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Flood

From This Might Be A Wiki
Flood album cover
Flood
Studio album by They Might Be Giants
First released January 15, 1990
Full Release details / Collectors: Show / Hide 		Tracks 19 Previous album Lincoln
Label Elektra <60907> Length 43:14 Next album Apollo 18

Flood is They Might Be Giants' third studio album, released in 1990. It was the band's first release on a major label; Elektra Records. Following the success of their second album, Lincoln, the band made the move from the independent label Bar/None Records.

[edit] Purchase

Contents

Seller Format Price Purchase!
Amazon CD $17.98
$13.99! 		Purchase!
iTunes AAC $9.99 Purchase!
TMBG Merch Store CD $14.00 Purchase!

[edit] Description

[edit] Background

Four of the tracks on the album were produced by the duo Clive Langer and Alan Winstanley (who would both later work with the band again on Mink Car). Flood was also the first time that the band would work with Pat Dillett, although his contribution was as a second engineer. After Flood, Pat became a frequent producer on subsequent TMBG albums. Although the mixing process was analog, Flood was the first TMBG album to be recorded digitally. The Johns spent two-thirds of this album's recording budget on four songs: Birdhouse, We Want A Rock, Your Racist Friend, and Istanbul.

[edit] Cover Artwork

The photo used for Flood's cover art "was found by Flansburgh in the basement archives of Life magazine. It existed as only a contact print on a roll of film shot by famous photojournalist Margaret Bourke-White. It was in a series of photographs of Kentucky flood victims from around 1930. Another photograph from that very same shoot has become quite well known. It is of people standing in a bread line in front of a billboard poster of a happy family in a car with the words "America: Highest Standard of Living." It is featured in the "Best of Life" and has become synonymous with the Great Depression, even though the events surrounding the photograph are unrelated to it" (from an interview on the old tmbg.com).

[edit] Sales

A chart showing the historical performance of Flood on the Billboard 200 & UK Albums charts.

Flood debuted on the Billboard Top Pop Albums chart the week of February 10, 1990, and spent 22 weeks on the chart, peaking at number 75. Sales in the UK were very strong as well, which caused the album to peak at #14 on the UK Albums Chart, and then spend a total of 12 weeks in the top 75. Despite it being TMBG's most popular album, it was given a pretty harsh "2 stars out of 5" review by Rolling Stone upon its release[3].

In addition, Flood became TMBG's first gold-certified release on December 22, 1993. As of March 2009, it has sold 783,000 units in the U.S. since Nielsen SoundScan began tracking sales in 1991. Later in July 2009, it became the band's first-ever album to achieve platinum certification.

[edit] Singles

LP cover
UK magazine ad for the album
Back of a promotional flat

The album generated three singles: Birdhouse In Your Soul, Istanbul (Not Constantinople), and Twisting. Birdhouse became one of the group's biggest hits, spending 11 weeks on the Billboard Modern Rock Tracks Chart, eventually peaking at #3. Likewise, Twisting spent 7 weeks on the same chart, but topped out at #22. Particle Man also became one of the group's most recognizable songs, but was never actually released as a single (contrary to many people's perceptions). However, both Particle Man and Istanbul were used in videos for the children's television show Tiny Toon Adventures, both of which proved to be quite popular.

To this day, Flood continues to be TMBG's best-selling album of all time.

[edit] Track listing

# Title Length  Lyrics Downloads Guitar Tab
1 Theme From Flood 0:27 
2 Birdhouse In Your Soul 3:20 
3 Lucky Ball & Chain 2:46 
4 Istanbul (Not Constantinople) 2:38 
5 Dead 2:58 
6 Your Racist Friend 2:54 
7 Particle Man 1:59 
8 Twisting 1:56 
9 We Want A Rock 2:47 
10 Someone Keeps Moving My Chair 2:23 
11 Hearing Aid 3:26 
12 Minimum Wage 0:47 
13 Letterbox 1:25 
14 Whistling In The Dark 3:25 
15 Hot Cha 1:34 
16 Women & Men 1:46 
17 Sapphire Bullets Of Pure Love 1:36 
18 They Might Be Giants 2:45 
19 Road Movie To Berlin 2:22 


[edit] Gallery

LP back

UK label

German lyrics sheet

Back cover of the CD

CD

CD foldout

CD longbox front

CD longbox back

Promo CD

Cassette cover art

Saudi Arabian pirate cassette J-card

Blue canary night light.

[edit] Trivia

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