by Zak Mercado (@ciaoguaglione)
Last year, music writer Steven Hyden named one of King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard’s five albums released in 2022 as one of his favorite albums of the year. He called their excellent album Ice, Death, Planets, Lungs, Mushrooms and Lava “Phish-esque.” Naturally, King Gizzard has waded into “jam” territory on albums like Fishing for Fishies (where they’re called “boogies” and not “jams”). Though any Gizzhead will tell you this band has a little bit of everything for everybody, it is interesting to view King Gizzard as a jam band, specifically reflecting on their new album. PetroDragonic Apocalypse; or, Dawn of Eternal Night: An Annihilation of Planet Earth and the Beginning of Merciless Damnation does not have, prima facie, the trappings of a jam band record. At least, musically, it feels removed from the Dead or Phish. However, from a lyrical perspective, PetroDragonic Apocalypse continues the expansion of the King Gizzard lexicon, filled with an environmentalist ethos and goofy/perhaps serious mythological and fantastical creatures and imagery—sharing DNA with contemporary jam bands.
PetroDragonic Apocalypse sees the Aussie lads return to “thrash metal.” This choice recalls a quote from Flannery O’Connor about themes in her work: “I have found that violence is strangely capable of returning my characters to reality… Their heads are so hard that almost nothing else will do the trick.” In a sense, nothing but the seeming violence of thrash metal will do the trick in stressing the importance of environmental awareness. In their new record, King Gizzard achieve this, with an even more brutal approach than their first full foray in Infest the Rats’ Nest.
PetroDragonic Apocalypse confronts gas-guzzling and wasteful world uses as the reality they are. On blistering opener “Motor Spirit,” the riffs and rhythms come on heavy. In some ways the band addresses ‘70s and ‘80s metal like Motörhead’s self-titled album. However, instead of masculinity or overt-sexuality, King Gizzard sees the “cold black cloud horizon.” As on their previous full-on thrash outing, King Gizzard takes aim at non-renewable resources and greed as the root of environmental collapse.
This album is a two or three-hander though. King Gizzard has taken its Rats’ Nest style and applied it to the albums that came before it. The songs on PetroDragonic Apocalypse feel more like the song cycles on Murder of the Universe (the vinyl even has an extended spoken word track) and Nonagon Infinity. Indeed, like Nonagon, this record is a loop. On “Flamethrower,” the album ends with a chanted “motor spirit,” that can play seamlessly back into the album opener. Appearing throughout the album are references to Gaia, the Greek Goddess stand-in for “mother Earth,” as appeared previously on King Gizzard’s Omnium Gatherum. The other recurring characters represent this world of fire and hell – Gila and the Dragon. In many ways, the mood and lyrics convey that hell is now. Humanity inhabits the environmental apocalypse brought on itself. In the PetroDragonic universe, the Rats’ Nest Venusian spaceships never took off. Maybe the rich went to Mars, but everyone else is left to suffer the consequences of the decisions made by the powerful few. On “Witchcraft,” pagan or religious hopes aren’t enough to stop the destruction. In that song, King Gizzard’s world building is constructed through an imagist poetic stream of words: “lay the altar/charge the crystals…/witchcraft.” On “Supercell,” the apocalyptic world is plagued by storms brought on by environmental neglect. The images are punctuated by the ever-chantable refrains like “Gila! Gila!” One can imagine crowds shouting that for years to come.
Instrumentally, the bass guitar pops, the guitar riffs and solos are deliciously interminable, and drums unrelenting. With songs extending over eight and nine minutes, in some ways this excursion into thrash territory feels more uncompromising than Rats’ Nest., but both equally provide punchy and heavy rock music. Then, in “Flamethrower,” the onslaught subsides to progressive percussion and synthesizers. It breaches a space beyond or, possibly, adjacent, to the jam band allegations, sounding nearly like an extended Tool song. It’s the best of all the Gizzverse distilled into one song. It demonstrates all of their skills and taste. In this synthesis of interests, it shows another direction King Gizzard may take their project.