Oklahoma City-based Flaming Lips remained on the fringe on the music scene for over twenty years, despite creating some of the most lush, skillfully arranged music in the alt-rock scene. Even with relatively low album sales and no significant American chart appearances, the band managed to pick up three Grammys in recent years. Now, with any luck, they might add a Tony Award to the mantle; Emmy Award-winning playwright (and “West Wing” creator) Aaron Sorkin announced plans to turn the Flamming Lips beautiful 2002 disc Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots into a Broadway musical.

Speaking about the show during its earliest stages of production, Lips frontman Wayne Coyne predicted the final product will be reminiscent of Terry Gilliam’s 1985 film “Brazil.”

More on the Flaming Lips plus the free MP3 of the week after the jump.

”There’s the real world and then there’s this fantastical world,” explains Coyne. ”This girl, the Yoshimi character, is dying of something. And these two guys are battling to come visit her in the hospital. And as one of the boyfriends envisions trying to save the girl, he enters this other dimension where Yoshimi is this Japanese warrior and the pink robots are an incarnation of her disease. It’s almost like the disease has to win in order for her soul to survive. Or something like that.”

We don’t have many details yet–Sorkin hasn’t even announced a lead yet–however, despite this minor detail, the idea sounds amazing. The Flaming Lips reached their zenith with Yoshimi, a masterpiece worthy of a large-scale stage production.

MP3: The Flaming Lips – “Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots Part 1“