Review: King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard – Phantom Island

King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard
Phantom Island
p(doom) Records
Street: 06.13.2025
King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard = Tame Impala x Phil Spector

As a result of the removal of King Gizzard’s discography from Spotify this past July due to ethical and business concerns, less avid listeners of the band may have missed their latest studio record, Phantom Island, which spent only about a month on the platform. While I adamantly agree with the band regarding their concerns regarding Spotify CEO Daniel Ek, an unfortunate byproduct of this act of protest is the sheer volume of people who have missed out on this excellent record.

If you haven’t listened to King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard (KGLW) before, it’s a difficult band to describe without listening to them first. They’re quite simply taken in best sonically, as opposed to in the format of a review. Since their formation in 2010, King Gizzard has released 27 studio albums and 63 live albums across a wide range of genres and themes, though generally sticking to progressive, psychedelic and garage rock, whilst dipping toes into more niche musical concepts such as microtonals. They have pop records, thrash records, synth-wave records, records that make you question your existence and records that make you feel right at home. I highly recommend the album Polygondwanaland for first-time listeners of the band, but Phantom Island proves to be an equally digestible record, albeit not nearly as indicative of KGLW’s sound.

Recorded concurrently with 2024’s Flight b741, Phantom Island takes many of the musical ideas heard on the previous release and soaks them in an orchestral sound arranged by Chad Kelly and performed with the Los Angeles Philharmonic. The result: a hypnotically groovy cityscape with a Mike Tyson punch. It’ll bite your ear off!

This is a sound that the band has never tried before, but they pull it off incredibly well. The opening title track builds up gradually into an incredible horn-saturated groove rivalling the likes of Earth, Wind & Fire. An inability to find yourself tapping your foot to this track may be indicative of psychopathy. It’s followed by “Deadstick,” an upbeat, blues-rock anthem.

The production on this record is excellent. Perhaps it’s just the instrumentation, but I find myself drawing a lot of parallels to the techniques of Phil Spector here. This record really does take a “Wall Of Sound” approach to its recording that we haven’t seen from the band in the past. I don’t believe there is a poorly produced KGLW record, but Phantom Island takes the cake as their best produced. It’s a tight, punchy record that sounds well-mixed in every format I’ve heard it in.

Overall, it’s an awesome feel-good record. It’ll get you moving, and I find it quite difficult to get sick of the songs. Phantom Island, along with the rest of KGLW’s discography, is streaming on every platform besides Spotify. If you find yourself in the position of a Spotify user looking for an alternative, ad-free solution to listen to this record, I encourage you to support the band on their Bandcamp page. Their entire discography, in addition to copious professionally recorded bootleg records, is currently listed there for free. —Ezra Smith

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