King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard -

[HardTI]

These guys are deserving of their own thread. Their 3rd album of the year titled Ice, Death, Planets, Lungs, Mushrooms and Lava just dropped yesterday with each song on the album being played in a different mode from the major scale. It's fucking phenomenal and they still have 2 more new albums coming this month. These guys dethroned Pearl Jam as my favorite band ever because they are so damn prolific. Most albums are concept albums and they bring the jam band style jams with really clever ideas. Some albums are using microtonal instruments, and they have a variety of styles like thrash, an album that uses lots of modular synths, jazz, and even some hop hop and grungy tracks. Well worth a deep dive and some time listening.

[Teeeeeekay]

Big king gizzard guy. I think I bought oddments through murder of the universe and then couldn’t keep up. I did just get ahold of the new one that dropped.

[Ello Sailor]

Big king gizzard guy. I think I bought oddments through murder of the universe and then couldn’t keep up. I did just get ahold of the new one that dropped.

Omnium Gatherum from April of this year is also worth a listen. If they keep this up, they'll be the only artist in my top 3 albums of the year. Ridiculous band.

[Ello Sailor]

All of their pre-2021 stuff got pulled from Spotify in my region. Wtf.

[HardTI]

im liking the new one more than omnium gatherum (which was fantastic).
lava is next level.

what's your favorite era of KG? the albums from 2017 were where i started with them and probably still spend the most time.

here are some of my favorite tracks

[Ello Sailor]

Nonagon Infinity was the first album I heard and is still probably my favorite. Polygondwanaland and Infest the Rats' Nest are right up there, though.

[liebzz]

I am gonna finish the album tomorrow but Ice V is sneaky great. Lava is really killer. I wasn’t planning on falling down another rabbit hole in 2022.

[Ello Sailor]

The deepest of holes. See you in 2024!

[liebzz]

Just finished it. Magnificent. Damnit.

[liebzz]

Omnium Gatherum- drank the kool-aid.

[HardTI]

I'm so fuckin pumped to see people here are into them. Also... I got to see them this past Saturday at a 2500 person venue in Chicago. Fuuuuuuuckinnnng incredible! They also dropped another new song yesterday from their new album that's coming out I believe next week. Greatest band on Earth.
https://youtu.be/2e2bCIslajk

[liebzz]

I'm so fuckin pumped to see people here are into them. Also... I got to see them this past Saturday at a 2500 person venue in Chicago. Fuuuuuuuckinnnng incredible! They also dropped another new song yesterday from their new album that's coming out I believe next week. Greatest band on Earth.
https://youtu.be/2e2bCIslajk

Awesome. I figured I would listen to the new stuff before reverting back to the beginning. Made in Timeland was not really for me - it sounded like the music being played slightly too loud in a pretentious restaurant or art gallery - but its companion album, Laminated Denim, was really good.

[Teeeeeekay]

I still think my favorite song of theirs is God Is In The Rhythm.

[liebzz]

King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard journey time!

The early singles and EPs:

Hey There/Ants & Bats (2010): early on, it wasn’t nearly as anything goes as it is now, but even in this first single there is certainly a sense that more is more. The early days seem largely Sonic Youth-like through a prism of surf rock. Hey There was the stronger of the two but definitely a more than solid start.

Sleep/Summer (2011): another two solid tracks running in the same circles as the first single.

Anglesea EP (2011): interestingly it seemed to me like each track got stronger as it went along. Not sure if was mental calibration, but this sort of brand of noise surf rock seemed to dig its heels in more at the second half of this short EP, that being Good to Me and Tomb/Beach

Willoughby’s Beach (2011): 9 songs, 22 mins, so this one goes by real quick. There were moments where the noise surf party continued, and moments where rockabilly was really sleeping in, in an almost Reverend Horton Heat kind of way. There’s certainly worse company to be in, but all of these early releases seem quite raw, but all those instruments are in there causing that wall of sound, channeled into this surf noise punk thing. Still it is breezy and enjoyable.

[liebzz]

12 Bar Bruise (2012)

Their first album seems to be a natural progression from the singles and EPs. There’s a bit more going on here, probably with the incorporation of the blues harmonica to their already busy yet straight forward sound. Muckraker, 12 Bar Bruise, Garage Lidiard, the spoken word western themed Sam Cherry’s Last Shot, High Hopes Low, and Sea of Trees stuck out to me on first listen - still a lot of surf rock, but you can really sense a bit of Stones-like bar band blues in there hidden away. As it goes with them it seems, there’s a lot going on under the surface of the rhythm. I enjoyed this one quite a bit.

[liebzz]

Eyes Like the Sky (2013)

It seems like an incredibly bold move to make a spoken word spaghetti western as your second album. Deep in the realm of anything goes, this one is a single concept played across 27 minutes where the band serves as much of the storyteller as the narrator, moving sonically through the story and giving it space and depth in a tale of a young man who guns down a group of American pioneers/gunslinger whilst unsuccessfully rescuing an Apache woman from being held captive by a clergy of some sort.

Despite what may have just been the strangest paragraph I may have submitted in the RM world, this is an engaging album worth at least a single listen. I may not hear this album again, but I won’t song forget it.

Edit: also it never occurred to me how similar surf rock and spaghetti western music sounded until this moment. Weird band.

[Ello Sailor]

Keep 'em coming, liebzz. This is great!

[liebzz]

Float Along - Fill Your Lungs (2013)

Having now released two albums and a couple EPs - ranging from punk rock to surf to spaghetti westerns - all quick burst of energy - KGLW naturally throw it all off course opening with Head On/Pill, a 16 minute psychedelic epic of instruments weaving over top of one another. Certainly a huge statement mirrored by truly fantastic Float Along - Fill Your Lungs closer. In between, we are full of psychedelic rock nuggets that are reminiscent of early Pink Floyd in both their trippiness and catchiness, God Is Calling Me Back Home and Let Me Mend the Past as my favorites outside of the album’s tremendous bookends. 30 Past 7 is another slower gem, and Mystery Jack also a highlight. It is here I think we get our first truly essential album. These guys are adventurous for sure - but this one ups the ante in a big way.

[liebzz]

Oddments (2014)

This album neatly serves a few purposes. At first blush, it’s a landing spot for songs that didn’t make the three albums that precede it - obvious from its fragmented sound and lack of distinct cohesion. It also serves as a sort of notation of where we’ve been sonically before charging forward. A revue that we’ve now covered all these distinct sounds so far, channeled through some sort of psychedelic haze. And finally, this album serves notice that this brand of rock music might be weird and wonky, but it can also be immediately catchy and satisfying as well. Allie’s Majaka, Vegemite, It’s Got Old, Work This Time, Sleepwalker, Hot Wax, and Crying are all immediate and catchy - in the moment and equally good as toss offs (they were immediately tossed off after all). Surprisingly good for what you’d expect it to be.

[liebzz]

I’m Your Mind Fuzz (2014)

For their fifth album in 3 years, KGLW seem to put it all together in a driving rock album that’s largely still pinned in the swirl of psychedelic sounds. When I hear this kind of intense layering of sounds, it often seems like weaving a basket or a piece of clothing, taking all these different threads and tightly winding them together to create a greater cohesive whole. Great albums, like this one, do it in spades. The opening suite of songs here (I’m In Your Mind, I’m Not In Your Mind, Cellophane, and I’m Your Mind Fuzz) are completely woven together such that you can’t tell where one ends and the next begins despite having distinct identities as songs. Empty and Hot Water change things up enough to distinguish themselves but maintain that high level of energy and quality. And then, like a blast of cold air walking out from a warm room, Am I in Heaven? clobbers your senses and takes the mantle on this album. This one slowly comes to a close with 3 mellower but no less great tracks, Her and I a great finish to what seems in the moment like an other worldly album. Damn this was great.