryonic
(2009)

At War with the Mystics is the eleventh studio album by the American psychedelic rock band The Flaming Lips . It was released on April 3, 2006 on Warner Bros. Records .

The DVD version of the album is entitled "At War with the Mystics 5.1" and contains the entire album in a DVD-Audio and Dolby Digital surround sound mix. There are also other songs and videos on the DVD. The CD version of the album is enclosed with the DVD.

Track list

The playlists contain the full titles of the songs as they can be found in the booklet. The title list on the back of the CD and DVD contains only the abbreviated titles.

CD / LP

  1. The Yeah Yeah Yeah Song (With All Your Power) - 4:51
  2. Free Radicals (A Hallucination of the Christmas Skeleton Pleading with a Suicide Bomber) - 3:39
  3. The Sound of Failure / It's Dark… Is It Always This Dark ?? - 7:18
  4. My Cosmic Autumn Rebellion (The Inner Life as Blazing Shield of Defiance and Optimism as Celestial Spear of Action) - 4:48
  5. Veign of Stars - 4:15
  6. The Wizard Turns On… The Giant Silver Flashlight and Puts on His Werewolf Moccasins - 3:41
  7. It Overtakes Me / The Stars Are So Big… I Am So Small… Do I Stand a Chance? - 6:50
  8. Mr. Ambulance Driver - 4:21
  9. Haven't Got a Clue - 3:23
  10. The WAND (The Will Always Negates Defeat) - 3:44
  11. Pompeii at Götterdämmerung - 4:22
  12. Goin 'On - 3:39

DVD

  1. The Yeah Yeah Yeah Song (With All Your Power) - 5:22
  2. Free Radicals (A Hallucination of the Christmas Skeleton Pleading with a Suicide Bomber) - 3:39
  3. The Sound of Failure / It's Dark… Is It Always This Dark ?? - 7:18
  4. My Cosmic Autumn Rebellion (The Inner Life as Blazing Shield of Defiance and Optimism as Celestial Spear of Action) - 5:01
  5. Veign of Stars - 4:58
  6. The Wizard Turns On… The Giant Silver Flashlight and Puts on His Werewolf Moccasins - 3:45
  7. It Overtakes Me / The Stars Are So Big… I Am So Small… Do I Stand a Chance? - 6:50
  8. Mr. Ambulance Driver - 4:21
  9. Haven't Got a Clue - 3:23
  10. The WAND (The Will Always Negates Defeat) - 3:44
  11. Pompeii at Götterdämmerung - 4:19
  12. Goin 'On - 3:44
  • Outtakes:
  1. Why Does It End? - 4:38
  2. You Gotta Hold On - 4:52
  3. Your Face Can Tell the Future - 5:20
  4. The Gold in the Mountain of Our Madness - 4:47
  5. Time Travel ?? Yes !! - 3:23
  6. Bohemian Rhapsody (cover by Queen ) - 6:36
  • Radio sessions:
  1. My Cosmic Autumn Rebellion - 4:39
  2. Goin 'On - 3:43
  3. Unmade Bed / No Quarter (Cover by Sonic Youth / Led Zeppelin ) - 6:55
  4. The Sound of Failure - 4:03
  5. Vein of Stars - 4:50
  6. Vein of Stars (Operatic Spook) - 4:15
  7. The Yeah Yeah Yeah Song (Chicken Fried Hoedown Protest Rally) - 4:44
  8. The Yeah Yeah Yeah Song (In Anatropous Reflex) - 4:22
  • Videos:
  1. Mr. Ambulance Driver
  2. The Yeah Yeah Yeah Song
  3. The WAND
  4. 2006 OKC Classen High Commencement Speech

Publications

  • Mr. Ambulance Driver (2005, soundtrack to the film The Wedding Crashers )
  • The WAND (The Will Always Negates Defeat) (2006, single)
  • The Yeah Yeah Yeah Song (With All Your Power) (2006, single)
  • It Overtakes Me (2006, EP)

The song It Overtakes Me was used in a 2006 commercial for Beck’s . The WAND was featured in a Dell commercial that aired in the US and UK.

more publishments

For the computer game "The Sims 2: Pets" , the Flaming Lips recorded the song Free Radicals in Simlish , which, according to Coyne, suited the band's interest in "daring to new challenges".

Artistic description

music

On At War with the Mystics , in contrast to the synthesizer-heavy previous album Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots , more guitars are used again. It contains various musical quotations and references. Laut.de primarily hears references to African American music , especially George Clinton (on It Overtakes Me ) and Prince (on Free Radicals ). There are also references to psychedelic music as described by Pink Floyd and a closeness to the previous album Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots .

According to Neumu 44.1 kHz , the album stands out due to its musical spontaneity, which enables “ that absolutely anything could happen ” ( Sam Ernst , German: “that absolutely anything could happen ”). According to the filter, “ Each consecutive [song] […] is stranger than the last ” ( Filter , German: “each following song is more foreign than the previous one”).

Texts

The album has a lyrical concept in which a wizard in space is looking for a supernova cluster that resembles a naked star queen with her legs apart, in order to fly his spaceship into the vagina of this star queen. Kurt Dahlke commented on the concept of the album as follows:

"On the one hand there is the completely cerebral rationalism of the modern age, on the other hand the exaggerated religiosity of the sects and most religions"

- Kurt Dahlke

Artwork

The picture painted by Coyne on the cover represents a stylistic cross between the cover pictures of the two predecessors The Soft Bulletin and Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots .

reception

Reviews

The album received a Metascore of 76. E! It achieved the highest possible number of points online and uncut . Plattentests.de rated At War with the Mystics as "the most combative kindergarten album of all time" and awarded 8/10 points. cdstarts.de awarded 8/10 points and described the album as "entertaining pop with depth". helga-rockt.de rated "At War with the Mystics" as an album "that can confidently be described as a masterpiece" and awarded 4 out of 5 points.

However, there was also less positive criticism: exitmusic.ch described the album as “another showpiece” and awarded 3.5 / 5 points, but also stated that “the Flaming Lips are annoying because they wait and get bogged down, play too long ". Spiegel Online awarded 6 out of 10 points and criticized stylistic devices such as alienated singing, sirens and the quotation of the German national anthem in “Pompeii am Götterdämmerung”. Laut.de awarded 4 out of 5 points, but described the album as “a little tiring”. The Austin Chronicle awarded 1.5 out of 5 points and described the album as “ That's what bands do when they don't have anything to say ” ( Melanie Haupt , German: “This is what bands do when they have nothing to say . ")

Commercial win

At War with the Mystics was # 6 on the UK album charts , while it was # 11 on the Billboard 200 . This made it the Flaming Lips' most successful album to date in both countries. In Norway (place 14), Denmark (place 20), Finland (place 25) and Sweden (place 32) the album came into the top 40.

In connection with the Dell commercial, The WAND reached number 41 in the UK singles chart in July 2006. In April of the same year, The Yeah Yeah Yeah Song had already reached number 16 in the British charts.

Awards

At War with the Mystics won a Grammy in 2007 in the category of Best Engineered Album, Non-Classical , the instrumental The Wizard Turns On… won in the same year in the category of Best Rock Instrumental Performance . It was also At War with the Mystics in the category Alternative Music Album Best nominated. In 2008, the 5.1 surround sound mix of the album was nominated as Best Surround Sound Album .

In the annual charts of Intro , At War with the Mystics was number 25. At New Musical Express , the album was number 22 and the song The Yeah Yeah Yeah Song was number 25. In the annual charts of the Musikexpress , At War with the Mystics was number 32. In In the Spex annual charts , the album was at number 41 and the song The WAND was at number 46. In the annual poll by The Tris McCall Report, the album was at number 35, and in the online record tests it reached number 77 in the 2006 poll.

Web links

  • Album info on flaminglips.com (English)
  • Entry at musicbrainz.org (English)

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Flaming Lips, The - At War with the Mystics 5.1 on Discogs (English)
  2. ↑ thepublican.com: Beck's back on TV with £ 12m campaign (English)
  3. ↑ Hype Sheet: Dell Shows Signs of Life on gizmodo.com (English)
  4. ↑ diesims2.de:  ( Page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. "The Sims 2: Pets - Soundtrack Auditions"@1@ 2Template: Toter Link / www.diesims2.de  
  5. ↑ a b c Dominik Kraus: Review at laut.de
  6. ↑ a b c Daniel Gerhard: Review at Plattentests Online
  7. ↑ a b c Sam Ernst: Review at neemu.net (English)
  8. ↑ Filter, No. 19/2006, p. 94, quoted from The Flaming Lips: At War with the Mystics (2006): Reviews on metacritic.com (English)
  9. ↑ Poll is great 2006 - Part 2 on pyrolator.com
  10. ↑ The Flaming Lips: At War with the Mystics (2006): Reviews on metacritic.com (English)
  11. ↑ Christian Kruschel: Review on cdstarts.de
  12. ↑ Mario Kißler: Review on helga-rockt.de
  13. ↑ Rafael Werner: Review ( Memento of the original from October 25, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. at exitmusic.ch @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.exitmusic.ch
  14. ↑ Jan Wigger: Review at Spiegel Online
  15. ↑ Melanie Haupt: Review on austinchronicle.com (English)
  16. ↑ a b c The Flaming Lips in the Official UK Charts (English)
  17. ↑ Artist Chart History - The Flaming Lips on billboard.com (English)
  18. ↑ The Flaming Lips - At War with the Mystics (Album) on swedishcharts.com (English)
  19. ↑ 49th Annual Grammy Awards Winners List on grammy.com (English)
  20. ↑ 2008 Surround Sound Grammy Nominees Announced on highfidelityreview.com (English)
  21. ↑ Annual charts (intro), 2006 on indiepedia.de
  22. ↑ Annual charts (NME), 2006 on indiepedia.de
  23. ↑ Annual charts (Musikexpress), 2006 on indiepedia.de
  24. ↑ Annual charts (Spex), 2006 on indiepedia.de
  25. ↑ Critics Poll 2006 - The Albums ( Memento of the original from September 15, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. on trismccall.net (English) @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.trismccall.net
  26. ^ Annual poll 2006 - The results of online disk tests