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Archive for the ‘King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard’ Category

Elisa Levine–“This Wicked Tongue” (The Walrus, January/February 2019)

Posted in Canadian Content, Death, Huh?, King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard, Religion, Short Story, The Walrus on February 20, 2019| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: KING GIZZARD AND THE LIZARD WIZARD-Quarters (2014).

KGATLW have made all kinds of albums, but up until now they hadn’t put any real restrictions on themselves.  Enter Quarters.  This album is made of four tracks.  Each track is 10 minutes and 10 seconds long.  It was never released on CD, only vinyl (and digital).  And it’s pretty fantastic.

Each ten minute song is very different from the others.  The songs are not complex mutli-part suites or anything, they are more like gently meandering trips which explore a melody in every possible way.

“The River” has a fun opening and then a jazzy main riff in which the vocals follow the guitar line as it meanders nicely.  After a couple of verses it takes off into a kind of Santana vibe, with some great soloing and some bongos.  It seems like its going to end early, but the last two minutes introduce a new guitar riff and style that compliments the beginning–a nice instrumental coda to the beauty that has come before.

“Infinite Rise” opens with the sound of something lifting off–soaring higher and higher–and then the music starts.  It’s a series of slow two note lines (vocal and musical) that conclude with a great verse-ending riff.  It’s such a groovy trippy song that when they start adding sound effects (a baby crying, jolly laughter, a monkey, a rooster crowing) it is a little jarring but still makes sense somehow).  The groovy guitar solo(s) that float through to the end are pretty great too.  This one seems like it’s cheating the 10:10 rule because it ends around 9 minutes but then tacks on the reverse soaring intro and ten seconds of noises.  But it’s not like they ran out of ideas…that song could have jammed for ten more minutes.

“God is in the Rhythm” is a slow, pretty bluesy song.  The vocals are high and gentle and the guitar solo sounds like it came straight from the 1950s, but there’s enough psychedelia on it to keep it from sounding like it’s a 50s tribute song.  The guitar work throughout is really spectacular.   Once again, the last ten seconds or so mess about with sound and speed but it never feels like they ran out of ideas.

“Lonely Steel Sheet Flyer” has a rather dramatic build up for an introduction.  A pretty, meandering vocal and guitar riff is accentuated with cool trippy guitar sound (rising echos and the like) .  The middle has a quiet interlude with more cool guitars and a nice bassline.  It feels like the song is going to end early, but no, it starts a kind of middle eastern riff and then takes off again.  I love that the pretty main riff returns many times to basically start the story over again.

This is a wonderful record.  It’s cohesive and very chill, and the musicianship jumps exponentially with each release.

[READ: February 16, 2019] “This Wicked Tongue”

I love The Walrus.  I read every issue cover to cover (one of the few publications I still do). But sometimes the short stories in the magazine just don’t work for me.

I was pretty intrigued to read this one because it had a kind of prologue: “Here beginneth a short treatise of contemplation taken from the Book of Alice Nash, Ancress of Shere, c. AD 1372.”

But then I started reading the story and I just could not get into the writing style at all.

“Before we leave, we tell You–smoke kestrel, thumb sky.”  What kind of opening is that? (more…)

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Han Kang–“White Out” (Harper’s, February 2019)

Posted in Deborah Smith, Dogs, Excerpt, Han Kang, Harper's, Huh?, King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard, Short Story, Snow, The Dog Dies, Translation on February 19, 2019| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: KING GIZZARD AND THE LIZARD WIZARD-I’m in Your Mind Fuzz (2014).

Even though this record came soon after Oddments, this has been considered the first major release by KGATLW (maybe that’s because it was the earliest recording that was still in print (until the reissues).  This album is a major step forward in their psychedelic garage rock sound.

The first four songs are more or less a continuous suite.  Not really, but all four songs contain the same breakneck drum pace and rumbling bass line and each one segues into the next.

“I’m in Your Mind” has a simple guitar riff, lots of wickedly distorted harmonica and a catchy vocal line.  It segues into “I’m Not in Your Mind” which is a three-minute jam based around a guitar solo.  The tone has changed slightly, but only slightly.  The solo features the main melody from “The Streets of Cairo or The Little Country Maid” (which we in the States think of as the Egyptian song or the snake charmer song because it was in every cartoon from the 1950s). The end of the song features a bass rumble which segues into the intro to the classic KGATLW song “Cellophane” (where the lyrics are nearly all nonsense singing and the word “cellophane”–catchy as anything).  The quartet returns to the opening song with the reprise called “I’m in Your Mind Fuzz.”   The same guitar melody and tempo resume with a similar-sounding chorus.

A click opens the next song, “Empty,” which halts the fast-paced bass and drums and grows much slower.  With a new rhythm and a more staccato delivery, this song maintains the fuzzy sound and distorted vocals and adds, I believe, a flute.  It’s followed by the wonderful “Hot Water.”  It’s an uptempo song with muted delivery in the vocals and guitars.   It’s also got the simple chanted chorus of “Hot Water” all surrounding this cool 70s sounding melody.

“Am I in Heaven” begins as a folkie acoustic song.  It’s pretty gentle for about 45 seconds until it turns into a screaming and thumping rocker with all kinds of wailing—guitars, vocals, harmonica.  Then at 3 minutes it returns briefly to that original folkie melody until, once again, the loud rocking just overtakes the whole thing with psychedelic soloing.

“Slow Jam 1” slows things down a lot. “I need to slow my mind down” is the lyrical opening.   It is slow and hazy for a few gentle minutes.  “Satan Speeds Up” sounds like it might be an old lost psychedelic/metal song–a cool vibrato guitar riff and flutes play this excellent opening.  The verses are gentle–falsetto singing as the band chills out around it.

“Her and I (Slow Jam 2)” returns to that acoustic mellow sound, this time with some extra fuzzy notes sprinkled around the song.  After about a minute and a half (of the 8 minute song), the tempo picks up and there’s a cool guitar solo which returns a couple of times by the end adding harmonica and wah wah guitar.

This is a very cool album that really shows what KGATLW is all about.  At least until their next release.

[READ: February 18, 2019] “White Out”

This issue of Harper’s had two stories and I didn’t really enjoy either one.

This first one was written in Korean and was translated by Deborah Smith.  What I didn’t like about it was that I wasn’t sure if these nine short pieces were sections of a big story or individual (somewhat) connected stories.  Either way the blocks of text were all quite short and not always complete.

Frost
This tells us that she was born on a day of frost but her father chose seol, snow, as one of the characters for his daughter’s name.  I found that pretty interesting and would have liked to know more about that. (more…)

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David Astle–Cluetopia: The Story of 100 Years of the Crossword (2013)

Posted in Arthur Wynne, Bill Clinton, Crossword Puzzles, David Astle, Dip-in Books, Eugene Maleska, Frank Longo, Jeremiah Farrell, King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard, Language, Leonard Dawe, Lindsey Browne, M*A*S*H, Oulipo, Political Humor, Politicians, Puzzler, Simon & Garfunkel, Simon and Garfunkel, The Beach Boys, The New York Times, The Telegraph, Will Shortz, Word usage, World War II on February 8, 2019| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: KING GIZZARD AND THE LIZARD WIZARD-Oddments (2014).

After the psychedelia of the previous album, KGATLW released this varied collection of songs.  Indeed, none of the 12 songs sound anything like the others.  It’s hard to say if this is a collection of leftover songs or an attempt to make a varied record.  After all, they had released four and a half albums in three years.

Nothing is really more than 3 minutes except “Work This Time.”  Everything goes by so quickly it’s hard to know what to think.

“Alluda Majaka” opens this record with an instrumental that has every style of music thrown into it–funky bass, organ, Indian music, there’s also sound effects and clips from a movie or two and really loud drums.  It’s a crazy opening for a crazy album.

“Stressin'” slows things down with a falsetto vocal and a gentle groove including a warbly wild guitar solo.  It’s followed by “Vegemite,” a nonsensical ode to vegemite with a great beat and an easy to sing along chorus (sung by Ambrose, I believe): Veg-e-mite…I like.

“It’s Got Old” is slower simple rocker (complete with flute and handclaps) and somehow is followed by the trippy, synthy swirls of “Work This Time.”  It opens with a rumbling wild drum intro and then becomes really gentle with more soft falsetto vocals.

“ABCABcd” is 17 seconds of garage rock nonsense before the sweet rocking acoustic guitars of “Sleepwalker.”

“Hot Wax” sounds like an old(er) KG garage rock song.  There’s creepy vocals from Stu and a simple riff and a chorus that literally repeats chorus from “Surfin Safari” but with their own muffled, fuzzy garage rock chords.  “Crying” has an old soul sound with its simple three note melody.  It even has spoken word parts (the way you act, girl) and everything.

The end of the disc throws in even more craziness in the last five or so minutes.  “Pipe Dream” is a one minute instrumental that doesn’t really do anything except evoke a psychedelic moment.  It fades out just as a riff begins.  But it’s not the riff to “Homeless Man in Addidas” which is a quiet acoustic folk song that sounds an awful lot like “April She Will Come” by Simon & Garfunkel.  The disc ends with “Oddments,” a 25 second piece of silliness that’s like a commercial for the disc which even chants out the disc name.

Unlike their more cohesive albums, this is not a necessity exactly, but it is a fun opportunity to see just how much KGATLW can do in 30 minutes.

[READ: November 2018] Cluetopia

This is a brief history of the crossword puzzle as broken down by year.

David Astle (whose name must be a crossword answer) is a crossword maniac.  What makes this book especially interesting to me is that he is from Australia, which means he has a very different perspective on the crossword puzzle than someone like Will Shortz.  For there is a great American/British (and Australian) divide when it comes to crosswords.

Astle is a huge fan of British-style cryptic puzzles and he really delves into some of the best ones over the last century.

A neat summary of the different types of puzzles comes from Always Puzzling: (more…)

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Antoine Revoy–Animus (2018)

Posted in Antoine Revoy, Death, First Second :01, Graphic Novel, King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard, Supernatural, Superstitions, Surreal, Violence on February 7, 2019| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: KING GIZZARD AND THE LIZARD WIZARD-Float Along-Fill Your Lungs (2013).

In 2013, KGATLW released a Western narrative record and this record which opens with a 16 minute psychedelic epic called “Head On/Pill.”  It’s got everything, including a sitar.

There’s a cool, simple riff that lends itself to some groovy jamming.  After 3 and a half minutes the song takes off in a rocking/psychedelic avalanche of sounds.  Around five minutes it settles into a two note sing/play along.  By 7 and a half the sitar is back and the two-note melody has expanded somewhat.  By ten minutes its just bass and drums before the band starts to rebuild the song again.  It’s a very cool exploration of a style that the band hadn’t really toyed with before.  And it would really go on to define one aspect of the band (minus the sitar).

The rest of the album is largely shorter tracks.

“I’m Not a Man Unless I Have a Woman” is a weird little nugget with a soul feel and falsetto vocals.  But with sitar and harmonica.

For the first minute or so of “God is Calling Me Back Home” its sounds kind of goofy and lo-fi.  It’s just a guitar and lots of vocals.  But after a minute, it rocks out with full distortion.  It’s a wild ride for a couple of minute before it degenerates into just feedback and noise by the end.

“30 Past 7” is slower with sitar and a soaring psychedelic feel.   While “Let Me Mend the Past” has a classic Motown sound with piano and falsetto vocals from Ambrose.  Keeping with the jumping around, “Mystery Jack” is a short, fuzzy, garage rock song.  Then comes “Pop In My Step,” which was created by guitarist Cook Craig.  It’s a simple poppy song with fuzzy guitars and a trippy synth.  The middle has a very cool riff that separates the parts.

The disc ends with “Float Along – Full Your Lungs” which returns to the psychedelia.  This song is shorter but even wilder with the sitar and trippy sounds. It’s a fantastic bookend to this wild collection of songs.

[READ February 7, 2019] Animus

This is a creepy story set in Japan.

It opens on a police detective discovering that yet another child has gone missing.  That makes 40.  Luckily the press hasn’t gotten word yet so there’s no general sense of panic, just upset parents and frustrated police.

We cut to two kids in a playground.  A boy playing with a soccer and a girl reading.  It gets dark and the kids are still there.  When the boy kicks his soccer ball, another child, a boy in a mask, shows up and kicks it into the sandpit.  The boy yells at the strange kid and goes for his ball.  But when he steps in the sand, it turns to snakes and the boy runs off.  The girl gets angry at the kid in the mask.  She acts very mature with him and she goes for the ball.  But when she walks in the sand, arms reach out and grab her.  She grabs the ball and flees while the kid in the mask laughs.

The next day the kids return to the park to talk to the weirdo in the mask (in the daytime).  He says that nothing that happened was his fault–it was all the park.  The sand pit shows your greatest fear, the swings show you other people’s dreams and the statues of animals are the ears of the area…they hear everything.  Then he reveals that he was taken from this world a long time ago.  He was buried and never found and now he must haunt this area until he is freed.  His name is Toothless. (more…)

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Hope Larson–Knife’s Edge (2017) [Four Points, Book 2]

Posted in Broderick Smith, Children's Books, Death, Graphic Novel, Hope Larson, King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard, Native Americans, Orphans, Pirates, Rebecca Mock, Twins, Violence, Western on February 6, 2019| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: KING GIZZARD AND THE LIZARD WIZARD-Eyes Like the Sky (2013).

King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard clearly didn’t set out to top the charts. After the frenetic fun of 12 Bar Bruise, their follow up is this–a spoken word “Western” musical.  Stu Mackenzie says that after recording “Sam Cherry’s Last Shot” with Broderick Smith, he wanted to try a “multi-song, read-along, narrative based western musical” and Brod was keen to write a story and narrate it.

The music is impressively “Western.”   Right out of the gates, you feel the reverbed guitars and sound effects of gun shots.  Repeating motifs abound and there is an amazing amount of restraint.  Plus, the songs (which don’t really follow the story chapters) are quite different from each other (all within the same Western motif). “Year of Our Lord” builds some real suspense.  While “The Raid” adds some surf guitars.

You can also hear his parents’ dogs barking in “The Killing Ground” and his dad banging on a rusted saw blade, which you can hear in “The Raid.”

“Drum Run” is, indeed, very drum heavy with distant echoing harmonica.

And then there is the story.  A story of a man who is feared as a legend.

The bad white men call him the devil the Yavapai call him Eyes Like the Sky.

Miguel O’Brien was kidnapped from his white family when he was five years old.  He became a fearless Yavapai Apache warrior.

The American Civil had not encroached on Apache territory.  But ten years later, the Americans brought their war to Apache land.  They were

Led by a man holding a leather book with a cross stamped in the leather.  An evil man who did terrible  things to people in the name of a god that looked upon the man himself with revulsion

The music for this track is called “Evil Man” and between the Western riff and the backing “ahahas,” it’s got gunslinger all over it.

The Americans killed the Apache, but he was spared because of his blue eyes.  But once more family he loved had been killed–this time by Americans.

The god man thought he might be from the O’Brien family or maybe the Jebsen family.  So they named him Jebsen O’Brien but they called him “blue” because of his eyes and his expression.  A trapper taught him white man’s ways so that he could read and write and also learned to use a gun.

The god man was a truly evil man–“satisfying his goat lust with a Yavapei girl.”  Seeing this defilement, Blue swiftly killed him. Then he took guns, money and the defiled girl and fled from the Fort.  The two of them happened upon a scene of death–white men killing white men but disguised as Apache.

I’ll not spoil the ending but the final two songs are “Dust in the Wind” (not that one) and “Guns & Horses.”   “Dust in the Wind” is a stomping song that presages death–of many.  “Guns & Horses” ends the story–all too early in my opinion.  While Eyes Like the Sky’s story comes to a satisfying conclusion, I want to hear more.

With a cool soundtrack.

Incidentally, the soundtrack is far more grown up than the graphic novel.

[READ: February 5, 2019] Knife’s Edge

I didn’t realize that these two books made up the Four Points series (I didn’t know there was a series title until I looked this book up].  But it is nice to see that this book ends the story.  And it ends it very well.

This book opens with the explanation of what happened to Alex and Cleo’s father when he left them on their own.  He went off to do a (supposedly) simple job down at the docks.  But while he is aboard a ship he is attacked by Lucky Worley.  Turns out Worley knew that Mr Dodge had the pocket watch and pocket knife–the clues that will lead him to the treasure he wants so badly.  It also turns out that he doesn’t know about Alex and Cleo.  So he hijacks Mr Dodge and takes him aboard his ship.   We also learn that Dodge isn’t their father–which we knew from how young the babies were when he received them, but the kids didn’t.  He doesn’t know who their real father was.

Worley had caught word of them through their involvement in the Black Hook gang and he deduced that they had the map pieces.  So their lives were now in danger.  And that’s pretty much where book one began. (more…)

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Nicholson Baker–Checkpoint (2004)

Posted in 'Spida' Everitt, Aaron Hamill, Abortion, Ang Christou, Assassination, Aussie Jones,  'Spider' Burton,  'Sticks' Kernahan,  Ashley Sampi,  Bruce Doull the 'Flying Doormat',  Chad Rintoul,  Craig Bradley,  Darren Jarman,  Gary Moorcroft, Bill Clinton, Broderick Smith, Che Cockatoo-Collins, Clint Bizzell, Dale Kickett, Donald Rumsfeld, donald tRUMP, Gavin Wanganeen, George W. Bush, Guns, King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard, Mick Martyn, Nicholson Baker, Phillip Matera, Politicians, Richard Irving Dodge, Soccer, The Dingoes, Violence on February 3, 2019| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: KING GIZZARD AND THE LIZARD WIZARD-12 Bar Bruise (2012).

12 Bar Bruise is the first full-length album from KGATLW.  It sounds even rawer than their EP.  But there’s no drop in intensity.  It’s an intense mix of punk, psychedelic blues, surf rock and boogie all filtered through a buzzing, fuzzy sound.  Distortion rules this album, but never enough to obscure what are remarkably simple but catchy riffs.  Most songs are just around 3 minutes long.

Once again, lyrics take a lesser place than great music. So “Elbow” has some bad words in it, but you can’t tell.  It’s more about whoops and tricked out guitar solos and chants of “ey ey ey.”  “Muckraker” introduces the surf punk elements and “Nein” has my favorite lyric thus far: “1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8, Nein, Nein, Nein, Nein, Nein”

“12 Bar Bruise” is the longest song on the disc at 3:47.  It is indeed a simple blues with muffled vocals.  “Garage Liddiard” introduces the concept of surf rock in a garage.  The guitar slides like a surf rock song but the whole vibe is garage with “ooh ooh” backing vocals and a harmonica solo that sounds like someone singing at the same time.

“Sam Cherry’s Last Shot” is the one very different song on this record.   It is played like a Western and it features spoken word.   Broderick Smith [of The Dingoes] is harmonica player Ambrose Kenny-Smith’s father.  He is an absolute Western nut so he narrated page 521 and 522 of the book “Our Wild Indians: Thirty-Three Years’ Personal Experience among the Red Men of the Great West” by Colonel Richard Irving Dodge, Aid-de-Camp to General Sherman.  This is certainly the set up for their next album, Eyes Like the Sky which is a full album of Western music with narration from Smith.

“High Hopes” is almost as long as “12 Bar,” but it has an intro of electronic drums and video game sounds before it switches back to the standard rocking sound.  There’s a lengthy, wickedly distorted harmonica solo.  “Cut Throat Boogie” features a different vocalist (I think Ambrose Kenny-Smith).  It’s a garage rock boogie.

Despite the title, “Bloody Ripper” is a slower, quieter less frenetic and really catchy song.  “Uh oh, I Called Mum” wins for best song title.  It opens with everyone chanting “mum” and lots of backing vocals.  The lyrics: “I bought a funny glob / I put it in my gob.”  “Sea of Trees” is the least distorted track.  It’s a catchy swinging song with a cool harmonica solo.

The disc ends with “Footy Footy,” a two-minute stomper dedicated to playing footy.  The chorus:
Footy footy, all I wanna do is
Footy footy, all I wanna kick is
Footy footy, they catch the ball, kick, play on!
Footy footy, footy footy footy!

But the verses are presumable great players:

Ang Christou / Che Cockatoo-Collins / Phillip Matera / Gavin Wanganeen / Gary Moorcroft / Aussie Jones / Bruce Doull, the ‘Flying Doormat’ / ‘Spida’ Everitt / ‘Spider’ Burton / Craig Bradley / The 1995 Carlton football team

and

‘Diesel’ Williams / Dale Kickett / ‘Sticks’ Kernahan / Darren Jarman / Chad Rintoul / Ashley Sampi / Mick Martyn / Dean [?] / Clint Bizzell / The Brisbane Bears / Aaron Hamill / Everyone

with the final line: “I hate what this game has become.”

It’s a lot of fun crammed into 35 minutes.

[READ: February 1, 2019] Checkpoint

This book was a pretty controversial work back in 2004.

Released before the re-election of George W. Bush, this book is, very simply, a dialogue between two men.

The topic?  Jay wants to assassinate President Bush.  Ben, his oldest friend, wants to talk him out of it.

There was a lot of discussion about the merits of this book–regardless of the politics–and I didn’t want to read it because of all of that.

In the real world, it’s fifteen years later and we are suffering through a trump–far worse than Bush could have even imagined being–although clearly Bush marched the Republican party off the cliff that had trump at the bottom of it.

So, how does one come down on this spicy subject fifteen years later? (more…)

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Hope Larson–Compass South (2016) [Four Points, Book 1]

Posted in Children's Books, Graphic Novel, Hope Larson, King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard, Orphans, Pirates, Rebecca Mock, Twins on February 1, 2019| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: KING GIZZARD AND THE LIZARD WIZARD-“Cyboogie” (2019).

Few band names are as much fun as King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard. With a name like that, the fact that they actually make good music is somehow amazing.

2018 was a quiet year for the band after they released five albums in 2017.  But they are now back with a new single and an upcoming tour.

“Cyboogie” is basically exactly what it sounds like it might be–a cyborg boogie.  It also features a classic trope of KGATLW songs–one word repeated over and over again (see: Rattlesnake).

This boogie is nearly 7 minutes long and features electronically processed vocals, prominent synth sounds and the occasional run up the musical scales at the end of each chorus.

It opens with the robotic voices chanting “boogie boogie boogie.”  Over a pulsing bass and 70s sounding keys, this very retro song starts.  There are lyrics in the verses, but they are so processed as to be almost inaudible (nice melody though).  They lead to the chorus: cyboogie, cyboogie, boogie boogie boogie boogie, cyboogie.  All with that undeniable beat.

The instrumental breaks are classic trippy 70s era instrumental breaks.  Including the one at 3 minutes where the music stops briefly and a new beat and sound style emerges (more boogie).  The third verse is so vocally processed I wasn’t even sure if there were words–but since the music has all boy dropped away it’s all you can hear.  But fear not it is melodically sound and makes the next chorus even more interesting.

The song ends with some more robotic voice reciting something (no guesses as to what).

[READ: January 31, 2019] Compass South

This story was written by Hope Larson but illustrated by Rebecca Mock (which is only odd because Larson herself is an excellent illustrator).

It opens in New York City, 1848.  A man named Dodge is seen going home when he is stopped by a large man in a cloak.  The cloaked man tells him that his beloved Hester is dead in Ireland.  But she wanted him to have…two babies:  Alexander and Cleopatra.

He vows to be there for them, but in Chapter One, it is twelve years later and the children are on their own.  As we zoom in on them, they are in the middle of robbing a house.  They are with the Black Hook gang and Alex is getting tested.  But Alex gets caught.  Cleo goes to save him, but Luther, the local head of the gang stops her and says if they rat on the gang, they are dead.

Next, the twins are talking to the police.  They have nothing to offer, so he gives them a deal–tell them about the Black Hook gang and they can go free.  Of course, they take the deal. But before Luther can go after them, he is contacted by the henchman of Felix Worley, famed pirate and captain of El Caleuche.  Seems he wants the twins, too. (more…)

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King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard (Union Transfer, Philadelphia, PA, June 18, 2018)

Posted in Australia, King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard, Philadelphia, PA, Union Transfer on June 18, 2018| Leave a Comment »

[ATTENDED: June 18, 2018] King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard

‘I’ve been a fan of Melbourne’s King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard since I heard Nonagon Infinity which came out in 2016.  SET

Since that record, the band have released five full length albums (five in 2017!).

And that kind of dedication to making music has seen their fanbase grow and grow.

From the 140 capacity Kung Fu Necktie in 2014 to the 650 capacity Underground Arts in 2016 to the 1,200 capacity Trocadero in 2016 (I found out about this show literally two weeks after it had happened or I would have been there!)  And now finally to selling out Union Transfer (a higher profile show to be sure).

When the band came around in 2016, most of their set came from the then new Flying Microtonal Banana, but here they were one year and four albums later.  What would they play?

They played twenty songs dividing them between Murder of The Universe, Polgondwanaland (their fifth album of 2017, coming out on New Year’s Eve) and Banana, as well as a few from Gumboot Soup (yet another 2017 release) and Nonagon Infinity.  They went back to an earlier album for “Cellophane,” but this show was all about the newest stuff. (more…)

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Amyl and the Sniffers (Union Transfer, Philadelphia, PA, June 18, 2018) [KING GIZZARD AND THE LIZARD WIZARD]

Posted in AC/DC, Amyl and the Sniffers, Australia, Beat, King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard, Philadelphia, PA, Union Transfer on June 18, 2018| Leave a Comment »

[ATTENDED: June 18, 2018] Amyl and the Sniffers

I had never heard of Melbourne’s Amyl and the Sniffers before this show.

From their name, it’s pretty obvious what the band is all about.  They’re a four-piece, bass, guitar, drums and Amyl up front.  They play short, fast, loud rockers.  On their bandcamp site they have released ten songs totalling about twenty minutes.

And they were pretty fun.

This song shows their garage rock sensibility.

Amyl is an enjoyable frontwoman.  I think we were taken more with her thick Melbourne accent than any words she may have been saying. (more…)

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