The band with the most ridiculous/awesome name in the world, King Gizzard and The Lizard Wizard, launched their latest album, Float Along/Fill Your Lungs, at the Corner on Saturday night. These guys are fun. Really fun. The energy in the air was palpable while we waited for this psycho/punk seven-piece to hit the stage, and when they did, the couple of hundred heads at the front of the room went absolutely wild. A friendly, excited wild that infected the rest of the crowd and made the room move. Every single person in the room had an enormous smile on their face from woah to go, and even the crowdsurfing kids who could have been dropped at any second had a look of pure glee.
The crowdsurfing started with their first song, and didn’t let up until the unabashed psychedelic end. It’s a rare energy that’s really engaging to be around, because one can’t help but get involved. Even the old folks up the back were swinging their hips to the melodic jangling guitar and punk breakdowns.
King Gizz played their songs faithful to the studio recordings, right down to each wah and reverb-drenched guitar lick. They used some kind of special microphone to get those carbon filter-esque vocal effects, which sound especially cool when they hum and scream into it. I haven’t ever even entertained the notion that a band would even want two drummers, but they pull it off admirably. You can tell that they practice a lot, but the guys are so far from just going through the motions – the performance aspect of the show seems rehearsed, yet with a cool, organic component.
The sound is exactly what you’d expect from a band that bills themselves as ‘surf psych punk someshit.’ The wet reverb guitars could be informed equally by The Del-Tones or Jimi Hendrix, genre-mashing from song to song while retaining a hook-driven pop sensibility, reminiscent of The Beatles in their prime. It’s as if they’ve taken chunks of every classic or influential style or band, and savagely twisted it into their own brand of mature rock‘n’roll. The boys’ excellent attitude towards melody is showcased even in the most simple of ‘hum-into-a-filter-mic-after-the-verse’ parts, and shines with each crashing breakdown.
It’s no wonder that these guys took out the Carlton Dry Global Music Grant. They recently received $50,000 to establish themselves internationally – rightfully so, as it would be a crime to not show King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard off to the rest of the world. I look forward to watching them continue to move from strength to strength, and I’m quietly confident that they can take over the world, in one way or another. Their live show is awesome, their albums rock. Go get yourself some King Gizz today!
BY REI BARKER
Loved: The band.
Hated: Jerkoffs who’d been at the races.
Drank: Beer.
