Song · The Flaming Lips
“Waitin' For A Superman” by The Flaming Lips
From the album The Soft Bulletin (1999)
“Waitin' For A Superman” by The Flaming Lips appears on 12 radio countdowns from 6 stations between 1999 and 2023. It was first released in 1999 on the album The Soft Bulletin. Its best result is #12 on the John Peel's Festive Fifty of 1999. In the combined RockLists rankings it is the #177 alternative song of 1999 and #3,620 alternative song of all time.
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"Waitin' for a Superman" was the second single from the Flaming Lips' 1999 album The Soft Bulletin, a slow, heavy-hearted hymn that sounds like it is carrying far more than its own weight. On the American album it carried the subtitle "Is It Gettin' Heavy??", and in 2025 Wayne Coyne told a Dublin crowd the song grew out of losing a childhood friend to leukemia at 10.
Coyne wrote it with Steven Drozd and Michael Ivins, and they produced and recorded it with Dave Fridmann and Scott Booker, with Peter Mokran adding extra production and mixing. The sound is huge but fragile, swelling around Coyne's cracked, earnest voice. It reached No. 73 in the UK, and "Do You Realize??" followed it.
Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.
RockLists rankings
Alternative & Modern Rock
Indie & Adult Alternative
All Rock Formats
Year-end countdowns
| Year | # | Station | Countdown | of |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1999 | 12 | John Peel (BBC Radio 1) | John Peel's Festive Fifty of 1999 | 50 |
All-time and decade countdowns
| Year | # | Station | Countdown | of |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2007 | 1466 | CD101 | CD101 Top 2008 Songs of All-Time (December 2007) | 2008 |
| 2008 | 1540 | CD101 | CD101 Top 2009 Songs of All-Time (December 2008) | 2009 |
| 2009 | 1550 | CD101 | CD101 Top 2010 Songs of All-Time (December 2009) | 2010 |
| 2009 | 502 | WYEP | WYEP 913 Essential Songs | 913 |
| 2010 | 1581 | CD101 | CD101 Top 2011 Songs of All-Time (December 2010) | 2011 |
| 2011 | 1649 | CD101 | CD101 Top 2012 Songs of All-Time (December 2011) | 2011 |
| 2013 | 1705 | CD101 | CD101 Top 2013 Songs of All-Time (December 2013) | 2012 |
| 2014 | 1771 | CD101 | CD101 Top 2014 Songs of All-Time (2014) | 2013 |
| 2021 | 622 | 90.9 The Bridge | 90.9 The Bridge Top 909 Songs of the '90s | 908 |
| 2022 | 694 | The Colorado Sound | The Colorado Sound Top 1055 Colorado Sound Songs of All Time | 1055 |
| 2023 | 480 | The Current | The Current's 893 Essential Songs of the '90s | 893 |
Also listed as: Waiting For A Superman; Waiting for a Superman.
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