Frontman Wayne Coyne talks about space balls, working with Miley Cyrus and why he loved working as a fry cook
Wayne Coyne is the dream interviewee. Perhaps one of the most fascinating men in rock, the Flaming Lips frontman’s career tells the story of an unrelenting artist—one who has never once compromised his creative vision for financial gain. Beginning his career as a fry cook for a Long John’s restaurant, Coyne now hailed as one of the most creative people in music. And even that might be a slight understatement.
Calling me from his home in Oklahoma City, Coyne appears exactly as I expected—his rainforest-like hair taking up about 90% of the screen, his phone thrashing about. The word ‘icon’ immediately springs to mind, or perhaps ‘wizard’—either works.
“I still say this Australian phrase ‘No worries,’” Coyne says after hearing my accent. “The rest of the world doesn’t say it, but now I’ve got my two little boys saying it too.”
Reflecting on the current ‘chilly’ weather in Oklahoma, I ask Coyne whether he’s ready to face Australia’s sometimes punishing summer weather. “Australia is not hot for us,” Coyne replies, insisting he’s more than ready. “Oklahoma is humid and punishing in the summer.” He also has a unique superpower: He doesn’t sweat much. “I don’t sweat that much, and my sweat doesn’t stink. It dries up, and it’s all good.”
The Flaming Lips will soon be arriving Down Under—like, really soon. Their first show is in Adelaide on January 30. Flaming Lips shows are renowned for their explosiveness. It feels like entering a technicolour universe. Filled with confetti, disco balls, rainbows, and silver, a Flaming Lips concert is something you must experience at least once in your life. Coyne and his team are entirely in control of the spectacle too. Unlike most performers who delegate to a team, Coyne literally makes the props himself.
It’s this spectacle that Coyne craves. “I don’t care if people use their cellphones. You can do whatever you want at a Flaming Lips concert. I see it as a great compliment if someone takes a photo. It’s like, if you’re at a sunset, the sunset doesn’t say, ‘Turn off your phone.’”
At one point during the show, Coyne will also crowd-surf into the audience inside a space ball—something the band has become famous for. The origins of the space ball are fascinating. “We made a movie called Christmas on Mars. In one of the scenes, I arrive in a spaceship. I wanted the spaceship to be like Glinda’s ball from The Wizard of Oz. So, we did that. Then I wanted to include one in our live shows, but I couldn’t find one. Then, in 2004, we were scheduled to play Coachella, and one of them arrived. I didn’t tell the festival people I was doing it, but at one point, I went out into the crowd in the space bubble. It was exhilarating, but I didn’t know whether it was cool or stupid. Then, the next day, as we were leaving, I saw a picture of me in the space bubble in the newspaper. It became our thing. Kiss does fire; the Flaming Lips do the space bubble.”
Coyne loved the ball so much, he later got married inside one. “We got married in January, so it made sense. It also meant my wife wouldn’t have to worry about her hair getting messed up.”
Flaming Lips shows now, however, as Coyne tells me, are markedly different from how they used to be. “If you go back to the ‘80s Flaming Lips shows, my hair was the same, but everything else was different.” He’s not wrong. You know when musicians say they had quite the “come-up”? Well, Coyne can speak to this better than most.
He began his career in 1977, taking a job as a fry cook at a Long John Silver’s restaurant, where he worked until 1992. “A lot of people think I was rebelling against working,” Coyne says, reflecting on his time there.
And unlike most people who don’t look back fondly on their 9-to-5 jobs, Coyne has quite the opposite reaction. “I loved working there,” he says, a smile lighting up his face. “I loved the customers. A couple would come in on a date, then come in married, then with kids. I just thought, ‘If this is my life, that’s amazing.’ Then some people started to like our music.”
It was here Long John’s too, where Coyne developed some of his wildest ideas. Pushing through the boredom that comes with a mundane job, he began to dip his toes into the absurd. “I love visual stuff. I’m a painter, and I do comics. I’m not a very good musician, but I love creating music. I think if you’re an imaginative person and are given freedom, and people are willing to help you, you can do great things.”
It’s this limitless creative freedom that, I believe, makes Coyne and the Flaming Lips stand a little taller than the rest. As adults, we often immediately dismiss ideas for fear of failure or embarrassment. Children, by nature, do not share mentality. When an idea floats into their head, they let it marinade. Coyne and the Flaming Lips appear to have never lost this childlike approach.
He looks touched when I offer him the compliment. The man with a million things running through his head suddenly looked almost lost for words. “I think that’s the greatest compliment an artist can have. Thank you. I love life. I love being able to do my art. I’m lucky I’ve attracted people who love it too. We’re doing music. I’m not making medicine for children. I can do the most absurd thing I want to do.”
This trait is something that Coyne believes his friend and collaborator Miley Cyrus has never lost either. “That’s why we’re friends and make records together. We do exactly what we wanted to do.”
And with that, my 23 minutes with arguably rock’s most creative man came to an end. It felt like a fever dream—something I could only have conjured up in my wildest imagination. I left feeling like I’d made a friend and been blessed by a cosmic deity all in the same breath. Now, just imagine what two hours in his presence could do.
The Flaming Lips are performing in Adelaide, Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane from 30 January to 5 February. Tickets can be accessed here.
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