Oczy Mlody

Album opener instrumental “Oczy Mlody” translates roughly from Polish to English as “Eyes of the Young.” Not to be confused with track four on the album, “Sunrise (Eyes of the Young),” title track “Oczy Mlody” uses the same phrase as its title, but in broken Polish – making it one of four songs on the album with a title in the West Slavic language. Likewise, there’s another song title that references eyes, “Listening to the Frogs with Demon Eyes.” Flaming Lips frontman Wayne Coyne says the Polish titles were inspired by a book he keep in his studio.

Wayne says:

“About five years ago I found a little paperback book in a used bookstore. I liked the cover, a painting of a woman that looks like Eryka Baddu crying and sweating, and the title Blisko Domu. I didn’t know what it meant. It’s written in Polish (Blisko Domu means Almost Home).. But I didn’t care. I liked it and it is one of the books I have in the studio that I would look at all the time in between mixes and slow recording times. I would read it as a kind of meditation. Meaningless (well, meaningless to me. I don’t speak Polish) sentences and paragraphs. I would flow over the text like I was reading but It would never alight any story.. occasionally I would stumble upon cool sounding words and phrases not having any idea of their real meaning and I think I would allow the words to trigger something, maybe something subconscious, in my searching mind. I stumbled upon the words “Oczy Mlody”.. they struck me as sounding like Oxy (as in Oxycodone) Melody and, as my imagination ran away with it, also the name of a drug made in the future. Every time I would pick this book up I would, kind of, add to the made-up meaning that I had given to the words that I liked.. The actual meaning of “oczy mlody” is something like “eyes of the young”.. which we (Steven and Dennis and I) thought was great.. Eyes Of The Young is not really a title that appealed to us but Oczy Mlody meaning “eyes of the young” greatly appealed to us.. Ha.. Who knows why.. And so we began to realize we were starting to make a record with this kind of removed,abstract substitute meaning.. or a record that we followed what meaning the initial sounds triggered.. . Sounds of words. Sounds of music. Sounds of beats..””

How??

Spotify stream

White trash rednecks, Earthworms eat the ground

Legalize it, Every drug right now

Are you with us.. Or are you burnin’ out??

Kill your rock n roll.. Motherfuckin’ hip-hop sound

I tried to tell you but I don’t know how!!

I tried to tell you but I don’t know how!!

How?? A thousand suns are in the sky right now

Let them shine now shine for just one hour

I tried to tell you but I don’t know how!!

I tried to tell you but I don’t know how!!

How?? Back when we were young.. We killed everyone

If they fucked with us.. With our baby guns

We were young with our baby guns

We were young with our baby guns

A bird is singing.. Singing really loud

A jet is flying.. Flying through a cloud..

Wayne says:

“The lyric is all stream of consciousness emotional syllables and fucked up junk-sta position of words and mood to create (accidentally) the mysterious, epic meaning or meaninglessness of the song. And maybe that’s why it works.. The lyric ‘I tried to tell you but I don’t know how!!’.. Is really what the main power and dilemma of the song is.. .which is often how we communicate with each other in real life situations all the time.. and in real life we struggle to find the right words to say some ‘all encompassing perfectly meaningful statement’ and, on an emotional level it does communicate and then we fuck it up with words.. Ha.”

There Should Be Unicorns

Yeah there should be unicorns..

Ones with the purple eyes

It should be loud as fuck,

Hope the swans don’t die

There should be burning sun,

And naked slaves

And if the police show up..

We’ll give them so much money it will make them cry

And forgive us..

Yeah there should be unicorns the ones with the purple eyes not the green eyes

Yeah there should be day glow strippers

Ones from the Amazon

Some edible butterflies.. We put ketchup on

Some motorcycle stunts.. That always crash

And if the police show up we’ll bribe them into helping us steal the light of love from the rainbow sluts that live next door

Yeah there should be unicorns

Ones with the purple eyes.. Not the green eyes..

At first there should be unicorns. The ones with the purple eyes not the ones with green eyes. Whatever they give them, they shit everywhere. And it would be great if the moon was almost down… in a very red/orange state… Let’s leave it like that for at least three hours… Hovering just above the horizon. And if the police show up we will give them so much money that they can retire from their shitty, violent jobs and live the greatest life they’ve ever lived. And we will be high. And the love generator will be turned up to its maximum. And we’ll get higher when, at last, the sun comes up in the morning and we will collapse under the weight of the ancient earth. And it will be inside me and it will be inside you… and it will be the end of the world and the beginning of a new love…

Wayne says:

“It is meant to be a kind of ‘wish list’ that someone is reading off to a party planner.. ‘At first there should be unicorns..’ as if unicorns are something you can just order to have at your party.”

“We felt like maybe it needed an emotional hook in it and we put in the part that is now like a chorus ‘yeah there should be unicorns the ones with the purple eyes.. not the greeneyes,’ the lyrics implying that you can choose which unicorns you prefer.. the purple eyed ones or pink-eyed ones or green eyed ones.. Ha..And do I believe it just built from there and we couldn’t stop ourselves from turning it into a song..”

Sunrise (Eyes of the Young)

The sunrise insists on gladness..

But how can I be glad

Now my flower is dead

Oh, sun

I see you happy

You’ve made the morning dew

Now you’re showing me the truth but I don’t want to

believe you..

The sunbeams

Burnin’ my child dreams

The machine that brings me joy,

now it’s just a stupid toy

Oh, if I could

Go back and find you

I’d kiss your glowing head

And hear the things you said

And always believe you…

Oh, the sunset

Is fuckin’ with my head

Feels like a dying love in the eyes of the young

Tell me love is neither living or dying

It’s a power in your mind

I think it’s with you all the time

It only hurts when it leaves you.

Wayne says:

“The first verse of this song is the same as the Miley Cyrus and Her Dead Petz version. It’s in its original key (we made it a slightly higher register for Cyrus) and has the same melody and chords but with a radically different vibe.. the other verses are a kind of philosophical take on the struggle and acceptance of death, the death of love, the pain of living in the face of sadness.. but it is, I think, also about being in awe of beauty and power and just the weirdness of existing.. Ha..”

Nigdy Nie (Never No)

Never no no

No no no never

Never no no

No no no never

Forever ever yeah

Yeah yeah forever

Forever ever yeah

Yeah yeah forever

Na na na na na na

Watch Wayne explain how “Nigdy Nie (Never No)” and three other songs on the album came to have Polish titles:

Galaxy I Sink

I saw the universe in your giant Eye

I want to touch your mind hole and go inside

Last night

Last night

And when I look at you it’s like the sun

I understand how space and time begun

Last night

Last night

Your face I sink

In time I sink

And I will never reappear

Your love I sink

You’re everything I sink

The threat that you’ll disappear

And with the floating specs

In my tired eyes

I can see all dimensions of my life

How can the stars really know me now

When I fear their light will burn me up

Hmmm…

One Night While Hunting for Faeries and Witches and Wizards to Kill

One night while hunting for fairies

and witches and wizards to kill

I came across a hole in a tree in the forest

I climbed inside the tree hole with small fear

and loaded my gun

I should have heeded that small fear

I walked towards the wizard’s cave shooting to

shoot out his wizard brains

With a wave of his hand he created a force field

My bullets all ricocheting, bouncing around his old cave

One of them shot through my temple

and severed my eyes

Blinded by my own gun I got up

and turned around to run

Stumbling and tripping I fell blooded on the ground

The wizard and fairies and witches all came with their

medicines to my side

They sprinkled some frog dust on my face

I saw death’s face, but somehow his bad grip let me go

I awoke in a strange room with new eyes and that’s

when I saw her

Do Glowy

Glowy Glowy glow

Let’s get together yeah

Glow glow glow glow

Glarey and glarey yeah

Doin’ it right, doin’ it like you care

Under the tree where the spider got in your hair

and I thought we should spend the night together..

Dewy dewy dew

Let’s get together yeah

Drip drip drippy glow

Glowy and drippy yeah

Dewing in it right, dewing it like you care

Runnin’ all night through the flowers that eat us there

and I thought we should spend the night together…

Thought we should spend the night together

Glowy Glowy Glowy Glowy Glowy Glowy glow…

“Do Glowy” is Polish for “head,” making this song one of four on the album with a Polish title – the others being “Oczy Mlody” (Eyes of the Young), “Nigdy Nie (Never No),” and “Almost Home (Blisko Domu).”

Listening to the Frogs with Demon Eyes

Glistening in the moonlight

Listening to the frogs

Hiding ourselves in the trees

Watching with demon eyes

Here we go again, here we go…

Have you ever seen someone die

in the summertime…??

Is that what your demon eyes see…??

Have you ever gone through the hole

in the night sky…??

I can’t see the moon though I know it’s there

I can’t see the end but I know it is there

I can’t see the sun but I feel it’s there

I can’t see your love but I know it is there..

I know it’s forbidden

We can squash the stars

New holes in the darkness

Darkness in the dark

Yeah here we go again

Here we go.

Have you ever seen someone die

in the summertime??

Is that what your demon eyes see..??

Wayne says:

“The title ‘Listening To The Frogs With Demon Eyes’ goes back to 2012. I had posted on Instagram (maybe it was Twitter back then) of our little dog sitting by the creek in the park late one night. I had used the flash from my phone and so it gave the dog camera flash red eyes (so I said Demon Eyes). And.. we were actually listening to the frogs singing and croaking in the creek.”

The Castle

Spotify stream – Official music video

Her eyes were butterflies..

Her smile was a rainbow

Her hair was sunbeam waves..

Shining round like a halo

Her face was a fairy tale.. that has a poison apple

Her skull was a mighty moat..

Her brain was the castle

And the castle gets mistaken for a ship

that is floating in the clouds

And the castle is brighter than a thousand Christmas trees

And the castle can never be rebuilt again… No way…

One day a strange storm rolled in

while she was riding on her dragon

The mushrooms and the bumble bees told the flowers how it happened

She was lost in the invisible war..

Fighting in the battle

Her love is still buried there in the ruins of the castle

And the castle oscillates to the beating heart of her mind

And the castle is taller than the northern lights

And the castle can never be rebuilt again…

No way…

Wayne says:

“An embarrassingly pure little song.. Ha.. I say embarrassing because as I wrote it (just a couple of lines, that didn’t end up in the song, and the one chorus line “and the castle can never be rebuilt again.. No way..” I was truly sad and I was singing and writing about this sad sad situation (a friend of ours had committed suicide) and felt like I was doing what a songwriter should do.. be real and let it flow.. Ha.. But the next day when I listened to it.. I thought it was really boring and approached the song as being about the person (who had killed themselves) instead of it (the song) being about me.. So yeah.. I’m embarrassed about that part.. But I think songs work like that.. They let you get something out.. And I think this delicate whimsical song really came to life as soon as I sang (into my phone .. It was the only recording device I had in that moment) the very first lines.. ‘Her eyes were butterflies her smile was a rainbow’.. I still heard it (the song) as being very very sad and so, to me, because I was convinced of its power (the power of this sadness.. which, I think, was just me being still sad about the real life situation) it allowed me to sing these utterly silly romantic lyrics as a way of masking something horrible and brutal and fucked up and unspeakable.. it’s a motherfucker.”

Almost Home (Blisko Domu)

Oh, we’re almost home

Oh, oh, almost home..

Oh, we’re almost home

Home…

The thought soon becomes the word

The word then becomes the deed

If the deed is evil blame the thought is the seed

Change the spark that makes the need

Did your mind invent your mind??

The insect crawls out on the leaf

The leaf falls into the fire

Burning up my fragile dream

of how the world is full of love.

It’s not what I thought it was.

Hurting us until we’re dust.. Us, us, us

The action needs its energy

It takes it from your hate and greed

Makes you scared there’s gonna be

a stranger grabbin’ you by the throat…

or is it someone that you know.

You fear revenge from those you’ve hurt…

Haha

Referring to a meme quote that, as fakebuddhaquotes.com explains, is “all over the web” falsely attributed to Buddha and others, Wayne says of the lyric to “Almost Home (Blisko Domu)” that he thinks he “saw a Buddha quote on Instagram and I just kept the parable going..”



We A Famly

It’s been a long cold winter

Feels like it’s been forever yeah…

We both travelin’…

I’m somewhere south of Wichita

You’re somewhere up there under the moon

I can’t see you

Flying along the engines hummin’

Jesus and the spaceships comin’ down

Oh and I just can’t imagine life

without you could ever happen now!!

It’s you and me..we a famly…

It’s been a long hot summer

I miss you, it’s a bummer yeah

We both travelin’

You’re somewhere south of Wichita

I’m up here somewhere under the moon

I can’t see you..

Flyin’ along the engines hummin’

Jesus and the spaceships comin’ down

Oh and I just can’t imagine life

without you ever happen now

It’s you and me… we a famly