- Record Label: ATO
- Release Date: Aug 16, 2019
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Aug 20, 2019On Infest the Rats' Nest their garage rock roots are almost imperceptible, as they commit so heartily to thrash metal and produce an album placed firmly at the top of its genre.
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Aug 16, 2019Their consistently unpredictable high standards keep the rest of us interested as well, and have turned them into something pretty special.
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Aug 16, 2019King Gizzard aren't sugarcoating anything, either musically or thematically, and that makes for their most timely and political album yet. It's also one of their most musically compelling and impressive, too, and that's saying a lot.
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MojoAug 15, 2019It all adds up to the heavy, heavy sound of extinction rebellion, King Gizz developing themes they first explored on 2017's Murder Of The Universe. [Sep 2019, p.94]
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Q MagazineAug 15, 2019Moving into attack mode suits the band, most strikingly on the monolithic Superbug and the effects-laden boogie of Mars For The Rich. [Sep 2019, p.112]
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Aug 15, 2019As one should expect from King Gizz, Infest the Rats' Nest never repeats itself, flying through idea after idea like a heart-stopping drop into the rock'n'roll depths of "Hell," the final track.
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Aug 23, 2019While the album may be directly compared to 2017’s Murder of the Universe, it’s arguably the most straightforward material they’ve written in some time. And while it feels like a minor misstep in comparison to much of their catalog, it finds the band crafting forceful and ferocious, mosh pit-friendly rippers that are politically and socially relevant.
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Aug 22, 2019By no means is Infest the Rats’ Nest the best ‘heavy’ album of the year, that honor is shared by Lingua Ignota and Baroness. But it’s not crazy to suggest that Infest the Rats’ Nest is one of the most valiant efforts of 2019, one that has only furthered the wondrous mystery of Melbourne’s beloved band.
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Aug 20, 2019Like most King Gizzard records, it runs out of steam in the second half, but when ‘Infest’ rips it rips as hard as some bands who have been making this music for decades. Like the modern thrash revivalists, King Gizzard combine youthful energy with enough of their own inimitable style to make this excursion into the cobwebbed world of thrash fresh and interesting.
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Aug 16, 2019Frontman Stu Mackenzie nails a Hetfield-esque gurgle from the galloping, squiddle-spattered opener Planet B, and it’s hard to resist the rat-a-tat riff and stuttering vocal of Self-immolate or the insistent turbo-Sabbath churn of Mars For The Rich.
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UncutAug 15, 2019An album of rapid-fire drums, throbbing bass and colossal riffs that nod, well, headbang, back heavily to the glory days of thrash metal. [Oct 2019, p.29]
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Aug 19, 2019As the Gizzard’s two releases this year respectively prove, they’re not afraid to push their sound to its most playful and punishing extremes. But it’s always been more thrilling to hear them excavate the uncharted territory in between.
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Aug 16, 2019Infest the Rats' Nest can sometimes feel like a band playing at the harder edges of its sound just because, but when it comes together on tracks like "Mars for the Rich" or "Venusian 2," who really cares. The whole King Gizzard thing is so happily uncool at times that it can't help but be cool.
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Aug 21, 2019Things do pick up with messy, closing tracks ‘Self-Immolate’ and ‘Hell’, but these are proficient rather than remarkable moments. Ultimately, it’s not enough to prevent ‘Infest The Rats’ Nest’ from feeling like a case of “look what we can do!” rather than a record fully realised.
Awards & Rankings
User score distribution:
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Positive: 67 out of 70
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Mixed: 1 out of 70
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Negative: 2 out of 70
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Aug 17, 2019I absolutely loved this album to pieces. It's politically charged, environmentally conscious, and a slam front to back.
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Aug 16, 2019
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Aug 16, 2019