Fans of The Flaming Lips are about to get a healthy dose of déjà vu…

Last September, the social media account of one Wayne Coyne was deleted by the powers that be at Instagram, supposedly because the Flaming Lips frontman posted one too many psycho-sexual, NSFW images to his many followers.

“I do regret that I was a little too free with my Instagram…” said Coyne following being kicked off, referencing the deletion of nearly two years and 12,000 images worth of F’lips archival material, which a groundswell of fans petitioning for the re-instating of his Instagram; pushed by Coyne’s musical mate and collaborator Moby, saying “there’s no place for censorship in a free society.”

“Everybody else wanted me to protest. And I should’ve, [but] I don’t care that much,” said Coyne at the time, who picked up exactly where he left off, creating a new account and posting more psychedelically inclined imagery (would you expect anything less from the leader of a band who regularly appear on stage by ‘birthing’ themselves through a giant vagina?).

But it seems Instagram feels Coyne hasn’t learnt his lesson and has again deleted his new (two-month old) account, for the exact same reasons. Rather than kick up any kind of fuss, Coyne has simply created yet another profile, but this time he promises to “play by the rules”, as his new account name attests: “waynewontpostpicsofnakedwomen.”



That new image, and many of the offending posts that likely ruffled the Instagram gate-keepers, were shot by Coyne from his Womb Gallery in Oklahoma City.

“We had an opening at our gallery and I was doing a lot of pictures of stuff at the gallery and there was a statue we have and she’s naked, but if I take a picture, you can’t tell if she’s a statue – and I forget that,” Coyne explained last month of his first shutdown, describing the ‘Womb Room’ bar area’s centrepiece juice dispenser:  “kind of modeled after the milk bar machine’s in Stanley Kubrick’s A Clockwork Orange.”
But it seems Instagram feels Coyne hasn’t learnt his lesson and has again deleted his new (two-month old) account, for the exact same reasons.

“It’s funny when you’re there, but I can see when I posted it it just looked sort of disturbing and pornographic,” he added.

Instagram never offered an official statement on the incident, and very unlikely to offer one over the most recent account snub, but a representative of the social media site told MTV News: “Instagram has a clear set of community guidelines which make it clear what is and isn’t allowed. This includes photos or videos of actual nude people. We encourage people who come across content that makes them uncomfortable to report it to us using the built-in reporting tools next to every photo or video on Instagram.”

In non-social media controversy news, The Flaming Lips actually have a ton of new music in the pipeline with a rather prolific list of unique releases up their sleeves.

Firstly, there’s the new Peace Sword EP, a six-track release inspired by the new blockbuster movie adaption of Orson Scott Card’s sci-fi novel, Ender’s Game, with the full release streaming online, as Flaming Lips fan site The Future Heart reports.

The band have also recorded a limited edition vinyl release with tourmates Tame Impala. Kevin Parker and the award-scooping Perth cosmonauts have been playing European and North American dates with The Flaming Lips in the last two month, and the two bands recorded covers of each other’s material for a four-track split EP – titled Peace And Paranoia – to be sold exclusively at their concerts.

Tame Impala performed F’lips’ ‘Silver Trembling Hands’ at a concert in Dublin in mid-August, then a cover of Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots cut ‘Are You A Hypnotist?’ at the Rock En Seine festival. Then Wayne Coyne and co. unveiled their version of one of Tame Impala’s biggest tunes, the mighty Lonerism single that is ‘Elephant’.

Now the entire EP is available online, thanks to YouTube user, Heady Fwends. Listen to Peace And Paranoia, in simulated vinyl style, as ‘Side 1’ and ‘Side 2’ below. As for that touted collaborative album with Ke$ha? Flaming Lips say that ‘Lip$ha’ is now off (thank goodness).


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