When you have the opportunity to witness something magical with the ones you love, don’t hesitate. Seeing The Flaming Lips ring in the new year at The Anthem felt like a once in a lifetime event, though as front person and ring-leader Wayne Coyne told the crowd they’ve been doing this for 23 years.

This year’s “Freakout” – a special event that include massive visuals, lasers, confetti, giant inflatable robots, and so much more – was announced earlier in the year to be in DC at The Anthem with local favorite, Bartees Strange opening the evening.

How I ended up there was a little bit of luck and a daughter’s piqued interest in The Flaming Lips’ catalog. The last time I had seen The Lips perform was at the 9:30 Club way back for The Soft Bulletin tour. Back then the band was already putting on engaging performances. I remember vividly Coyne touching his head during “The Spark That Bled” with fake blood running down his face and thinking, “This is one of the craziest shows I’ve seen.” And that was over 25 years ago! Flash forward to the summer of 2025 and a car ride with a request to play some Flaming Lips, and I just happened to look and see they were not only playing nearby but it was a special New Year celebration. So started the journey.

Arriving at The Anthem, it was clear the place was already in party mode as lines of costumed patrons made their ways through coat check and the merch stand.

It was also clear that this show would not be your typical concert as in front of the stage I saw flanking confetti cannons, but more about that shortly.

Bartees Strange, whose third full-length, Horror, was released in 2025, took the stage first. I’ve seen Strange a few times over the years and each time it is a full-force, emotionally resonant performance. This night at The Anthem was no different as he and his band rocked through some of my favorites, including “Mustang,” “Sober,” and a song that’s been growing on me a lot lately, “Baltimore.”

As the lights dimmed and the massive screens filling the rear of the stage slowly lit up with an unlikely start, the slow instrumental build of “Sleeping On the Roof” from The Soft Bulletin. But that was just prelude as the band went into “Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots Part 1 and 2” as giant inflatable pink robots slowly filled the sides of the stage.

Culminating with huge blasts of confetti and Coyne firing his own smoke cannon as he pointed to fans in the crowd, the band went into a couple of the band’s early songs “Turn It On” and “Five Stop Mother Superior Rain,” which I hadn’t heard in years. In fact, much of the set list seemed to come from 2006’s At War With the Mystics.

Take a look at a live video of The Flaming Lips performing “War Pigs” by Black Sabbath:

Things kicked back into high gear with crowd favorite and early hit, “She Don’t Use Jelly” and “The Yeah Yeah Yeah Song (With All Your Power)” and “The Golden Path,” which saw, what I can only describe as, liberal use of lasers and bouncing inflatable eye balls and lips and dancing aliens and the sun.

But it was the culmination of the show, the countdown to the new year, that was the icing on the cake. After getting the crowd to sing along to the old traditional Scottish “Auld Lang Syne,” Wayne Coyne led the countdown to 2026 as rows and rows of giant balloons were let go from the top tier of The Anthem and giant mylar balloons that spelled out “Fuck Yeah” and “Happy New Year” floated like crowd surfers from the stage clear across the dance floor. They even played the unreleased instrumental “The Process” that The Lips had performed during New Year celebrations years ago made an appearance as the band ended the regular set with perhaps their most well known song, “Do You Realize??”

But that wasn’t all! After a brief pause, the band returned for the Black Sabbath tune, “War Pigs” and a rousing “Race for the Prize,” which saw Coyne, returning to the clear plastic bubble that the band had used in past post-pandemic tours, before tossing out a huge “Fuck Yeah, Washington, DC” balloon amidst curtains of confetti and flashing lights.

A perfect ending to 2025 and a hell of a way to ring in 2026.

The setlist included:

Sleeping on the Roof
Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots, Pt. 1
Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots, Pt. 2
Turn It On
Pompeii Am Götterdämmerung
The Spark That Bled
Five Stop Mother Superior Rain
The Golden Path (The Chemical Brothers cover)
Vein of Stars
She Don’t Use Jelly
Christmas at the Zoo
The Yeah Yeah Yeah Song (With All Your Power)
Auld Lang Syne
The Process (NYE Countdown, first since January 1, 2012)
Do You Realize??

Encore:
War Pigs (Black Sabbath cover)
Race for the Prize

Check out more photos of The Flaming Lips ringing in the new year at The Anthem on December 31, 2025. All photos are copyright David LaMason:

And here are photos of Bartees Strange opening the evening at The Anthem: