The Flaming Lips explored emotional engagement with experimental electronic exuberance on this playful concept album about evil machines and mysterious magical moments. The trio recorded 'Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots' at Tarbox Road Studios in Cassadaga, New York. Wayne Coyne handled guitar, vocals, artwork, mixing, and production; Steven Drozd took on guitars, keyboards, electronics, drums, vocals, mixing, and production; and Michael Ivins worked bass guitar, keyboards, vocals, mixing, production, and additional engineering. Scott Booker assisted with production; and Dave Fridmann contributed with production, mixing, programming, engineering, and mastering; Trent Bell and Andy Taub helped with additional tracking.
Coyne describes the band's creative process: "We purposely, at the very end, made that feel like a concept record by giving it the title 'Yoshimi', it has a song called 'Yoshimi' and 'Yoshimi Pt. 2,' and it has that picture on the cover that's obviously Yoshimi and a pink robot. So, we purposely said, 'Let's just not make this as abstract.' Definitely on those records we dropped what we used to do and said, 'We're just going to create ourselves, and we'll see if we're that band that's capable of this stuff.' That's just monumental...I do think, even when we made 'At War With the Mystics', we were not searching that far. We had so many things going on that we wanted to make rock music in a sense, and we liked this idea of being a radical, drugged-out, political freak-out band. But we didn't have some agenda of reinventing the wheel again. What's the point? We didn't want everybody not to know what we're doing. Now, as time has gone on, I feel like this idea that, whatever the band was during 'The Soft Bulletin' and during 'Yoshimi' and during 'At War With the Mystics', will all be a thing. Whatever we move onto next could be any of those things and not feel like, 'Hey! Where's the next phase?' and perhaps go into the unknown again or not. It's hard to say."
Yoshimi P-We from the Boredoms did vocalization and inspired the title character. Coyne explains: "There's the real world and then there's this fantastical world. This girl, the Yoshimi character, is dying of cancer. And these two guys are battling to come visit her in the hospital. And as one of the boyfriends envisions trying to save the girl, he enters this other dimension where Yoshimi is this Japanese warrior and the pink robots are an incarnation of her disease. It's almost like the disease has to win in order for her soul to survive. Or something like that."
'Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots' went to number sixty-two in Australia, fifty in the US, and thirteen in the UK. It has been certified gold in all three countries. Coyne admits: "I think in some ways, it is that sort of fairytale storybook format that we kind of set a lot of it in, You know, it’s meant to seem like these things that I'm in awe of, or these things that I think are wondrous things, I try to sing about them like I'm seeing them for the first time and maybe that enthusiasm and me being in awe will make the listener kind of feel like, 'gosh, you're right', that there is awe in that even though it's things that we could perceive everyday and I think it has more to do with the tone of my voice and the melodies we like to sing in, as opposed to me thinking that that’s a thing that I could actually present, because I think you get the music and my tone of voice, 'cause I'm not a very good singer, so it always gets a little bit quirky up there, it always sounds a little bit like Bobby Brady or something. So there's an element that does sound like children's music sung by Tiny Tim or something ridiculous like that...And I don't do it in a kind of unrealistic way. I try to be enthusiastic about these ideas and I think it shows, and especially, you know, music really is such a powerful format, people forget sometimes how music just does stuff to you that a story or anything else just can't do. Music really sets up a whole magical sort of atmosphere right there in your head almost instantaneously, you hear music and lyrics that go together and it just builds a little story. I know that music has that power, I mean, not necessarily our music, but all music has that potential. But I'm lucky that the tone of voice that I like to sing in evokes that in people, ’cause it could go the other way. Sometimes people could think I can't sing very good and it's annoying to some people, but I'm lucky that it resonates with some people instead of making them ill or something."
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'Do You Realize?' went to thirty-two in the UK.
Do you realize that you have the most beautiful face?
Do you realize we're floating in space?
Do you realize that happiness makes you cry?
Do you realize that everyone you know someday will die?
And instead of saying all of your goodbyes
Let them know you realize that life goes fast
It's hard to make the good things last
You realize the sun don't go down
It's just an illusion caused by the world spinning 'round
Do you realize, ohh?
'Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots Part 1' went to number eighteen in the UK.
Her name is Yoshimi
She's a black belt in karate
Working for the city
She has to discipline her body
Cause she knows that it's demanding
To defeat these evil machines
I know she can beat them
Oh Yoshimi
They don't believe me
But you won't let those
Robots defeat me
Oh Yoshimi
They don't believe me
But you won't let those
Robots eat me
Those evil natured robots
They're programmed to destroy us
She's gotta be strong to fight them
So she's taking lots of vitamins
'Cause she knows that it'd be tragic
If those evil robots win
I know
She can beat them
'Fight Test' hit number twenty-eight in the UK. Coyne says: "I know "Father and Son" and I knew there would be a little bit of comparison. "Fight Test" is not a reference necessarily to the ideas of "Father and Son", but definitely a reference to the cadence, the melody, and chord progression. I think it's such a great arrangement of chords and melody."
I don't know where the sunbeams end
And that the starlights begin
It's all a mystery
Oh, to fight is to defend
If it's not now then tell me when would be the time
That you would stand up and be a man
For to lose I could accept
But to surrender I just wept
And regretted this moment, oh that I, I was the fool
Approaching Pavonis Mons by Balloon (Utopia Planitia)
won a 2002 Grammy Award for Best Rock Instrumental Performance.
'Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots'
full album:
1) 00:00 Fight Test
2) 04:14 One More Robot/Sympathy 3000-21
3) 09:14 Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots Pt. 1
4) 13:46 Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots Pt. 2
5) 16:58 In the Morning of the Magicians
6) 23:23 Ego Tripping at the Gates of Hell
7) 27:47 Are You a Hypnotist??
8) 32:37 It's Summertime
9) 36:57 Do You Realize??
10)40:30 All We Have Is Now
11)41:23 Approaching Pavonis Mons by Balloon (Utopia Planitia)
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