Then, we got tighter and tighter and the songs became more woven together, like we were trying to figure out how to be Hawkwind or something. “Back then, we did a different show every night because we didn’t feel like practicing. “I’ve literally never listened to jam band music in my whole life, but we started off kind of like a jam band,” says Mackenzie, who grew up in the southern Australian port city of Geelong. Mackenzie tries to explain how Gizzard has begun morphing into something akin to a jam band more than a decade into its existence. The night before the first Barcelona show, we find ourselves drinking beers and cinnamon-dusted rum cocktails in a backstage compound while the newly reunited Pavement plays a few hundred feet away. Tall and thin with a perpetual bedhead of light brown hair, Stu Mackenzie is King Gizzard’s de facto leader, principal songwriter, lead guitarist and primary vocalist, but he encourages any and all creative participation from multi-instrumentalists Joey Walker, Ambrose Kenny-Smith, Cook Craig, bassist Lucas Harwood, and drummer Michael “Cavs” Cavanagh. ![]() Stu Mackenzie realizes a solitary game of dice is no fun. ![]() In Spain, I wondered how far they could take their jamming: on the road with them for five shows, I quickly realized I wasn’t prepared for the answer. The “Gizzverse,” a fan community known for creating their own band-sanctioned bootlegs and merch, pick apart every nuance of the band’s music on Reddit and follow them to every corner of the globe. With only the occasional mainstream press hit, even less radio airplay, and frequent comparisons to the jam band scene, this anti-buzz band has become a cult movement. Then came thrash metal homages so spot-on that they pissed off lifelong thrash metal fans ( Infest the Rats' Nest), pandemic-necessitated, genial synth-rock detours ( Butterfly 3000), and little bits of everything in between (this year’s vinyl-only Made in Timeland and the 16-song, 80-minute April release Omnium Gatherum). Five releases in 2017 alone dabbled in bizarre microtonal tunings, stoner jazz-rock and a concept album about a God-like robot that yearns to destroy and/or vomit up the universe. ![]() Since forming in early 2009 when some of its members weren’t even of legal drinking age, Gizzard has released 20 esoteric studio albums: early, heavily Oh Sees-indebted recordings like 12 Bar Bruise quickly became more psychedelic ( Float Along - Fill Your Lungs) an album composed as one 41-minute loop that somehow won the best hard rock/heavy metal award at Australia’s equivalent of the Grammys ( Nonagon Infinity, at the 2016 ARIA Music Awards). I’d come to Barcelona to accompany the band for five shows over six nights, including the beloved Primavera Sound Festival, to peek behind the proverbial curtain of the six-man Australian band. on June 10, 2022, when King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard fully liquified my brain.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
Details
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |