Reining Australian psychedelic rock overlords King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard recently stopped by Office Hours with Tim Heidecker, where members of the group weighed in on jam bands Phish and Goose. The appearance came after Gizzard wrapped up a U.S. “residency tour” with a three-hour marathon concert at the Hollywood Bowl.
Guitarist Joey Walker and bassist Lucas Harwood appeared on the Tim & Eric star’s video podcast as representatives of the band, though frontman Stu Mackenzie and drummer Michael Cavanagh were on the original call sheet. While Cavs bowed out early on the previous night, Stu didn’t withdraw his name from contention until about 5 a.m. that morning, letting the rest of the band know via a group chat that he wasn’t quite camera-ready. That, however, didn’t stop Joey and Lucas from “smashing on his door for about 15 minutes.”
In Stu’s absence, Walker served as a mouthpiece for the band for this rare irl media appearance. Together with Harwood, they revealed a few nuggets of insider KGLW knowledge, including that the band has a full rap album that will never see the light of day. As for projects fans will actually get to hear, they dropped some breadcrumbs on the band’s alluded-to but yet-unannounced 25th studio album, which is evidently “90%” finished.
“It’s gonna be different,” Walker let out, noting that the album is the yin to the yang of the group’s latest offering, the thrash metal double LP PetroDragonic Apocalypse; Or, Dawn Of Eternal Night: An Annihilation Of Planet Earth And The Beginning Of Merciless Damnation. As far as concrete details, all the band members let loose was that they broke out the modular synthesizer for this next disc.
But fans waiting to hear more King Gizzard music need to look no further than the Office Hours appearance, as Walker and Harwood composed a song on-site with Heidecker, who is also a musician with a sporadic catalog to his name. After a query about whether the band would ever make a Beach Boys-esque album to showcase their vocal capabilities, the bandmates put their layered harmonies to the test, singing along with Heidecker on a song about the previous night’s gig.
“Last night we played at the Hollywood Bowl / The place was hardly half full / We’re not the kind of band you hear on the radio / But last night we played at the Hollywood Bowl.”
As the interview wound down, a call from fan Joshua Levy prompted Heidecker to ask Gizzard if they had beef with any bands, specifically throwing out Connecticut indie-jam quintet Goose.
“Goose requested a green room at our Red Rocks show,” Harwood revealed.
“Those motherfuckers,” Heidecker—who is the hardest on Goose of anyone in the room—snapped back. “For them to congregate?”
(For what it’s worth, the President of AEG Rocky Mountains, Dan Strasburg, has stated that he—not Goose or its management—attempted to set up a VIP viewing area for the band.)
Levy chimed in with the assertion that Phish frontman Trey Anastasio didn’t even ask for a green room, to which Walker responded, “Actually no, fuck Trey Anastasio,” a statement that was later shown to be in jest.
In reality, the Aussie psych-rockers are not too dialed into the American jam scene. Contrary to what Heidecker had heard, they are not fans of Phish, a misconception Walker attributes to the sizable overlap in the Venn diagram of King Gizzard and Phish fandom. They are, however, Trey Anastasio’s favorite band, something he has asserted on numerous occasions including to their faces.
“We met Trey recently and he was a lovely, lovely person,” Harwood stated before Walker chimed in, “We’re his favorite band.”
“He says that to everybody,” Heidecker quipped. “He said that to Toad the Wet Sprocket.”
Though they aren’t familiar with the musical aspect of the jam band world, the band is aware of the similar cultural phenomenon they represent to their fans. The group tours prodigiously, presenting a unique setlist every night—with Mackenzie going so far as to check Setlist.fm to ensure the band never repeats a song from the previous time they visited a city.
“It’s that kind of American pastime of the jam band I feel like has resonated with us here in the States,” Walker observed. “It’s crazy that people just follow us around for the whole tour.”
Check out the full King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard appearance on Office Hours Live, with the Goose/Phish segment beginning at 58:30.
King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard, Eric Wareheim, Tim Reactivates His Twitter (Episode 256)
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