PARIS, France — King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard did not mess around in the opener of their 2023 Winter European Tour.
Guitarist Joey Walker walked out on stage and blew kisses to the crowd.
“It’s good to be back in Paris!” he said at the Zenith-La Villette on March 2.
The band began their tour with an energetic “Rattlesnake,” off 2017’s Flying Mictrotonal Banana LP.
That song choice brought Stu Mackenzie’s flying microtonal banana guitar out for an early appearance.
Mackenzie’s “Rattle” call deeper into the song engaged the Parisians, who broke out into the first of several claps during the show.
Next up was “O.N.E.” (which included a “Straws in the Wind tease,” according to kglw.net) the first of two songs in a row from 2021’s L.W. along with “Ataraxia.”.
That was followed up by two songs from the 2016 Nonagon Infinity LP, “Wah Wah,” (which included “The River” teases) and “Road Train.”
Joey Walker was animated throughout the night and oozed appreciation for Paris. Photo by Javier Serna
Walker couldn’t help himself, his love for Paris overflowing again, “Fuck!,” he said. “Fuck, your city is good!”
King Gizzard then teased AC/DC’s “Hells Bells” before launching into “Hypertension,” one half of 2022’s Laminated Denim LP. That lent itself to some improvisation from both the guitarists and Ambrose Kenny-Smith on synth, he also used a tambourine on the song.
KGLW played two in a row from the beloved 2022 LP Ice, Death, Planets, Lungs, Mushrooms and Lava: Lava and and Iron Lung. Lava, of course, brought out Kenny-Smith’s saxophone, something that came out several times during the night. The excellent version of Iron Lung ended to increased applause from the Paris crowd.
Ambrose Kenny-Smith played his alto sax on more than one occasion in Paris. Photo by Javier Serna
The band returned to its earlier material with a trippy “Work this Time,” from 2014’s Oddments.
Then it was three off 2022’s Omnium Gatherum double LP, with Mackenzie’s flute and Kenny-Smith’s hip-hop vocals for “The Grim Reaper,” “Garden Goblin,” and “Magenta Mountain.”
“Let’s do this,” Walker said as that Magenta started up.
Magenta Mountain went deep, dark and synthy on the back end, with Kenny-Smith getting into some supersonic fuzz. The Paris crowd was delighted for sure with this selection, and seemed pretty happy with much of the setlist. But here and in other spots they hummed along to the melody at times.
The band went particularly loud, with three metal songs to end the show.
First King Gizz played “Planet B,” from the 2019 Infest the Rats’ Nest album.
UPDATE: While a fourth Omnium song, “Predator X,” was listed on the setlist, it apparently wasn’t played according to KGLW.net, which stated it wasn’t played but for “a dream beat reminiscent of the intro.”
“Hell,” shifted things back to Infest for a song.
And then the band ended the show with incredible energy during “Gaia,” a fourth song from Omnium Gatherum, running up to a hard curfew at 11 p.m. with no encore. The crowd once again broke into a supportive clap deeper into Gaia as Michael Cavanagh was given some time to shine on his percussion rig.
London’s Los Bitchos, an all-female instrumental band opened up the festivities at the Zenith.
JamintheStream.com will be providing updates for six of the first nine shows of the tour, including Paris, Amsterdam (March 3), Tilburg, Netherlands (March 4), Stockholm (March 7), Oslo (March 8), and Prague (March 12). The band picks up today in Amsterdam at the Gashouder.
