Embryonic
The twelfth album and the first double album, with guests including Karen O and MGMT.
The Flaming Lips, 2009
- Released
- 13 October 2009
- Recorded
- February to July 2009
- Studio
- Tarbox Road Studios, Cassadaga, New York, and Dull Roar Studios, Oklahoma City
- Label
- Warner Bros.
- Producer
- The Flaming Lips, Dave Fridmann and Scott Booker
Coyne said the idea of a double album was that a couple of themes could be woven together and the band could sprawl a little. He named the Beatles' White Album and Led Zeppelin's Physical Graffiti as records he likes because they are not focused. Karen O contributed to I Can Be a Frog and Watching the Planets, her parts recorded by Coyne over the phone, MGMT appear on Worm Mountain, and Thorsten Wörmann speaks the announcements on Gemini Syringes and Virgo Self-Esteem Broadcast. Derek Brown joined late in the recording on keyboards, percussion and guitar.
Embryonic reached 8 on the Billboard 200, the band's most successful album in the US, with 32,000 copies in its first week, and 43 in the UK. Metacritic lists 81 from 33 critics. Pitchfork gave it 9.0 and named it fourth best album of 2009, and NME gave it 9 out of 10.
Track listing
- Convinced of the Hex3:56
- The Sparrow Looks Up at the Machine4:14
- Evil5:38
- Aquarius Sabotage2:11
- See the Leaves4:24
- If2:05
- Gemini Syringes3:41
- Your Bats2:35
- Powerless6:57
- The Ego's Last Stand5:40
- I Can Be a Frog2:14
- Sagittarius Silver Announcement2:59
- Worm Mountain5:21
- Scorpio Sword2:02
- The Impulse3:30
- Silver Trembling Hands3:58
- Virgo Self-Esteem Broadcast3:45
- Watching the Planets5:16
Personnel
- Wayne Coyne lead vocals, guitar, theremin, keyboards, vocoder, mixing, production
- Steven Drozd guitars, keyboards, drums, bass, backing vocals, lead vocals on If, mixing, production
- Michael Ivins bass, keyboards, backing vocals, mixing, production, additional engineering
- Kliph Scurlock drums, percussion
- Dave Fridmann production, mixing, programming, engineering, mastering
- Scott Booker production
- Karen O additional singing, screaming, animal sounds and noises
- MGMT additional singing and playing on Worm Mountain
More from The Flaming Lips
Transmissions from the Satellite Heart (1993), Zaireeka (1997), The Soft Bulletin (1999), Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots (2002)
Sources
- Embryonic (album), Wikipedia