The Flaming Lips set January release for The Teardrop Throbs
The Flaming Lips will release their seventeenth studio album, The Teardrop Throbs, on January 22 through Third Man Records. Their first new album since 2020 arrives with the single God Will Control the Werewolves. A five-city concert series will give each city two different programmes, pairing the new songs with separate periods of the band’s catalogue. Singer Wayne Coyne and the band will play the entire new album on the first of two nights at New York’s Irving Plaza.
Arts··Morning
A January album follows American Head
The Flaming Lips, the psychedelic rock band, will release The Teardrop Throbs on January 22. Their seventeenth studio album is their first new collection since American Head in 2020, and their first for the label Third Man Records. The announcement includes the lead single God Will Control the Werewolves. The production team includes the band, Taylor Johnson, Dave Fridmann and Scott Booker; Jon and Mike Fridmann also contributed additional production.[1], [2]
The recording also marks a change in the group’s personnel. Steven Drozd, the multi-instrumentalist who has left the band, does not appear. It is the first Flaming Lips album in thirty-five years without him.[1]
Coyne links the single to his children
Singer Wayne Coyne traced God Will Control the Werewolves to a game of hide-and-seek with his children. A question about werewolves became part of his account of the song’s origins. Elsewhere on the album, Ego Tripping at the Gates of Hell Part Two revisits a song from Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots, the band’s 2002 album. The new title places that return near the end of the thirteen-track sequence.[1], [2]
Throb opens the album, followed by the single and Titan. Other tracks include Every Teardrop Cried, Hooray, You See You in Me, You’ve Got Brain Damage and At the End of the Day. A Sunset Far Away and Now I Understand are the closing two songs.[1], [2]
Five cities get two different concert programmes
The accompanying concert series pairs two nights in each city. Nashville’s Brooklyn Bowl and New York’s Irving Plaza host the January shows; Los Angeles’s The Bellwether and Chicago’s Metro follow in February. London’s O2 Shepherds Bush hosts the April dates, bringing the series from the United States to Britain.[1], [2]
The two evenings have distinct set structures. On the first night, the group will play the whole new album alongside songs from 1986 to 1999. On the second, it will reinterpret the new recordings and draw on songs from 2002 to 2020. The announced format therefore separates the band’s twentieth-century repertoire from its later work across the paired performances.[2]
