“She Don’t Use Jelly” by The Flaming Lips
The three verses on The Flaming Lips’ “She Don’t Use Jelly” are respectively centered on three different whimsical characters. There is a girl who butters her toast with Vaseline as opposed to butter itself. Then there’s a guy who “blow his nose” with magazines instead of tissues or napkins like normal people do. And finally there’s another lady whose affinity for dying her hair orange is manifest in her using tangerines to do so.
And for the record, the lyrics aren’t really intended to make any sense. However, there is a sexual undertone throughout, as interpreted by Wayne Coyne. And the singer also went on to explain that maybe the aforementioned characters are symbolic of certain ideas. For instance, the Vaseline girl, once again, symbolizes “some sexual thing”. Meanwhile the dude who blows his nose may be an allusion to real-life blow, as in coke. And the orange-haired girl represents the alternative-culture movement of that time.
Facts about “She Don’t Use Jelly”
This track comes from The Flaming Lips’ sixth-studio album, entitled “Transmission from the Satellite Heart”. And it proved to be one of their bigger hits, having appeared on the Billboard Hot 100 and UK Singles Chart in addition to peaking at number 9 on Billboard’s Alternative Airplay list.
This is the only Flaming Lips’ track, even well into the 21st century, to ever make it onto the Billboard Hot 100. Its success was buttressed by being featured on a couple of popular television shows of its day – namely Beavis and Butt-head and Beverly Hills, 90210 – after its release. And it is perhaps the only song from the band’s early days that the Lips still play in concert. For instance, even as recently as early 2021 they featured it in the special concert whereas both the band and audience where situation in plastic, coronavirus-preventing “space bubbles”.
“She Don’t Use Jelly” was exclusively written by The Flaming Lips’ W. Coyne, R. Jones, S. Drozd and M. Ivins. And the entire crew produced the tune, as did Keith Cleversley.
