This month, King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard launched their 24th studio album. It is called (takes a deep breath) PetroDragonic Apocalypse; Or, Dawn Of Eternal Night: An Annihilation Of Planet Earth And The Beginning Of Merciless Damnation. (If that’s a little too tl;dr for you, simply PetroDragonic Apocalypse will likewise be adequate.) It is a tongue-in-cheek throwback metal record that nods to bands like Slayer and Tool, based upon an idea just recently explained by frontman Stu Mackenzie as being “about humankind” and “planet Earth” and “also about witches and dragons and shit.”
If you understand anything about these Australian rockers, you’re most likely mindful that they don’t typically make metal albums about witches and dragons and shit. Of course, they don’t “normally” make any sort of album. Focusing on the prolificacy and eclecticism of King Gizzard is a trope of every interview profile and record evaluation ever discussed them. But it’s likewise difficult to prevent. It would resemble blogging about Lee Harvey Oswald and not fixating his regrettable confrontation with John F. Kennedy. In the case of PetroDragonic Apocalypse, the album marks a remarkable shift from the bounty of music — 5 LPs in all — the Giz put out in 2022, which normally had a jammier edge. That jazzy, crispy, and party-friendly perceptiveness have actually made them beloveds amongst music fans who sit at the nexus of caring both the Grateful Dead and garage-punk indie rock. (Which is a much bigger audience than the media may have you think.)
But King Gizzard is absolutely nothing if not unforeseeable, and PetroDragonic Apocalypse represents an intentional zag from in 2015’s zig. Though it’s not unmatched in the band’s total body of work: 2019’s Infest The Rats’ Next, their 15th LP for those keeping rating, was their very first venture into heavy music. After that record, they rotated hard once again with 2021’s Butterfly 3000, a collection of poppy electronic tunes.
For newbies — and even reasonably casual admirers like myself — remaining on top of this band’s myriad musical experiences can appear like a full-time job. To help understand (part) of King Gizzard’s stretching brochure, I just recently did a Zoom call with establishing member Joey Walker throughout a break in their recent U.S. trip, which covered recently ahead of a run of dates in Europe that begin in late July.
12 Bar Bruise (2012)
There were these unusual proto-Gizzard reveals that we were carrying out in possibly 2010, where we had this revolving lineup of members and buddies. Anyone who wished to play and might play. In 2011, the lineup ended up being sealed. We weren’t always striking the roadway, since the programs were simply on the east coast of Australia. But we were playing as much as we could.
As the very first full-length album, it was the very first version people doing anything like that. We were simply stabbing around in the dark a bit, in regards to procedure. The idea of even going to a studio was still actually unique. It was extremely amazing. I suggest, Stu was absolutely leading that entire thing. It seemed like he was blazing a trail, and it simply emerged.
There were loads of overdubs that were tape-recorded like a voice memo on an iPhone. I believe we tape-recorded a great deal of the vocals on a 10-watt PV strong state piece of crap amp. Stu did a great deal of the vocals on that. But in regards to tape-recording the beds — the primary drums, bass, guitar aspects of the album — we entered into a studio. And then after the reality, we entered and blended it because exact same studio in Melbourne.
It’s among our most cohesive albums, I believe, in regards to the noise. We use our impacts on our sleeves on that one. There’s some huge old nods to The Osees which garage scuzzy rock thing that was taking place then. It may have been a little bit of a blip on the radar, that garage rock thing that the Osees were leading at the time. But to us, it seemed like the be-all-and-end-all. It was the center of deep space, that world. It was the very first of lots of variations of that, simply dipping our toes into what it’s like to be in a band. We were still exercising characteristics interpersonally, and what functions we needed to fill.
Eyes Like The Sky (2012)
There’s a tune on 12 Bar Bruise called “Sam Cherry’s Last Shot,” which is spaghetti western sounding browse rock tune. We were all in our early 20s and attempting to be like Nick Cave. I’d simply dress up like Nick Cave or Warren Ellis, and go to celebrations, and walk around attempting to use a fit or something like that. And I remember I read Blood Meridian, that Cormac McCarthy book, and I got an excerpt of an audiobook on YouTube. And I played that over “Sam Cherry’s Last Shot.”
That was the beginning of resembling, “Fuck, we should maybe investigate this.” One thing resulted in another, and Ambrose [Kenny Smith’s] daddy, Broderick, who regrettably simply died, however he is this Australian music icon from the ’60s and ’70s. He remained in a blues boogie band called Carson, which was deeply prominent on us in the early days. The Australian handle American-design rock boogie thing. He’s likewise an author, continuously doing things, and he had this audiobook that we scored. Once we understood what it was going to be, it came together rather rapidly. Like a great deal of albums, we were probing in the dark for some form of idea or some form of criterion. Once those are called in, the album comes together actually rapidly. We’re actually effective at that nowadays.
Float Along — Fill Your Lungs (2013)
At that time it was pure naivety. Not understanding, no prepare for the future, no concept regarding what we’d be, or if we’d make another album. It was rather a haphazard sense of what would take place. We’d just been a band for 18 months or something, and it was similar to, “What the fuck is this?”
It was well and really more than a couple of albums in when I seemed like, “Oh, okay, maybe this is a thing that we’ll keep doing, moving on to something that’s exciting to us.” But [at first], I was simply presuming that we would be doing that garage rock kind of record once again. After that was Float Along, which is less cohesive. It was us exploring, decreasing a bit more of a psychedelic course.
I feared of Stu’s capability to simply toss something out there and progress and dedicate to whatever that was. I was a lot more pedantic. I would overthink it, like, “Oh, this sounds too much like that.” Whereas he simply never ever had that neurological setup in his brain. It didn’t seem like he reconsidered that kind of things. He utilized to state, “It’s just a song, it’s not the first or last thing you will ever do. If it’s a shit song, just make another one.”
Quarters! (2015)
My natural method of reflecting in the early days was, “OK, cool, that’s an album. Let’s breathe for a second.” But Stu resembled, “Let’s keep going.”
We weren’t actually jamming anywhere near near the degree we are right now on phase. But on I’m Your Mind Fuzz, which I believe preceded Quarters! there’s some little minutes, like “Slow Jam 1,” which enter into a bit into that area of what ended up being Quarters! So it’s like, “Oh, cool, that’s fun. Let’s do that.” That was absolutely the very first version people attempting to jam in an improvised method. The album recordings were items of live-take jams, and after that we would sew everything together.
As for “the 10-minute-10-second thing” with all 4 tracks, it resembled, “Oh, we have a couple of long-form songs.” And for whatever factor, they were all around 9 minutes. “The River” opted for 10 minutes, and after that another one opted for 10 minutes. And then Stu resembled, “I reckon we can get all of these songs the exact same length.” So suddenly the idea simply emerges. And then you’re like, “Okay, the four songs, they all go from the same time. Quarters!, obviously.” There’s a bit more insight or estimation that we use nowadays, however at that time it simply profiting from happy mishaps.
Nonagon Infinity (2016)
“Robot Stop” and “Gamma Knife” were the very first time we were appropriately beginning to fuck with odd time signatures in such a way that was at the core of what the album seemed like, or was a thing that we were building the album around. And having fun with concept — referencing tunes or concepts or words that took place more than as soon as throughout the album.
Stu created a concept: “Imagine if it ends in the same way it starts, so you can just have it on loop, and they’d just link up.” And that was basically it. It was similar to, “Fuck, let’s make this album, the whole album, on loop.” And then as soon as we had that, we entitled the album Nonagon Infinity. The mixing of all the tunes, and connecting things together, that was the very first time we actually dealt with doing that. When it was ended up, I resembled, “Fuck, how did we do that?”
For a great deal of individuals, it is an entry point into the band, or the very first time they heard the band. We were all ultra pleased with it. What we were as a band and our identity began to come a bit more into the clear for us.
Murder Of The Universe (2017)
Stu and I in specific are relatively huge sci-fi heads. There’s a book that had a substantial influence on me, a lesser-known Philip K. Dick — I believe it was his last book — called Valis. I chose that up on trip in the early days. I believe we remained in Chicago. I’d check out A Scanner Darkly and a few of the classics. But I got Valis, and it actually fucked me up. It’s in fact this semi-autobiographical account of Philip K. Dick, when he was entirely screwed up on acid and psychedelics for an extended period of time. He was residing in a modified reality, and the world around him ignored that. He has this theophany, this spiritual experience, that winds up being this alien. Anyway, it sounds insane, however I seem like a great deal of etymology of Gizzard tradition has actually originated from that book, specifically with my writing.
Infest The Rat’s Nest (2019)
Infest The Rats’ Nest was one hundred percent like, We’re going to make a heavy album. That was me, Stu and Cavs, the drummer. Us 3 are the only individuals in the band that matured listening to heavy music. By now we had actually weaponized the genre-jumping thing. It’s simply what we’re specified by. But if we were going to do a heavy record, we desired it to do it our method and be positive about it. As quickly as we began doing it and dedicating to it, we likewise had a lot more of a concept of our noise, a King Gizzard noise. We felt great adequate to dedicate, and resemble, “Oh, we’ll make it our own.” Even though you can hear all of the impacts that entered into it — undoubtedly Metallica and Slayer and Tool. Tool is big for Stu, myself, and Cavs. I was most likely 13-years-old when Lateralus came out, and I remember I was simply remarkably consumed with it. Had no concept what a time signature was. I keep in mind simply playing along to what I now understand are relatively intricate guitar riffs, and I seem like that in fact was rather a crucial thing in regards to my advancement.
But yeah, that was an entirely and absolutely determined experiment. We were simply fucking tossing shit at the wall in that regard.
Ice, Death, Planets, Lungs, Mushrooms, And Lava (2022)
Part of the idea was simply going through all of the modes of the significant scale. All of the tune titles start with the very first letter of each mode of the significant scale. The very first track “Mycelium,” it seems like this almost reggae or African-type thing, since it’s had fun with a significant scale. And then as it moves through the tunes, or the scales, they grow simply due to the basic nature of what notes you’re playing. They can sound more dissonant, or more dark. Before we even jammed, it resembled, “This jam is going to be in the Phrygian scale,” which is really metal sounding. So simply due to its very nature, you understand it’s going to have a Soviet marching feel. It might just go one method, simply due to simply the nature of the notes you were utilizing.
PetroDragonic Apocalypse (2023)
After making the Ice, Death, Planets album, and making Changes, those are meandering, jammy sort of albums, and the character of them is a lot more placid. I believe typically we’ll simply resemble, “Fuck, we need to expel some energy or something.” But despite the fact that sonically it is significantly various, the real procedure of how we made Petro resembles how he made those albums. Especially the Ice, Death record, it’s, that was an item of everybody jamming, sewing the jams together, and after that developing the tune out of that. And then composing lyrics as a cumulative. Then we resembled, “Fuck, I reckon that would work really, really well if we tried to do a metal version of that.” So that’s where we chose that. When I reflect on the recording, the Petro record, it felt so warm. It was so enjoyable to do that things. I see Petro as a spirited, tongue securely planted in cheek album.
We made that Butterfly 3000 record, which is simply electronic, and we haven’t actually had adequate time or wherewithal to include a great deal of that design into the live program. So more of the electronic things, I seem like are we’re going to do that and jam it moving on. Therefore it’s about attempting to exercise a method which we can do that. What equipment do we get? How do we fucking execute a MIDI so we can all remain in time?
We’ve simply begun doing that on this trip, and I’ve got my modular synthesizer. I seem like that’s going to start to actually permeate how we play live. And it’s cool for me, since I’ve constantly played guitar my entire life, however dance music and electronic music sort of is my jam one of the most. That’s what I listen to. The other people never ever did at all. I would sort of be the butt of some jokes, like, “Fucking hell, go listen to your doof-music and shit.” But I seem like it’s simply unavoidable. If you like music, you may dismiss electronic music, however ultimately, it’s like jazz. If you in fact offer it the time, or you experience it in the best context, it’s undoubtedly a few of the purest form of music. So the other people are beginning to be thrilled by that.
I absolutely understand we won’t make a reggae album. But you likewise never ever understand. I fucking love that shit. And we have rap tunes now. So absolutely nothing is spiritual in this band.
