King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard started out as a “joke” band. As guitarist/songwriter Joey Walker says with a grin, “Now the joke’s on us.”
There’s a dangerous, pernicious myth, seemingly spread in perpetuity among fledgling artists and music fans alike, that when you’re a musician, inspiration—and therefore productivity—comes naturally. Making art is the opposite of work, and, conversely, we know what happens to Jack when there’s all work and no play. But what happens when the dimensions of work and play fuse together like time and space? What happens to Jack then? Well, behind such an instance of metaphysical reaction, undoubtedly, would be King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard.
King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard - Le Risque (Official Video)
On the day that I connect with King Gizzard's guitarists and songwriters Joey Walker and Stu Mackenzie, they're settling into their hotel in Paris, after arriving on their tour bus that morning. As two of six bandmates of the psychedelic, maniacally chimerical Australian band, their work is rambunctiously genre-agnostic—with records falling into garage rock, prog-rock, folk, heavy-metal, and jazz-fusion categories. Celebrated in part for their unfaltering output of releases since their inception 14 years ago, they have 25 studio and 15 live albums to their name. We’re meeting to talk about the release of their 26th studio album, Flight b741.
In my conversation with Walker, who I speak with one-on-one a few hours before I have my call with Mackenzie, I comment, “You guys are known for putting music out like crazy. And you have this whole fun energy about your sound that could be misleading to fans—as if you’re just goofing off and succeeding—but you must have an incredible work ethic.”
“When I’m not in the studio, I’m making music as well. The beauty is that we really love each other’s company and just enjoy doing it.” —Joey Walker
“Gizzard is an example of a band where we just work really hard,” he reflects back. “There’s no other answer. People are like, ‘How the fuck do you put out so much music?’ We just go to the studio heaps, and make heaps of music together, and when I’m not in the studio, I’m making music as well. The beauty is that we really love each other’s company and just enjoy doing it.”
Of course, like most of King Gizzard’s catalog, on Flight b741 all you can hear is the fun. The album rings like an amusement park of classic rock and Americana, knitted together with full-band vocal harmonies appearing throughout—like a family choir—and chords echoing in the many familiar furrows of folk tradition. And yet, the band perhaps takes a page from the Kinks’ library, where the words underpinning that joyful music can often get a bit grim. For one, “Antarctica” is about climate change, with the lyrics, “Take me away / I wanna feel them frost flakes on my face again / Take me away / Where the temperature stays below 25/78,” and “I know this ain’t gonna go well / Snowball’s chance in hell.” The title track is a tale sung in first person by a forlorn pilot: “This plane is going down with me on / The splatter of the engine and the creaking of the skeleton, composing a requiem / I’m frightened.”
Joey Walker's Gear
Joey Walker says the band puts out as much music as they do through sheer dedication, motivated by the joy it brings them to create together.
Photo by Tim Bugbee
Guitars
- 2002 Gibson Flying V
- 2011 Gibson Explorer
- Godin Richmond Dorchester modded “Dickhead” microtonal guitar
Amps
- Fender Hot Rod Deluxe 1x12
- Hiwatt DR504 combo
Effects
- Boss TU-3
- Dunlop Cry Baby Wah
- Strymon Sunset Dual Overdrive
- Wampler Faux AnalogEcho
- Electro-Harmonix Flatiron Fuzz
Strings
- Ernie Ball Strings
As for the vocal parts, they indeed include every member of the band. As Walker explains, “We rely heavily on a conceptual thing to get going with a record. It makes it easier for us to cauterize an idea if there’s a limitation we impose. [For this record, we thought,] ‘What if, at multiple times throughout each song, there was a shift in who was the lead singer?’ So we’ve got our drummer Michael Cavanagh singing for the first time. Our bass player Lucas [Harwood] is singing on his first Gizzard song as well, and we all just had a big week of doing harmonies.”
When I connect with Mackenzie later in the day, he tells me, “It was all six of us standing around two microphones. We printed out all the lyrics and just stood there—it took us like four days—until the vocals were done.”
I mention that the album reminds me specifically of the spirit of Pink Floyd’s Meddle(but supercharged), and Walker obliges that there’s plenty of ’60s and ’70s rock influence present on Flight b741, adding that the trap they could have fallen into in is writing “some horrible, derivative” Rolling Stones-knockoff material. “But the thing with King Gizzard is trying to find whatever little angle you can slot into something that might be cliché or corny, and then subvert it,” he says. “And we have faith, since we’ve been doing it for so long and we know each other so well, that it’ll end up being a King Gizzard album.”
Both Mackenzie and Walker mention the band name frequently in their interviews, using a small assortment of nicknames: King Gizzard, King Gizz, Gizzard, Gizz … as if it’s a living and breathing creature who gobbles up musical ideas and births offspring in the form of spotlessly effusive, cheeky records. Maybe it feels that way to them, like how writers of narrative fiction often find that the more they visualize their characters, the more the characters seem to start acting out a plot on their own.
When King Gizzard’s characters met, they were students at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology. “We all lived in share houses around Melbourne and were in more ‘serious’ bands, and then King Gizzard was the joke party band, hence the name,” Walker shares, smiling. “And … now the joke’s on us.”
King Gizzard’s 26th studio album, Flight b741dips into folk, classic rock, and Americana territory.
As we cover ground on the topic of creative flow and how it relates to King Gizzard’s productivity, Walker and I get to talking about what it means to grapple with fears as an amateur artist, and what it’s like when you’re starting out and no one’s really paying attention to you.
“That’s where we started,” he says. “So many artists—broad term, ‘artists’—are crippled by their inability to let go of how stuff will be perceived, when most likely there won’t be anyone to perceive it, so they just don’t do anything. I get it, your song isn’t finished yet. It’s never going to be finished. You have to make stuff that necessarily might not be your best work; you have to feel like that to make your best work. Don’t be paralyzed by perception or fears.”
It’s clear in our conversation that King Gizzard’s output is fueled by the bandmates’ pure joy in making music together. So, is their love for one another essentially what’s at the heart of it all?
“Love, and perpetually being inspired by each other, as well,” Walker shares. “Stu kind of operates on a different strata of consciousness or something, just in terms of his approach to making music and stuff. If I hadn’t met him, I would have probably succumbed to that [state of being a] person that couldn’t finish that first song and never do anything. He’s completely unbridled or unbound by how things are perceived. There’s been a lot of teaching. We teach each other a lot, and we just kind of take little parts—and the amorphous whole of us becomes King Gizzard.”
When I share Walker’s comments with Mackenzie later in the day, he doesn’t seem fazed by his friend’s sentiments; my guess is that’s because he already knows how much Walker values their bond, and vice versa.
Stu Mackenzie's Gear
Mackenzie—pictured here making a whimsical “blep”—says the lessons he learned during the time he spent teaching as a teenager largely inform his guitar playing today.
Photo by Debi Del Grande
Guitars
- '67 Yamaha SG-2A Flying Samurai
- Gibson SG-3
- Custom-built Flying Microtonal Banana with additional microtonal frets
Amps
- Fender Hot Rod Deluxe 1x12
Effects
- Boss TU-3
- Boss DD-3
- Devi Ever FX Torn’s Peaker
- Fender Tread-Light Wah
- Strymon blueSky
- VVco Pedals Time Box
Strings & Accessories
Ernie Ball Strings- Divine Noise Cables
“That’s nice of him [laughs],” he says. “I think we all have spurred each other on in lovely ways and have been really inspired by each other in different, changing ways over the years, too.
“The six of us; they are my best friends, so I love them all and care for them all so, so deeply,” he continues. “And there really is just a lot of respect for each other, but that’s not to say that it’s always easy. My role has always been to be that kind of middle person and to mediate those incredible, creative minds, and make sure everyone feels heard, and ideas are being listened to even if they’re not used. It’s honestly a really, really challenging balance to keep a lot of the time.”
But, he adds, “I know this is a very privileged position to be in, to be artists full-time. The moment I feel like we take our foot off the gas, I will start to feel … guilty, like I don’t deserve to be here anymore. But we’re all workin’ our butts off. I’m here for it.”
The Lizard Wizard’s magic wands include an oddball array of guitars, including one set up for microtonal playing.
Photo by Maclay Heriot
Historically, there are actually three guitarists in King Gizzard—Walker, Mackenzie, and Cook Craig—but for Flight b741 Craig (or, as he’s called, “Cookie”) stuck to organ, Mellotron, vocals, and bass (for one song). Yet, neither Walker nor Mackenzie care much about analyzing their guitars or guitar playing. (Perhaps, King Gizzard hasn’t gotten this far in life by preoccupying themselves with analytics.)
“I’m always down to do stuff like this with guitar-based publications,” says Walker, at the beginning of our conversation. “But I feel like, if they want to get granular about guitar.... I play guitar, I love guitar, but I don’t think about guitar a huge amount, you know what I mean?”
When I ask Mackenzie asked about what informs his guitar playing, he rewinds the clock a bit. He explains that he began teaching guitar as a teenager, where he spent most of his time breaking down classic rock songs for his students to learn. “In hindsight, I was sitting down with a guitar for sometimes five straight hours, just deconstructing songs. And, learning the construction of songs and the way that comes together; I still think about guitar in that same way when we’re playing.
“For instance, the King Gizzard show has gotten quite improvised,” he elaborates. “And I’m still thinking about structure when we’re jamming. I’m trying to take things away from being linear. Linear’s great—we’ve made linear songs, too; that’s totally fine. But I’m kind of an old-fashioned guy when it comes to song structure. I do like songs to come back and for things to repeat and to have structure you can kind of grab onto.”
“How do you make a record that still feels like a whole, still feels like a universe in itself, but doesn’t sound like anything that you’ve done before?” —Stu Mackenzie
As a young teenager, Mackenzie loved bands like Slayer and Rammstein, and soon after discovered Tool, which led him “backwards” into King Crimson and other ’70s prog artists. But later in his adolescence, he grew into the belief that “all of the best music” was made between 1964 and 1969. “I would say there was a two, maybe three-year period where I didn’t listen to anything that was outside of those years, which is kind of crazy,” he says. In particular, he was fascinated with the “post-Beatles, post-Beach Boys era of amateur American garage rock.” Immersing himself in that world, he dug into obscure compilations like Nuggets: Original Artyfacts from the First Psychedelic Era (released on Elektra/Sire), thePebblesseries (AIP/Mastercharge/BFD/ESD), and the Back from the Grave series (Crypt).
My first thought when he mentioned that particular span of years, however, was the Beatles. How did he feel about them? “I do actually like all of the Beatles records,” he says. “I don’t think there are any bad ones. But when I was in that period of time, I wouldn’t have even listened to Abbey Road; The White Album was maybe on the cusp; I probably would have listened to Sgt. Pepper’s but I would have been like, ‘This is a bit too psychedelic.’ That’s where my head was at. I was like, ‘Help is the pinnacle of songwriting in the Beatles catalog.’ Teenagers are weird,” he comments, smiling.
So, when Mackenzie began making music with King Gizzard, his self-indoctrination in garage rock naturally nurtured the young beast of a band. Of course, by their fourth studio LP, the psychedelic, folky Oddments, they started taking a bit of a detour. “As we evolved, I think we wanted to try and pick apart and understand other ways of making music,” says Mackenzie. “How do you make a record that still feels like a whole, still feels like a universe in itself, but doesn’t sound like anything that you’ve done before? And that’s always kind of been the MO of making records with Gizz. I mean … that’s my life story at this point.”
YouTube It
Performing “Astroturf” from their 2022 album, Changes, King Gizzard conjures a blend of smooth jazz, prog, and nothing but strange, whimsical, waves of limitless creative energy.
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Naturally, every recording Eddie Van Halen ever played on has been pored over by legions of guitar players of all styles. It might seem funny, then, to consider EVH solos that might require more attention. But your 100 Guitarists hosts have their picks of solos that they feel merit a little discussion. Some of these are deep cuts—get ready for some instrumental bonus tracks and Van Halen III mentions—and some are among the biggest radio hits of their time. Just because their hits, though, doesn’t mean we don’t have more to add to the conversation.
We can’t cover everything EVH—Jason has already tried while producing the Runnin’ With the Dweezil podcast. But we cover as much as we can in our longest episode yet. And in the second installment of our current listening segment, we’re talking about new-ish music from Oz Noy and Bill Orcutt.
Tinkering with theSDE-3 Dual Digital Delay suggested a similar, possibly enduring appeal. As an evolution of the Roland SDE-3000rack unit from the 1980s, it’s a texture machine, bubbling with subtle-to-odd triangle LFO modulations and enhanced dual-delay patterns that make tone mazes from dopey-simple melodies. And with the capacity to use it with two amps in stereo or in panning capacity, it can be much more dimensional. But while the SDE-3 will become indispensable to some for its most complex echo textures, its basic voice possesses warmth that lends personality in pedestrian applications too.
Tapping Into the Source
Some interest in the original SDE-3000 is in its association with Eddie Van Halen, who ran two of them in a wet-dry-wet configuration, using different delay rates and modulation to thicken and lend dimension to solos. But while EVH’s de facto endorsement prompted reissues of the effect as far back as the ’90s, part of the appeal was down to the 3000’s intrinsic elegance and simplicity.
In fact, the original rack unit’s features don’t differ much from what you would find on modern, inexpensive stompbox echoes. But the SDE-3000’s simplicity and reliable predictability made it conducive to fast workflow in the studio. Critically, it also avoided the lo-fi and sterility shortcomings that plagued some lesser rivals—an attribute designer Yoshi Ikegami chalks up to analog components elsewhere in the circuit and a fortuitous clock imprecision that lends organic essence to the repeats.
Evolved Echo Animal
Though the SDE-3 traces a line back to the SDE-3000 in sound and function, it is a very evolved riff on a theme. I don’t have an original SDE-3000 on hand for comparison, but it’s easy to hear how the SDE-3 bridges a gap between analog haze and more clinical, surgical digital sounds in the way that made the original famous. Thanks to the hi-cut control, the SDE-3’s voice can be shaped to enhance the angular aspect of the echoes, or blunt sharp edges. There’s also a lot of leeway to toy with varied EQ settings without sacrificing the ample definition in the repeats. That also means you can take advantage of the polyrhythmic effects that are arguably its greatest asset.
“There’s a lot of leeway to toy with varied EQ settings without sacrificing the ample definition in the repeats.”
The SDE-3’s offset control, which generates these polyrhythmic echoes, is its heart. The most practical and familiar echos, like quarter, eighth, and dotted-eighth patterns, are easy to access in the second half of the offset knobs range. In the first half of the knob’s throw, however, the offset delays often clang about at less-regular intervals, producing complex polyrhythms that are also cool multipliers of the modulation and EQ effects. For example, when emphasizing top end in repeats, using aggressive effects mixes and pitch-wobble modulation generates eerie ghost notes that swim through and around patterns, adding rhythmic interest and texture without derailing the drive behind a groove. Even at modest settings, these are great alternatives to more staid, regular subdivision patterns. Many of the coolest sounds tend toward the foggy reverb spectrum. Removing high end, piling on feedback, and adding the woozy, drunken drift from modulation creates fascinating backdrops for slow, sparse chord melodies. Faster modulations throb and swirl like old BBC Radiophonic Workshop sci-fi sound designs.
By themselves, the modulations have their own broad appeal. Chorus tones are rarely the archetypal Roland Jazz Chorus or CE type—tending to be a bit darker and mistier. But they do a nice job suggesting that texture without lapsing into caricature. There are also really cool rotary-speaker-like textures and vibrato sounds that offer alternatives to go-to industry standards.
The Verdict
The SDE-3’s many available sounds and textures would be appealing at $219—even without the stereo and panning connectivity options, a useful hold function, and expression pedal control that opens up additional options. The panning capabilities, in particular, sparked all kinds of thoughts about studio applications. Mastering the SDE-3 takes just a little study—certain polyrhythms can be dramatically reshaped by the interactivity of other controls and you need to take care to achieve identical results twice. But this is a pedal that, by virtue of its relative simplicity and richness and breadth of sounds, exceeds the utility of some similarly priced rivals, all while opening up possibilities well outside the simple echo realm
Reader: T. Moody
Hometown: Myrtle Beach, South Carolina
Guitar: The Green Snake
Reader T. Moody turned this Yamaha Pacifica body into a reptilian rocker.
I have always loved the reverse headstock, simply because nothing says 1987 (the best year in the history of the world) like a reverse headstock. The pickups are both Seymour Duncan—an SH-1N in the neck position and TB-4 in the bridge, both in a very cool lime green color. Right when these pickups got listed, the Buy It Now button once again lit up like the Fourth of July. I am a loyal disciple of Sperzel locking tuners and think Bob Sperzel was a pure genius, so I knew those were going on this project even before I started on it. I also knew that I wanted a Vega-Trem; those units are absolutely amazing.
When the body arrived, I thought it would be cool to do some kind of burst around the yellow so I went with a neon green. It turned out better than I imagined. Next up was the shaping and cutting of the pickguard. I had this crocodile-type, faux-leather material that I glued on the pickguard and then shaped to my liking. I wanted just a single volume control and no tone knob, because, like King Edward (Van Halen) once said, “Your volume is your tone.”
T. Moody
I then shaped and glued the faux-leather material in the cavity. The tuning knobs, volume knob, pickguard, screws, and selector switch were also painted in the lemon-lime paint scheme. I put everything together, installed the pickups, strung it up, set it up, plugged it in, and I was blown away. I think this is the best-playing and -sounding guitar I have ever tried.
The only thing missing was the center piece and strap. The latter was easy because DiMarzio makes their ClipLock in neon green. The center piece was more difficult because originally, I was thinking that some kind of gator-style decoration would be cool. In the end, I went with a green snake, because crocodiles ain’t too flexible—and they’re way too big to fit in a pickup cavity!
The Green Snake’s back is just as striking as the front.
