Every Moment Has A Song

Flaming Lips: “Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots, Part 1” (2002)

Like the Magnetic Fields’ “Andrew in Drag” (Songs You May Have Missed #162) Flaming Lips’ “Yoshimi” follows a cardinal rule of pseudo-novelty songwriting: if it’s catchy enough, even the people who ought to think it’s too weird will find themselves liking it. “Yoshimi” actually made it into the video game Rock Band 3 and has been reworked for the TV show Friends (“Phoebe Battles the Pink Robots”)–pretty mainstream for a song so bizarre.

If you removed the lyric about a city employee charged with the task of defending citizens from…well, pink robots–and substituted more typical love song sentiments, the melody could have carried it to pop hit territory. But I like it better as a cult classic.