"The discs can also be played in different combinations, omitting one, two or three discs. The album's title is a portmanteau of two words: Zaire, chosen as a symbol of anarchy after Wayne Coyne heard a radio news story about the political instability of the African nation, and eureka (literally: "I have found it"), an expression of joyous discovery. Zaireeka was the first album made by the band since the departure of guitarist Ronald Jones.[8] It acted as a preview of the music and style that would surface on the next album, The Soft Bulletin (1999)[9] and is the predecessor to the band's more conventional surround sound releases....During 1996 and 1997, The Flaming Lips ran a series of events known as "The Parking Lot Experiments". The concept was inspired by an incident in Coyne's youth, where he noticed that car radios in the parking lot at a concert were playing the same songs at the same time,[12] Wayne Coyne created 40 cassette tapes to be played in synchronization. The band invited people to bring their cars to parking lots, where they would be given one of the tapes and then instructed when to start them. The music was "a strange, fluid 20 minute sound composition".... After completion of Zaireeka, The Flaming Lips tried an unconventional method to tour the album. "The Boom Box Experiments", like "The Parking Lot Experiments", involved tapes being played at the same time. However, these shows were held in conventional rock venues, and the band supplied their own boom boxes. Coyne and Drozd conducted two "choirs" of people controlling the boom boxes, giving them instructions for actions like turning the volume up or down, while Ivins controlled the mixer."