Do the members of King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard play Dungeons & Dragons on their seemingly endless tours? feel like they probably play Dungeons & Dragons (as a tabletop nerd, I mean that in the nicest way possible). Not only would that provide additional context for their progressive aesthetic and the title of their 2016 breakthrough, Nonagon Infinityit might be the only credible explanation for how the six-person Australian band begins each new record: rolling a D100 on a table and choosing a new genre to explore.
The transition from the shiny space rock and synth pop of last year The Silver Accord to Country-Fried Faux-Americana by Flight B741 would be jarring for most bands, but in the context of King Gizz’s extensive discography, it makes sense. The band have tried everything from psychedelic and prog to jazz, ’70s R&B and metal over the course of their 26 studio albums, approaching each release with fearsome musicianship and disarming playfulness. Here they have a classic rock sound in the vein of Steve Miller, The Band and the Rolling Stones, with some pedal steel twang thrown in for good measure.
Flight B741 opens with “Mirage City,” a country-rock song that finds singer Stu Mackenzie yearning to escape to an interstellar city because “my mommy and daddy are fighting back home,” only to discover that this sci-fi utopia is just an illusion. The Skynyrd-esque first half gives way to a wild guitar and harmonica breakdown that has the whole band cheering and yelling. This is followed by “Antarctica,” one of several songs on the LP that owe an unmistakable debt to the Stones. This is another escape fantasy that sees the band “escape the heat” and head for cooler climes—a tricky metaphor that the delightfully silly lyrics stretch well beyond its breaking point. Ambrose Kenny-Smith’s harmonica dominates again, but it’s the rhythm section’s steady groove that gives the song a certain elegance.
Elsewhere, the glam stomp of “Field of Vision” recalls T.Rex. It’s the heaviest track on the album, its thrillingly distorted guitar blaring from your speakers as Mackenzie screams, “I was a fool! I was a fool!” The jaunty “Rats in the Sky” adds a touch of McCartney to the mix, with the band harmonizing some “Scooby-Do wops” in the background. The album’s centerpiece, “Le Risque,” meanwhile, grooves along on a bouncy bassline before drummer Cavs Cavanagh (singing on record for the first time) grabs the mic to deliver a raucous call-and-response chant midway through: “No fire! (no fire) / No flame! (no flame) / I’m always feelin’ the same,” which leads to Kenny-Smith screaming “Hello, Evel Knievel!” It’s ridiculous and brilliant at the same time.
The album ends with ‘Daily Blues’, a sprawling multi-part epic that offers a sort of accelerated speedrun of Flight B741The varied tones, from hip-swinging harmonica blues to a tension-filled glam-rock shakedown. Like the whole record, it’s maximalist, absurd, and made with genuine affection for the music it imitates. Flight B741 could have come across as overly cheesy or ironic, but King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard pull it off.
