The Flaming Lips
The W.A.N.D.

Has any recent single been better timed than this, The Flaming Lips’s fantastic tale of “fanatical minds trying to rule all the world” and the stealing back of power from those that spend their days atop crystal towers staring blinkered through blinds of diamonds and pearls, blissfully unaware of the opinion of the layman? Isn’t it the most sensational celebration of one’s ability to rise up and overthrow oppressors, to overcome seemingly impossible adversity? “You’ve got that right!” G8 leaders, wake up and hear this call to arms...

A prime cut from the trio’s At War With The Mystics long-player, ‘The W.A.N.D.’’s physical release following a pre-album digital run is more-than-warmly welcomed: packing a bassline dripping liquid gold from its glossy sides and the most empowering vocals heard on a pop record since ‘Fight For Your Right’ (albeit with entirely separate concerns at their heart), these few minutes almost certainly equal the finest single of the month. Forget entirely about your no-contest weekly overviews, as this blows all but Aguilera’s already drowning-in-its-own-ridiculousness falsetto clean out of the water.

“We’re the enforcers, the sorcerer’s orphans,” lead Lip Coyne claims of his clan, and who are we to dispute him when the music his fellow magicians conjure is so dazzling, so very obviously the work of righteous warlocks. Even if the lyrics weren’t so brilliantly balanced between sing-along-friendly and thought-provoking, that bassline… it’d make a clown weep ‘til his comedy footwear was soaked through.