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  • >> [Music: Flaming LipsShe Don’t Use Jelly”]

  • >> Wayne Coyne: You know we've always said that

  • as long as we can make more money being in the band

  • than we could, say, working at McDonald's or Target,

  • then we'll choose being in the band.

  • >> Jennifer Van Evra: Right.

  • >> Wayne Coyne: Only because that's what would be left for us if we weren't doing this.

  • That's the kind of skill level of any contribution to society that we would have.

  • Simply because we've spent our whole adult lives pursuing this.

  • >> [Music]

  • >> Wayne Coyne: I worked at this fast food restaurant in Oklahoma City, Long John Silver's.

  • Fried fish and french fries and stuff. I worked there for 11 years

  • from the time I was 16 to the time I was 27 or so.

  • I'd be working late at night and it was a reasonably bad area of town

  • and we got robbed a couple of times. Especially in the late 1970's

  • because the economy and everything really got horrible.

  • The first time we got robbed I was the only... I'm not saying this because I'm racist or anything

  • I'm just being pragmatic about it. I was the only white guy.

  • I was working with a bunch of black women. The guys who came in were black

  • and they were pissed off and they had biggest gun I've ever seen in my life.

  • Only because it's pointed at me did it seem so big. We all laid on the ground.

  • I thought, “fuck, this isthis is it. Here I am, I'm 17 and this is how it ends.”

  • Youre just working one second and the next second you're laying on the ground

  • and some guy puts a bullet in your head.”

  • Obviously they robbed us and left and didn't kill me. But I remember the elation of just...

  • We all cried. We couldn't stop crying and laughing and jumping up and down.

  • We were celebrating like we had just won a million dollars.

  • The idea of we are alive and isn't it a fucking great thing? I think it changed me.

  • >> [MUSIC]

  • Wayne Coyne: I think the idea of sort of confronting this always present idea

  • that people around you are going to die or you're going to die or...

  • I think it makes living better, it really does.

  • To me, I hate this notion that I would ever forget of how temporary this whole thing is.

  • You know life is worth celebrating and worth living

  • even though we're all headed to the same hole at the end of the day.

  • Without sort of coming to terms with it you're not coming to terms with

  • some of the joys of life at the same time.

  • >> [MUSIC]

  • Wayne Coyne: I don’t know. I think somewhere along the way

  • music allows you to sing and talk and think about those things,

  • and it can be beautiful instead of being horrible.

  • I remember when my father was dying,

  • I remember listening to Bjork, and listening to John Coltrane, and these things,

  • and I don't know why but music has the power to transcend your physical being

  • and take you up just a little bit. Because music has a metaphysical quality

  • it gets up there in these things and it really makes your life beautiful.

  • >> [Music]

  • >> Wayne Coyne: It's the same thing for virtually every human that's ever going to be alive.

  • Things that make them sad are going to be love, loss of love, death, fear of isolation.

  • It's a really small little corner. So I think any time you sing about those

  • you're probably going to have a crowd that knows exactly what you're talking about.

  • But when you're sing about things that make you happy, which I like to do that as well,

  • you know, you never know if you're going to hit the mark.

  • That's why when I sing a song like She Don't Use Jelly,

  • people go, “oh that's crazy, what are you talking about.”

  • Even though they enjoy it, they don't understand it.

  • [Music: The Flaming Lips "Spoonful Weighs a Ton"]

  • Stuff like when I sing about the Spoonful Weighs a Ton

  • and people understand this is about death and meaning that you put into in your life.

  • They go, “oh, I know what you're talking about.”

  • >> [Music: The Flaming Lips “A Spoonful Weighs a Ton”]

  • >> Wayne Coyne: So when I go in there and I’m singing about things that seem to be personal,

  • they can be my own exact personal experience, yet if I'm doing the job right

  • I can make it seem like it's your story at the same time.

  • I'm not just simply pouring my guts out.

  • I'm pouring my guts out so they can feel like your guts at the same time.

  • >> [Music: Flaming LipsDo You Realize”]

  • >> Jennifer Van Evra: Well I should let you go.

  • >> Wayne Coyne: All right, well thanks a bunch.

  • I'm sitting in the lobby where the elevators come out.

  • People have all been looking at me in my bare feet,

  • talking existential bullshit with you as they get in and out of the elevators.

  • >> Jennifer Van Evra: Hilarious. That was the odd ding I was hearing in the background.

  • >> Wayne Coyne: Yeah.

  • >> Jennifer Van Evra: Well thanks again and I really appreciate you taking out the time on a Saturday.

  • >> Wayne Coyne: Well I'm glad you called. Okay.

  • >> Jennifer Van Evra: Okay, cheers.

  • >> Wayne Coyne: Alright, bye.

  • >> Jennifer Van Evra: Bye.

  • >> [Music: Flaming LipsDo You Realize”]

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>> [Music: Flaming LipsShe Don’t Use Jelly”]

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