FIDLAR and The Flaming Lips Collaborated on ‘Punks’ Video and It’s About What You’d Expect [Video]

Faded “Whatever Forever,” “Truth is a Line,” and “Everything is Nothing” wheat-paste posters on brick walls pull us into the nihilist dystopia of FIDLAR’s “Punks” video. A collaboration with members of The Flaming Lips, and created at their art studio, the video combines the psychedelia that The Flaming Lips are famous for with the with the cynicism characteristic of FIDLAR. What we get from that is…bizarre.

As we follow the protagonist through his quest to join the social elite, we gain glimpses into a world that’s much like our own — except in this world, money almost literally grows on trees. Er, the extracts of a plant, when consumed, cause the people who consume them to produce money from every orifice — and I do mean every orifice, as at one point a girl pulls a $100 bill out from under her skirt. The extract is treated like alcohol at the party for the social elite the protagonist attends, and after consuming too much of this extract due to the encouragement of what he perceives to be his new peers, he does what most people do when they get too drunk — he vomits everywhere. But unlike most of us, his vomit comes out in the form of semi-precious stones, much to the eagerness of his perceived peers. Eventually, the protagonist passes away, as the social elite busts his body open for the stones inside.

Take what you will from my description of this video, but it’s something you have to watch and garner your own interpretation of.