King Gizzard Rip & Roar Through Mind Melting Desert Daze Show

An absolutely outrageous set to end the first night of Desert Daze 2022, King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard dominated The Moon stage for an hour and a half of jammy goodness featuring a career-spanning set list. We’re still choking on the dust from the mosh pit, but let us please break down the entirety of the set for you.


Peanut butter is to jelly, which is the same as King Gizzard is to Desert Daze. Arguably, the band could headline the festival every single year and we’re fairly sure that no one would bat an eye or argue given the insane output the band has given the world over the past 10 years. With that being said, they strolled onto the stage and delivered one of most high intensity sets of the weekend that besides the music, featured theatrics including front man Stu Mackenzie crowd surfing into the lake from the stage (we’ve got the videos to prove it).


As for the music, we were not overly surprised that the band opted to go with more of their faster paced tracks, specifically more geared off of records like Infest The Rats’ Nest and Murder of the Universe. However even though they only played 11 songs in the span of an hour and a half which is wild in its own right, they still managed to play a ton that we’d never seen before given that this was our 10th time witnessing them. We were treated to one of our personal favorites “Static Electricity” off of L.W. and a much older track “Float On - Fill Your Lungs” off their album of the same name. Mixed in was a 10 minute rendition of “Boogieman Sam” which showed off the capabilities of Ambrose Kenny-Smith and it’s easily the best version of “The Dripping Tap” we’ve seen live yet.


This band has spiraled to the point where if you don’t see every show of theirs on tour, you’re honestly missing out. Picking or guessing a setlist is borderline impossible and with the frequency of new albums that come out, three this October we might add, you might never see some songs played again. It doesn’t really matter though because each show is unique and there’s no doubt in our minds that they’ll be back to Desert Daze in no time.


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Photo by Travis Trautt

Austin SherComment