Infest the Rats' Nest

Their consistently unpredictable high standards keep the rest of us interested as well, and have turned them into something pretty special.

King 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.

It 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]

Moving 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]

As 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.

While 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.

By 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.

Like 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.

Frontman 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.

An 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]

As 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.