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Watch Flaming Lips Play ‘Try to Explain,’ a David Bowie Cover, and Pictionary on ‘Fallon’

The Flaming Lips, "Try to Explain," 'Late Night With Jimmy Fallon'

The Flaming Lips are the kind of band that would appreciate how crucial the extra quotation marks are in the title of David Bowie’s classic 1977 album “Heroes.” The Oklahoma City psych-rockers — who’ve done a better job than just about anyone in the past few decades of flirting with mainstream appeal while also holding a fun-house mirror up to that very mainstream — performed their spaced-out take on Bowie’s “Heroes” title track last night as a Late Night With Jimmy Fallon web exclusive. During the actual TV broadcast, the Flaming Lips did their SPIN Essential album The Terror‘s huge, heartbreak-as-supernova anthem “Try to Explain.” For both performances, because they’re the Flaming Lips, a clothes-eschewing Wayne Coyne was surrounded by wiry, streamer-like strands and an assortment of colored lights. Because they were on Fallon, Coyne also played Pictionary with their host, joined by Demi Lovato and actress Julie Bowen. Clearly, the Lips are the champions, friends.

Watch “Try to Explain” above, with “‘Heroes'” and the Pictionary bit below.