Anglesea

But what if we go further?

This is the ACTUAL debut of King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard. This is a pretty difficult album to come by, not being re-released before the compilation record “Teenage Gizzard”. Tracks 5-8 are remastered versions of these songs, but I’ve thankfully got the original rips. Since there’s not much more to say, let’s just get this over with.

—[REVIEW]—

A lot of early King Gizzard and the Lizard WIzard material is surf rock, or at least has elements of surf rock in them. Things only changed in Eyes Like the Sky (6.4), where the band shifted genres to a spaghetti western sound. Sure, the whole garage rock sound was present ever since the beginning, but the psychedelic sound really only started with 2013’s Float Along / Fill Your Lungs. In this short EP, KGLW… well, they’re rough. Actual lyrics are few and far between, and the main vocals are usually just fun scatting from Mackenzie.
I don’t think people give this album enough credit, though. Like 12 Bar Bruise (7), this is a very rough predecessor to professionally recorded Gizz records, and for that reason, I’d give it a little sympathy for its simplicity. It’s clearly just a group of young adults jamming around, and the fact that this EP was incredibly rare, not even released digitally until 2020, puts this record in a much more primitive state. I’d imagine it’s like when bands give out demo tapes at local venues, only for these tapes to be thrown away, not knowing how valuable the band would be in the future. Hell, you can hop on the train to Connecticut, the landfills are practically made out of discarded Have a Nice Life demo tapes.
With all that said… Jesus, I don’t think anyone really takes this EP seriously. The standouts are lackluster in comparison to other Gizz albums, the rest are meh, and it’s a sign that King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard are just a local band at this point.