Flying Microtonal Banana
by King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard
  • Record Label: ATO
  • Release Date: Feb 24, 2017
Metascore
72

Generally favorable reviews - based on 15 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 10 out of 15
  2. Mixed: 5 out of 15
  3. Negative: 0 out of 15
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  1. DIY Magazine
    Feb 24, 2017
    80
    Rich, imaginative, and more than a little strange.
  2. Exclaim
    Feb 23, 2017
    80
    Flying Microtonal Banana is another wonderful release by King Gizzard.
  3. AllMusic
    Feb 23, 2017
    80
    As the album concludes, it's clear that the experiment was a success and that the microtuned instruments fit in perfectly with their oddball aesthetic.
  5. Uncut
    Feb 3, 2017
    80
    The more melodic and less maniacal "Melting" and "Sleep Drifter" point toward newer ambitions and influences. Especially welcome is the turn toward Middle Eastern and North African sounds on "Anoxia" and the title track.[Mar 2017, p.32]
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  6. Record Collector
    Feb 3, 2017
    80
    These floaty psych-funk grooves are more fun than a barrel of chimps, even if the lyrics fret about global warming, nuclear fusion and other harbingers of doom.
  7. The 405
    Feb 27, 2017
    75
    Their homemade studio occasionally shows its flaws, but this is simultaneously heartening. King Gizzard are easy to forgive and fun to like, showing that it’s more than a record about reliving psychedelic music’s prototypes.
  8. Pitchfork
    Feb 27, 2017
    74
    If Flying Microtonal Banana’s randomized approach is ultimately less transfixing than Nonagon Infinity’s maniacal focus, it nonetheless shows that, after eight previous albums, this band’s creativity and curiosity knows no bounds, and their singular balance of anarchy and accessibility is still in check.
  9. PopMatters
    Apr 12, 2017
    70
    For such an experimental concept, Flying Microtonal Banana still finds a box of safety and doesn’t try to get out of it too much.
  10. Sputnikmusic
    Mar 1, 2017
    70
    Flying Microtonal Banana is essentially the same King Gizzard album from last year, updated for the sake of its own consequence. But it's also better than most other albums of its sort, specifically because King Gizzard appear able to coherently piece together a fun anthem with a sense of musical direction.
  11. Under The Radar
    Feb 3, 2017
    65
    A rock album drawing from a more nuanced tonal palate. [Jan - Mar 2017, p.66]
  12. The Observer (UK)
    Feb 27, 2017
    60
    It’s potent and audacious, if a little too far out.
  13. The Guardian
    Feb 23, 2017
    60
    Flying Microtonal Banana is occasionally pleasant but mostly pedestrian. If anything, it’s a step back from the experimentation of last year’s fierce Nonagon Infinity.
  14. Q Magazine
    Feb 14, 2017
    60
    Imagine the anarcho-grime of Fat White Family coalescing with a tripped-out Thee Oh Sees--then peel slowly and see. [Apr 2017, p.112]
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  15. Mojo
    Feb 3, 2017
    60
    Hypnotic channels occasionally, degrade into ruts, but more often this is a fabulous freakout. [Mar 2017, p.98]
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  16. Pretty Much Amazing
    Feb 24, 2017
    58
    It’s a solid record and one that’s sure to please fans, myself included, even if it doesn’t meet the highs of its predecessor.

Awards & Rankings

81
#81 Most Shared Album of 2017

User Reviews

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User Score
8.3

Universal acclaim- based on 72 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 67 out of 72
  2. Mixed: 3 out of 72
  3. Negative: 2 out of 72
  1. Aniican
    Feb 24, 2017
    8
    While not as driven as their previous project Nonagon Infinity, Flying Mictrotonal Banana is an ambitious album. The album is packed full ofWhile not as driven as their previous project Nonagon Infinity, Flying Mictrotonal Banana is an ambitious album. The album is packed full of interesting sounds and strange melodies. The progressive/experimental sound of this album is worth checking out for both new and old KGATLW listeners.… Full Review »
  2. PolentaVenenosa
    Oct 16, 2020
    10
    Ä Psychedelic experience with arabic tunes and heavy riffs. An excelent experimental album going completely outside the mainstream.
  3. logan-d-strait
    Feb 2, 2020
    9
    Psychedelic rock could stand accused of being stuck in a dizzying time warp that picks up somewhere in a yard with Clapton and Jeff Beck. ActsPsychedelic rock could stand accused of being stuck in a dizzying time warp that picks up somewhere in a yard with Clapton and Jeff Beck. Acts like Tame Impala, Melody's Echo Chamber, Thee Oh Sees, and Morgan Delt make their living on a retrofied aesthetic coming through the internet information storm, and this is good news for people (like me) who grew up playing that music and to whom rock music is something essentially sacred. Bands like Greta Van Fleet and Joyous Wolf take the Zeppelin a little too literally for my taste, and this brings us nicely to King Gizzard.

    On Flying Microtonal Banana, which was conceived on holiday in Turkey, then mostly scrapped, and recorded in the band's first of many manic frenzies afterwards, Gizzard and the Wizard execute a range of stylistic bends. The A-side rides a groovey and jerky krautrock motor in lead single "Rattlesnake" through the Fela-esque tropical flute storm of "Melting" into the aptly-named 70's-riff-oddysey that is "Open Water", with a twist: your traditional rock-and-roll chords and desert melodies of Gizzard's previous hard-rock projects has morphed into modal microtonal music, refining a progressive trick that the boys had first blasted out of their equipment on the A-side of 2016's Nonagon Infinity. The band's translation of oriental modality into a rock format is, it's true, rough at times, as the rolling third track begins to churn into something like "Kashmir", which is in no way a bad thing, and loses some of the enchantment of the utterly-psychedelic keyboard meltdown which proceeds it.

    The B-side opens with the single that most resembles the stylistic roots of the album; interviews suggest it's the only song from Stu's holiday which actually made it onto the disc. "Sleep Drifter", which is by far the greatest contribution to the band's live act on Microtonal Banana, renders a love poem in (very nearly) traditional Turkish makam, and has probably the finest production of all the tracks on the record, (which is, for the most part, a little more refined than Nonagon Infinity). The track recalls something from the 13th Floor Elevators' debut, with perhaps Stu's most refined lyricism, drawing apparent inspiration from John Lennon circa-1968.

    Ambrose gets one of his finest turns on lead, singing an honest-to-God Bush Ballad over a droning "vegemite western" groove with some rather interestingly-arranged piano. It strikes a kind of somber tone and feeling not heard since, "Sam Cherry's Last Shot", with which it has much it common. Joey's "Anoxia" continues this feeling bold and bluesy, though the lyrical thread begins to break down, with the kind of roach-choking feeling that the title implies, while "Doom City" seems to be an experiment in crafting a sonic weaponized heavy-metal bomb that strikes without context at the opening of a killer set. It's bizarre and apocalyptic scene is allegedly an ode to Chinese smog, and summons some of Sleep's gnarliest doom-rock:

    "Spark in firmament; Doom City sky opens up.
    He, the Empyrean, breathes, from his mouth and over tongue,
    charged particles. Doom City air rips me apart.
    Unbelievable; Doom City sky makes him laugh,"

    and Joey provides a wicked villain laugh, because this is not your neighborhood's lame punk rock band.

    "Nuclear Fusion" continues a trend seen in "Invisible Face > WahWah", if not earlier, of ending albums with a kind of consciously-hyperbolic domer. Perhaps one of the weaker tracks on the disc, it transitions seamlessly into the instrumental coda, a shimmering mandala of zurna, and lute, and congo drum. True to form, the final track fades with the sound of desert winds howling in the distance, creating a perfect circle with the beginning of the album.

    The paper CD sleeve features a fun little treatise on Pythagorean tuning and microtonal music, which perfectly essentializes the ethos that King Gizzard had generated in the first five years of their independently-funded and -realized existence. That is, one wonders if the boys know quite what they're talking about.

    "Flying Microtonal Banana" is a thoroughly enjoyable listen for anyone who likes to get stoned.    … Full Review »
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