King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard go metal again on upcoming LP (watch the "Gila Monster" video)
King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard have officially announced new album PetroDragonic Apocalypse; or, Dawn of Eternal Night: An Annihilation of Planet Earth and the Beginning of Merciless Damnation, which will be out June 16 via KGLW. Like their 2019 album Infest the Rats’ Nest, it finds the Australian band diving into metal waters. “When we made Rats’ Nest, it felt experimental,” says bandleader Stu Mackenzie. “Like, ‘Here’s this music that some of us grew up on but we’d never had the guts or confidence to really play before, so let’s give it a go and see what happens’. And when we made that album we were like, ‘Fuck, why did it take us so long to do this?’ It’s just so much fun to play that music, and those songs work so well when we play them live. So we always had it in our minds to make another metal record.”
“We worked on it the same way we started our Ice, Death, Planets, Lungs, Mushrooms And Lava album last year,” says Mackenzie. “We wrote a song a day, and we came into the practice space with no riffs, no tunes, no ideas, and started from scratch. And we jammed, and recorded everything, and pieced the songs together from that. I’d sketched out the story the songs would tell, and I’d portioned it out into seven song titles, with a short paragraph of what would happen in the song. I guess we kind of made the record backwards.”
As for lyrical themes, it mixes modern environmental concerns with elements of fantasy and lore. “We wanted to start the story in the real world, and then send it to hell,” says Mackenzie. “It’s about humankind and it’s about planet Earth but it’s also about witches and dragons and shit.” All that comes into play in the epic “Gila Monster” video which you can watch below.
King Gizzard will be back in North America later this month starting with Boston Calling and including multi-show residencies at TN’s The Caverns, Colorado’s Red Rocks, Chicago’s The Salt Shed and more. All dates are listed below.
PETRODRAGONIC APOCALYPSE; OR, DAWN OF ETERNAL NIGHT: AN ANNIHILATION OF PLANET EARTH AND THE BEGINNING OF MERCILESS DAMNATION
1. Motor Spirit – 8:33
2. Supercell – 5:06
3. Converge – 6:16
4. Witchcraft – 5:04
5. Gila Monster – 4:36
6. Dragon – 9:45
7. Flamethrower – 9:21
8. Dawn of Eternal Night feat. Leah Senior (Audiobook, VINYL EXCLUSIVE) – 14:22
KING GIZZARD & THE LIZARD WIZARD TOUR DATES
Sun. May 28 – Boston, MA @ Boston Calling
Thu. June 1 – Grundy County, TN @ The Caverns Underground – SOLD OUT
Fri. June 2 – Grundy County, TN @ The Caverns Underground – SOLD OUT
Sat. June 3 – Grundy County, TN @ The Caverns Amphitheater – SOLD OUT
Sun. June 4 – Grundy County, TB @ The Caverns Amphitheater
Wed. June 7 – Morrison, CO @ Red Rocks Amphitheatre – SOLD OUT
Thu. June 8 – Morrison, CO @ Red Rocks Amphitheatre – EARLY SHOW
Thu. June 8 – Morrison, CO @ Red Rocks Amphitheatre – LATE SHOW – SOLD OUT
Sun. June 11 – Chicago, IL @ The Salt Shed – SOLD OUT
Mon. June 12 – Chicago, IL @ The Salt Shed – SOLD OUT
Tue. June 13 – Chicago, IL @ The Salt Shed – SOLD OUT
Fri. June 16 – Carnation, WA @ Carnation Farms – SOLD OUT
Sat. June 17 – Carnation, WA @ Carnation Farms – SOLD OUT
Sun. June 18 – Carnation, WA @ Carnation Farms – SOLD OUT
Wed. June 21 – Los Angeles, CA @ The Hollywood Bowl – 3 HOUR MARATHON SET
Sat. July 22 – Byron Bay, AU @ Splendor In The Grass Festival
Thu. Aug. 10 – Gothenburg, SE @ Way Out West Festival
Sat. Aug. 12 – Piestany, SK @ Grape Festival
Mon. Aug. 14 – Verbier, CH @ Palp Festival
Tue. Aug. 15 – Cologne, DE @ E-Werk
Wed. Aug. 16 – Luxembourg, LU @ Den Atelier
Thu. Aug. 17 – Saint-Malo, FR @ La Route Du Rock
Sat. Aug. 19 – Biddinghuizen, NL @ Lowlands Festival
Sun. Aug. 20 – Kiewit-Hasselt, BE @ Pukkelpop
Mon. Aug. 21 – Munich, DE @ Tonhalle
Tue. Aug. 22 – Padua, IT @ Parco Della Musica
Thu. Aug. 24 – Barcelona, ES @ Plaza Mayor De El Poble Espanyol
Sat. Aug. 26 – Torremolinos, ES @ Canela Party
Sun. Aug. 27 – Madrid, ES @ La Riviera
Tue. Aug. 29 – Toulouse, FR @ Le Bikini
Wed. Aug. 30 – La Rochelle, FR @ La Sirene
Thu. Aug. 31 – Lille, FR @ L’Aeronef
Sun. Sep. 3 – Sixpenny Handley, GB @ End Of The Road Festival
