The Flaming Lips at the Greek: Better Than Woodstock

View more photos in the Flaming Lips slideshow.

Woodstock, schmoodstock. That was a one-time event. It rained, people were messed up on bad acid, and most of the performances, as evidenced by the new 6-CD Woodstock box set, sucked. And yet, and yet, every five years we get the same damned baby-boomer inculcation, a bullshit NPR/NBC/Rolling Stone propaganda fest telling us that this three day party was so transformational an event that it deserves anniversary celebrations.

Timothy Norris

In the beginning, there was the Digital Womb. And it beget, one by one, the Flaming Lips

Ho hum, another mindblowing Flaming Lips experience. Head exploding. Mind melting. Musically inspired. Joyous.

Not to go all generational on you, but we get the Flaming Lips nearly every summer. Unlike Woodstock, a once in a (self-important) lifetime event, we find meaning not by living in the past, but through the continual affirmation that is the Flaming Lips experience. Their show at the Greek last night was, like the dozens of other times we've seen them, remarkable.

Jenna Bauer

Backstage at the Greek: Costumes and bubbles await the magic

West Coast Sound got an early tease on the evening when we ended up in the Greek Theatres' innards before the show. Down below, rows of Lips costumes and props filled the dressing room. Next door, Wayne Coyne was doing photo shoots and video interviews in anticipation of the upcoming release of the band's twelfth studio album, Embryonic. Up above backstage, jumbo red, yellow and orange balloons filled a room to make it look like the Wonka factory.

Timothy Norris

From the digital womb was birthed one Wayne Coyne, a Flaming Lip

It was a nice little peak at the workings of the event, like seeing the Wizard of Oz running the machinery of his kingdom. And what a kingdom it was. Beginning with a high-intensity screen projection of a digital naked lady whose dancing was a graceful kind of sexy, soon her image sat and spread to reveal gaping chasm of bright light, out of which she birthed each member of the Flaming Lips, the Oklahoma City psych-rock band who have been blowing minds since 1983.