The Flaming Lips' new video features band and audience in plastic bubbles

The Flaming Lips have unveiled the third single from their upcoming album American Head. ‘Dinosaurs on the Mountain’ comes packaged with a music video that features the band members and a limited audience all in individual plastic bubbles.

The video was shot in the band’s home town of Oklahoma in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic. It was directed by George Salisbury and the band’s singer Wayne Coyne. The video comes courtesy of the Oklahoma-based production studio Delo Creative, which was conceived to service the creative needs of the Lips.

The video’s setting will be familiar to anyone who caught The Flaming Lips’ recent performance of ‘Race For the Prize’ on The Late Show With Stephen Colbert. All seven band members (including two drummers) are in their own individual bubbles. Likewise the audience members, with some exceptions made for parents with small children.

‘Dinosaurs on the Mountain’ is a wistful psychedelic ballad that longs for the survival of the dinosaurs. “I wish the dinosaurs were still here now / It’d be fun to see them playing on the mountains,” sings Coyne, without a wince of tongue-in-cheek humour.

It was preceded by ‘My Religion Is You’ in June and ‘Flowers of Neptune 6’ in May. All three songs will feature on the band’s new album American Head, which is due out on Friday, September 11th. ‘Flowers of Neptune 6′ features guest vocals from country pop songwriter Kacey Musgraves, who’ll also appear on the album track ‘God and the Policeman’.

American Head is roughly The Flaming Lips’ 16th studio album, but it’s hard to be completely accurate given how frequently they’ve collaborated across their 35 year career. Their latest offshoot project was Deap Lips, an eponymous LP made in collaboration with LA duo Deap Vally. It came out in March 2020.