My Top 1000 Songs #470: Do You Realize??

[I've been writing up my Top 1000 songs on a daily basis--you can see them all in descending order by hitting the All My Favorite Songs tag.]

I imagine this is a divisive pick. I know a lot of people hate the song, especially those Flaming Lips loyalists who grew up with their more boisterous, noisy, acid-drenched indie rock and were taken aback by the their deliberate move into a slicker, art/prog pop style (though it brought the band a whole new audience). That pivot was most vividly realized on 1999's The Soft Bulletin (my favorite Lips record, notwithstanding my love for the rougher early stuff). But even so, "Do You Realize??"--from the 2002 follow-up, the even gentler Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots--was the antithesis of the band's roots, pure, unadulterated schmaltz, but in the best way. The slow, airy ballad with the big sound, all chiming guitars and church bells and weird synths and plenty of reverb, went all in on the earnestness:

"Do you realize that everyone you know someday will die? And instead of saying all of your goodbyes, let them know you realize that life goes fast, it's hard to make the good things last."

Maybe I'm just a big ol' sap at heart.

Live 2017:

One more...