The cover of King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard‘s “first” live album (not counting the three live recordings they released earlier this year to benefit Australian wildlife charities), Chunky Shrapnel, features an image of a seven-headed hydra (the same number of guys in the band) surrounded by speakers hooked up to analog equipment to produce weird digital images signifying their already tremendous output of albums and songs, such as Infest the Rats’ Nest (bottom middle), “People Vultures” (bottom right), and even the cyborg Han-Tyumi from Murder of the Universe (second down from the top on the right).
It’s a neat image because it not only tells you what’s in store for you on this great live album, but also a nod to the blending of music and modern technology. The band released a Chunky Shrapnel concert film in a limited stream earlier this year. A full-blown theatrical / wide streaming release is in the works, but this album is a great taste of what to expect from it – and any live KGATLW show (which never disappoint).
The album is sprinkled with studio instrumentals (“Evil Star,” “Quarantine,” “Anamesis”) and the rest is stuffed with live tracks recorded in Luxembourg, Madrid, Manchester, Utrecht, London, Brussels, Milan, Berlin, and Barcelona) over the course of their 2019 world tour. The first live track is a wonderful, jazzy version of “The River.” It’s a neat choice to open your live album with a mellow track (that blooms into an epic jam around the three-minute mark) to get the listener grooving. “Wah Wah” gets the Madrid crowd chanting and jumping. “Road Train” is a nice, crazy follow-up, and the trippy “Murder of the Universe” lets them jam at will as Han-Tyumi’s vocals echo around them from some unseen machine.
The version of “Planet B” unleashed on the London crowd is downright dangerous, somehow sounding twice heavier and faster than the album version (which is already damn heavy and fast). “Parking” is a fuzzy two-minute drum solo that leads into the blazing “Venusian 2” and “Hell” that threaten to incinerate and / or flatten the Milan venue.
The bluesy, swaggering “Let Me Mend the Past” gets the Madrid crowd whooping and hollering. “Inner Cell” brings back a bit of menace. “Loyalty” and “Horology” both flow well together and ease us back down before nineteen minutes of “A Brief History of the Planet Earth” pieced together from four different shows. The song ebbs and flows, being manic one moment and euphoric the next. It’s full of noodling jams and more fuzz than a koala bear. There’s even a moment when they pass a beer through the crowd to their sound man accompanied by frenzied riffs.
It’s another great, stunning album from KGATLW – who by now are obviously unstoppable.
Keep your mind open.
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