I Just Read About That…

SOUNDTRACK: THE FLAMING LIPS AND HEADY FWENDS-“Tasered and Maced” (2012).

2012 saw the release of this very strange collaborative album.  Whether The  Flaming Lips had entered the mainstream or if people who’d always liked them were now big stars or maybe they all just liked doing acid.  Whatever the case, The Lips worked with a vast array of famous (and less famous) people for this bizarre album.  Here it is 8 years later. Time to check in.

The final song of the album features Chris Martin from Coldplay on the vinyl release.  But it’s something else entirely on digital releases.  This is the digital song.

This starts as a buzzy feedback wall of noise.  Then comes a simple synth riff over which Aaron Behrens tells a story about cops busting into a party and macing everyone.

He was drunk and decided to fight the cop.  The cop turned around and maced him in the face.  So he ran.

He says Friends will stop chasing you after a while, but copes don’t stop.  They caught him and tasered him.  Hence maced and tasered.

Musically thus piece is interesting to listen to, but the story doesn’t really hold up to repeated listens.

[READ: August 20, 2019] “No Life”

This story concerns parents looking to adopt.  But it is handled in a unique (to me) way.

As the story opens we meet Edward and Alison.  Once happily married (having sex everywhere) they were soon desperate to get pregnant (sex became a chore).  Now they have given up on getting pregnant. But neither one will ever refuse sex (even if they don’t want to have it) because it means they have given up.

So they are looking to adopt.

I’ve never heard of a setup like this, but maybe it happens all the time:

Prospective adoptive parents are invited to a picnic where all of the potential adopted children are playing.  The adults are told to act natural and speak to the children casually.  Never say things like would you like to come home with us and try to keep things as upbeat as possible.

When the adults are released to mingle, Edward finds himself drawn to a surly teen.  Edward sits by the kid who says, “You don’t want me, man.”  The boy, Nate, talks about how he had been in foster family but they kicked him out because he smoked weed.  Edward is sympathetic to him, but not fawning.  Nate says he doesn’t want parents.  Pretty soon he’ll finish high school, take the money they give him and get a bus to Vegas.

Alison is furious that Ed is talking to this older boy.  She believes they can;t handle an older child–one who is already defiant against them.  While she is stewing, Alison sees the boy she wants.  He looks like her.  He is so obviously perfect that it takes her a moment to realize there is another couple talking to him.

They look like older rich hicks from Texas.

Edward thinks Nate would be a breeze and he’s all set to introduce him to Alison (“Whatever,” the kid says).  But as soon as he sees the look in Alison’s eyes, he knows that she is in love with this little boy and he can feel Nate slip away.

Edward and Alison talk to the boy and to the older couple. Both pairs of adults are trying to one up the other and neither is giving an inch.

As they walk away, Alison confirms to Edward that she wants this boy.

Before they can leave, the Texan, Harlan Breece, knocks on their car window.  He says his wife Linda found them very charming and would like to invite them over for dinner.  Ed agrees immediately and as they drive home, Alison says he’ll be going alone.

But the next morning she changes her tune.  She called the agency and said which boy she wanted.  She was very pleased to learn that nobody else (meaning the Texans) had put in a request.  She also believed that younger families (and they were younger than the Texans) had a better shot.

They go to the Breece house the next night.  It is very large.  Edward and Alison cant imagine why this man, a Texas judge, has moved to upstate new York.  He clearly has no friends and really doesn’t fit it.

Mrs Breece tells about the foster boy they had adopted earlier who didn’t work out

The language she uses makes me very uncopmfotable and since this story is 20 years old I cant tell if it is supposed to or not. Their “little black boy” had a “nanny of his own kind.”  Harlan taught him golf “in the days before black boys played golf.”  She also thinks the new Nanny’s name was Armada.

The meal is surprisingly bad and Alison realizes that the food is not the main reason for the dinner.

As the men clear the dishes, Harlan gets to the point.  He did he research.  He knows a lot about what Edward has done wrong over the years.  And he decided that agency should know about those things as well.

Edward is shocked by this man and he starts laughing at the audacity–which Harlan does not appreciate.  Alison also knows something is up and she finds her own (surprising) way to act out, promising herself that anything is better than dealing with these people.