Fight Test

Album: Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots (2002)
Charted: 28
Play Video

Songfacts®:

  • Flaming Lips frontman Wayne Coyne explained the song's meaning in the album's liner notes: "The subject of the song is the singer's regret about taking the attitude of 'not fighting' to an extreme - and by the end of the song realizes he's made a mistake and sometimes a person has no choice - as unpleasant as it may be... To surrender to every conflict without a challenge, he finds, is worse than getting beat up."
  • The melody is very similar to "Father And Son" by Cat Stevens. The Flaming Lips agreed to share the song's royalties with Stevens.

    The melodic similarity to "Father and Son" wasn't intentional. "We thought it was the greatest thing ever to finally be involved in a plagiarism claim," Wayne Coyne told Uncut magazine. "We thought, 'We're legit! A real songwriter thinks it matters! It made the song more interesting. People probably listened to it five or six more times, just to be like, 'Does it really sound like that?'"

    Stevens didn't ask for much, just a quarter of the song's royalties. "We were like, 'You want a quarter of one song on a Flaming Lips album - do you know what this is? This isn't anything!,'" Coyne remarked.
  • This was the theme song for the MTV cartoon 3 South, which ran for one season in 2002.
  • Wayne co-directed the music video with documentary filmmaker Bradley Beesley. He explained the concept in the band's video compilation VOID (Video Overview in Deceleration): "Group of teenagers tries to spur the rivals to fight. One refuses to be aggressive until he's pushed into a pile of horse poop - finally he finds a smelly, but non-violent weapon."
  • This was used on the TV shows Smallville ("Prodigal" - 2003) and Six Feet Under ("The Last Time" - 2002). It was also featured in the movies One More Time (2015) and Freaky Friday (2003).
  • This was also featured on The Flaming Lips 2003 EP Fight Test, which was nominated for the Grammy Award for Best Alternative Music Album (it lost to The White Stripes' Elephant).

Comments: 1

  • Matt from Downers Grove, IlTotally Rocking Song, and 'Father and Son' is also good. Actually, Fight Test and Father and Son share a lot of similarities. "I don't know how a man decides what's right for his own life" sounds a lot like the choice the son had to make in the Cat Stevens song.
see more comments

Editor's Picks

Randy Houser

Randy HouserSongwriter Interviews

The "How Country Feels" singer talks Skynyrd and songwriting.

Gilby Clarke

Gilby ClarkeSongwriter Interviews

The Guns N' Roses rhythm guitarist in the early '90s, Gilby talks about the band's implosion and the side projects it spawned.

Subversive Songs Used To Sell

Subversive Songs Used To SellSong Writing

Songs about drugs, revolution and greed that have been used in commercials for sneakers, jeans, fast food, cruises and cars.

Tom Bailey of Thompson Twins

Tom Bailey of Thompson TwinsSongwriter Interviews

Tom stopped performing Thompson Twins songs in 1987, in part because of their personal nature: "Hold Me Now" came after an argument with his bandmate/girlfriend Alannah Currie.

Krishna Das

Krishna DasSongwriter Interviews

The top chant artist in the Western world, Krishna Das talks about how these Hindu mantras compare to Christian worship songs.

What Musicians Are Related to Other Musicians?

What Musicians Are Related to Other Musicians?Song Writing

A big list of musical marriages and family relations ranging from the simple to the truly dysfunctional.