![News Added Jan 19, 2013 Raucous 7-piece King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard are one of Australia’s most prominent rising acts, and with a successful 2012 under their belt, which saw them launch their full-length debut 12 Bar Bruise to widespread critical claim, the collective have dug in their spurs, ready to charge ahead into […]](https://hasitleaked.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/cova.jpg "King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard : Eyes Like The Sky")
Raucous 7-piece King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard are one of Australia’s most prominent rising acts, and with a successful 2012 under their belt, which saw them launch their full-length debut 12 Bar Bruise to widespread critical claim, the collective have dug in their spurs, ready to charge ahead into 2013 with a brand new album, following less than six months after their first release.
The new album, set for release this February, Eyes Like The Sky, a ten track collection that’s described as “a psychedelic western audiobook LP written and narrated by Broderick Smith.”
Broderick Smith is, of course, the former frontman of The Dingoes, but also the father of King Gizzard member Ambrose Kenny-Smith (who doubles as the leader of equally promising Aussie act The Murlocs), and Smith Snr’s fire and brimstone voice provides the narration on Eyes Like The Sky.
The idea for the new record originally spawned from a new short story to accompany an instrumental album of western music, proposed by Smith, who – in the band’s own words – “returned with 6 chapters of love, lust, scalping, and an evil holy man.”
The group also cite writer Cormac McCarthy, the bleak novelist behind The Road and No Country For Old Men, Kirpatrick Thomas’ dusty, psychedelic ensemble Spindrift, and of course the spaghetti westerns of director Ennio Morricone as influences on the new audiobook LP, described as a “triumph in gory western drama.”
The new album seems to be a logical extension of ‘Sam Cherry’s Last Shot’, a choice cut from 12 Bar Bruise that also featured Broderick Smith reading a murderous tale.
The track was originally conceived as an instrumental, as the band point out: “We considered synching a chapter of Cormac McCarthy’s Blood Meridian to the song but that was too hard,” explains Stu Mackenzie. “Brod is an absolute western nut and offered to read a chapter about Sam Cherry from the 1883 novel 33 Years Among Our Wild Indians which we included as a voice over on the song.”
The resulting collaboration was one of many highlights from the band’s debut, and the clear catalyst for what would become the band’s second full-length release.
Considering that 12 Bar Bruise was one of the best debuts of last year, and easily one of the best local releases of 2012, Eyes Like The Sky certainly has some expectations to meet, but given the calibre of its influences and executors, King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard look set to have another great release to add to their developing discography.
Eyes Like The Sky will be released through King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard’s own record label, Flightless on Feb 8, 2013.
