Infest The Rats' Nest
“Eclectic” is a redundant term when it comes to King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard. Having released 14 studio albums in eight years—including five in 2017!—the Melbourne-based band has widely explored psychedelic rock, electric folk, jazz experimentation, and ’70s soundscapes. But on *Infest the Rats’ Nest* they pivot once more, returning to their heavy metal roots in a celebration of enduring adolescent influences. They pay heed to ’80s thrash metal like Slayer with the pummeling drums and clipped guitar riff of “Organ Farmer,” as well as ’70s-era Sabbath-influenced metal on tracks like “Mars for the Rich” and “Superbug.” The songs are tightly formed and often brief compared to the band’s back catalog, with the album driven by a core trio: vocalist and guitarist Stu Mackenzie, bassist Joey Walker, and drummer Michael Cavanagh. What hasn’t changed is the ecological concerns of Mackenzie’s lyrics, which embrace dystopian scenarios as the wealthy abscond to Mars and pandemics strike the Earth. If that suggests the end days, for King Gizzard it’s also a new direction.
On their second album of the year, the ever-mutating Aussie psych-rock outfit embrace throwback thrash metal to soundtrack the end of life on Earth.
King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard are a busy bunch. With 15 albums in seven years, the Melbourne seven-piece are making music with a sense of urgency that pairs well with social commentary on Infest the Rats’ Nest.
King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard have dabbled in heavy metal before; their masterpiece Nonagon Infinity was metal adjacent, and other bits here and there across the group's expansive and ever-growing catalog have hinted at their love for pummeling rhythms, massed guitar riffing, and fantastical lyrical conceits.
Melbourne, Australia-based psychedelic rock monarchs King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard release their second album of 2019; Infest the Rats' N...
‘Beneath the rubble of the raw, analogous, shredding, the intoxicating psychedelic sound that the band are famed for oozes out like lava’King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard have always been an unpredictable, and slightly eccentric band.
The ability to surprise is a valuable commodity, one too often in short supply. Enter King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard, combining one of the best names in music with a prodigious work ethic and an unerring knack for leftfield diversions.
Metalheads, meet King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard: a seven-man psychedelic Aussie outfit who have achieved international success thanks to their
King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard further establish their claim to the throne as the 21st century’s answer to Ween with an album of thrash metal.
Given the volume of their discography, a new album release by Australian psychedelic garage rockers King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard may seem unexciting...