For some reason I ended up going to both nights of the Flaming Lips' London gigs, and had a ball at both (First night on my own, second with a group of friends - Hi Debs, Pete, Sally). Here are a band that like to make the whole concert experience fun and - as it should be - like a big party.
They accomplish this with the help of giant ballons thrown into the audience and lots of confeti and streamers shot into the audience at various stages during the night. Thankfully, it is not all about the Gimmick (did I mention the santas on one side ofthe dtage and the aliens on the other? or the people in superhero costumes?) because the Lips are also a exceptionally good band. Take Todd of AWATS stage and bring him into the 21st Century and I think a lot of what you'd get the Flaming Lips have (Just listen to WAND off current album).
The 105 minute set (inc encoures) featured a good mix of material from their albums with musical highlights for me being: Do You Realise; Spoonful Weighs a Ton; She Don't Use Jelly; Yeah Yeah Yeah Song; Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots; and The WAND (14th, vocal mix better). Oh, and the sing along version of Bohemian Rhapsody on the 13th was pretty fun too.
Great fun, and the kind of gig you cannot help but leave with a smile on your face.