Since everyone who has Twitter, Facebook, Firefox, Share, Digg, Reddit, etc already knows that the Flaming Lips were in Portland this week to film a music video featuring naked bike riders, there is no reason to re-post the fact. However, Wayne Coyne took a few minutes out of the hectic shoot to speak with me on the phone about picking the right place to get naked, his first trip to Europe and used bicycle seats.
Hi Wayne, how are you?
Where are you calling from?
I’m in Portland.
Oh, you are?! I’m in Portland with you. It’s been a very hectic day. Just organizing some locations and getting some preliminary stunts figured out with the people here. You would have been roped into helping me do this stuff if I had known.
Well, maybe tomorrow.
Well, you could always join in on one of the bicycles. It’s open to anyone who wants to come down and do it.
Yeah, I don’t think the general public would want to see that.
(laughs)
I’ve actually interviewed you before.
Oh you have?
Last year in Philadelphia at some festival. We did a little video together and took some pictures but you probably don’t remember me.
I bet if I saw you. I’m sure it’s in my mind somewhere.
Yeah, you can just remember me clothed.
(cracks up) I agree and you remember me like that as well. That will be our way of remembering one another.
Are you going to get naked tomorrow?
I don’t know. I did a naked photo shoot for Spin a few weeks back and I have to say that all these things seem like they would be a bigger deal in your life than they are. I’ve worked around naked people so much that it’s not that big of a deal. I will make a more thorough shot list tonight and go through what I think the script could be and see. If I get a lot of people really being crazy it almost makes sense that if they are all naked by the end of it they would get me naked and shove me back into this thing that they are all coming out of. So, I don’t know. Some of these things that I was doing just within the last couple of hours like getting shots established will dictate what the script is going to be because some of these things I don’t know if we really can do them. It’s mostly just people trying to carry me in this big space bubble and it’s difficult with people on bicycles and some of it is not stunt work, but you have to organize how people are going to do it. It’s not just got drunk, take your clothes off and go down a hill. It’s lights and angles and lenses. You know, boring show-making shit.
Are you up on Mt. Tabor?
We are. We have a couple of alternative locations in mind. Have you ever been over to the Sauvie Island nude beaches?
I’ve gone to Sauvie Island to go fruit picking, but never to be naked.
Yeah, it would never occur to me that you would want to go over there and be nude. It’s one of the only places in the world that I’ve seen that has totally nude beaches. I don’t know if you know this or not, but there’s one for gay men, there’s one for lesbians and there’s one for normal, nude people (laughs).
I used to live in Vermont and nude swimming holes are pretty much the norm up there.
Are they segregated by gay and straight?
You know, there was one place where you followed this trail. The first hole was mixed and then you would walk down and it would be more. If you keep going down the end, I have a gay relative and we took him all the way down to the end, there was like 45 naked guys hanging out down there.
Wow. We went out today and there was absolutely nobody there but there were signs that humans had been there. It wasn’t that inviting, I have to say. I do think, as an alternative, if Mt. Tabor…I don’t think Mt. Tabor is too conservative by any means but if it gets too crowded or if it gets too weird that people are going to be actually running around without any clothes on at all we would make a late decision to go out to Sauvie Island and shoot some stuff out there as well. I don’t want anybody to get into trouble like anybody who’s letting us shoot in the park. So, we’ll see. I don’t want anyone to think I’m being frivolous with the things that they are allowing me to do.
If you head west on I-84 there is a place called Rooster Rock, also known as Cock Rock, which is a big nude bathing area as well. It’s only like 10 miles outside the city west.
Oh, I see. Have you been out there?
I have not. I think it’s primarily gay also. I’ve been out that direction, but I’ve never been to Cock Rock.
For what it’s worth, the Tabor park is utterly beautiful and I am hoping that I can just stay true to the idea that we’re going to shoot there and it is what it is. I don’t know. It’s not like we we’re getting away with much. We’re just trying to make a crazy afternoon happen while I’m here in Portland.
The weather has been on your side, though it’s been unseasonably hot.
It’s totally been on my side. I feel like these are the last, dying embers of a beautiful summer these last days that I am here. I know, it’s just great timing.
So naked bikers, huh?
To me, there is an element of being unrestricted. Unrestricted in the range of being in the world can be. It’s like the scene at the end of that Broadway musical Hair. When I was growing up in the ’60s everybody was just thrilled or appalled or embarrassed or something about this scene at the end of Hair where everybody is naked and exalting how just how wonderful it is to be alive. I think there is an element of the stuff that we’ve been doing with our new record that feels like we’re going to some new depth of personal expression and freedom. I suppose when you’re an adult and you can do whatever you want that implies if you want to walk around naked and summon the powers of the universe, you just do it. (laughs). I don’t really know what it means. To me, it just implies that we’re doing what we want. We’re not following anyone else’s rules or that we’re following the rules and the morals that we think are right in our own minds. That means if we want to take drugs, we do, if you want to run around naked, we do. It’s just something like that. I really have no desire to see most people in the world without clothes on. I think most people, especially men, just appear a lot better in the world with clothes on. For me personally, women are one of the most beautiful things we have to behold. I’m not saying it from the point of sex. I just mean, I’m a grown man and I think women are beautiful. I try to stand in front of naked women as often as I can.
Even in the past, naked women have been part of your aesthetic. When I saw you cover “The Song Remains the Same” you had those naked women come out in Philly and during the Yoshimi tour you had that naked woman dancing on the screen.
Exactly! I just want people to know the rules we’re doing our art by are out own rules. But, I don’t want people to think it’s about sex either. It’s about freedom to do whatever you want to do. I actually really don’t know what it means. It’s just another level of intensity. Especially when those gals run out when we do “The Song Remains the Same,” I think that most people would believe that all rock festivals would have crazy, naked people running around them. The first time we went to Europe, I was completely freaked out by the idea. We went to this giant festival outside of Copenhagen. This was 1986, I believe. Here we were these guys from Oklahoma, it was the first time I’d even been on an airplane and we landed at Copenhagen at this giant festival. There were 120,000 people there and literally there were people walking around naked. I was like, “My God! What’s going on here? Is this some lawless fucking anarchy? What is this?” But it was also a lot of fun. Like anything goes. It was cool. I guess the same would be true of any kind of adult stuff. My feeling is that if you’re at a Flaming Lips show, this is our time together. You can fucking do whatever you want. We’re not there to cause any violence or suffering. It’s all in the sense of some kind of respect for your fellow human but also being not restricted by the laws of everyday life. But, I don’t really know what it means. I’m not really saying it as a protest or anything.
Well, it sounds like you’re just trying to have some fun.
Exactly! Again, it’s not about sex. It’s about letting your imagination and your life be free and unrestricted in all kinds of ways.
Based on anatomy, who has it worse riding a bike naked, a man or a woman?
(laughs). I would have to say that both have dilemmas. They really do. I know even that when I’m riding a bike, and I’m not riding it naked, it’s just a weird spot for your ass and whatever that thing is called between your ass and your balls, whatever that’s called. It’s just weird. I like a bigger padded seat but you’re supposed to balance on the balls of your ass. I think it rubs you raw no matter what. I’m sure women have a similar dilemma it just might be in a slightly different spot. I think it’s weird no matter what. That’s why part of it appealed to me. I actually talked to people in town who have done it and I said, “Well, you don’t really mean nude, do you? Because that seat up your butt really has to be uncomfortable.” And they were like, “Well, if you’re used to riding a bike, your butt is already kind of used to it.” So being naked doesn’t really change the dynamic of it too much. I am sitting on our sound technician’s porch and his next door neighbor is a very normal guy. He rides his bike to work every day and he does one of the nude midnight bike rides. I’m not doing it to point out some radical part of society. It’s just an absurd thing when you can talk to normal guys who work eight to five and, “Oh by the way, a couple of times a year I’ll ride around town naked.” It’s like, okay, cool!
I hear the sale of used bike seats are up the days following those rides. It’s an urban legend around here.
(laughs) That’s the cool thing about Portland! Who would think that?
by David Harris
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