Gizzfest at Luna Park was the perfect show to see King Gizzard live for the first time. I had been obssesed with them for a year, and was getting deep into the rest of the Flightless catalogue, most of which were also playing along with some new friends of the band.
It was my first time there as a music venue too. I hadn't been into the Big Top before, and being attached to the amusement park made the indoor stage feel almost like a giant circus tent. I'm glad we showed up early as they had most of the park attractions running, ferris wheel and all, and the place was draped in Jason Galea art installations. After a drink at the bar, we headed to the dodgem cars, and to my surprise saw half the band themselves had even taken the opportunity for a go, making themselves very popular targets. Yet meeting Stu shortly after only proved what everyone says about how gracious and kind the band members are with their time for fans.
They weren't the only performers mingling. It was impossible to miss a particular crew cutting through the crowds, who I later realised was Amyl and the Sniffers when I unexpectedly caught the end of their blistering set. I had showed up early to catch the start of Leah Senior's, the polar opposite in vibe but also excellent. There is much to say about getting to see Kikagaku Moyo, La Luz, The Murlocs, and glimpses of all the others at the same event, but this is a King Gizzard show review after all; we'd all put in a big evening already and were plenty worked up by the time their headline set begun.

The hype music on the house speakers included Rockets - On The Road Again, and the crowd started to get excited thinking they were previewing new music, little did we know it forshadowed the electronic boogie that would come two years later. A red nonagon appeared on the back of the stage, and suddenly the show had begun. Polygondwananaland had not even been out for a week yet, they were fully riding the crest of the wave of 2017 albums and so the setlist was comprised mostly of these with a few staples thrown in. A thick rendition of Digital Black was an early impressive moment, but our collective minds were really blown when the bassline at the end of The Lord of Lightning transitioned into Cellophane; just as fans had discovered with the studio versions in the last few months picking through the links planted between the new and old music.
I don't think anyone expected anything from Sketches Of Brunswick East, the energy was not right for this show, but the next surprise was Crumbling Castle. We were all still getting our heads around Polygondwanaland, and from the moment that first song had dropped as a single the question had risen: can they play this kind of music live? Of course the answer was a confident yes, the polyrythms and ambitious arrangement only elevated the performance beyond the familiar realm of the fast and loud energy that had dominated their live show since the earliest punk days through to the Nongaon Infinity tracks they still had in high rotation. This new realm was much headier, and just while it seemed like anything was possible, they blasted us once again with the most intense parts of MOTU and Nonagon Infinity, melting the final remnants of brains and faces with the injection of some Hawkwind into Robot Stop.

I had never been in a crowd like this before. There was a palpable sense of people at ease just being themselves in the dark room, where high intensity moshing, and chilling to the side openly smoking a joint both made sense. A huge variety of different band shirts were on display too, from all the bands present, to the classics like Pink Floyd, to various experimental Hip-Hop artists, to no top at all for one woman who spent a whole song standing (not sitting) swaying on someone else's shoulders.

Into the Flying Microtonal Banana tracks, and I was very satisfied with a perfect version of Nuclear Fusion, the first song to release after I had fully descended into fandom and it had remained my favourite. One of the few to truly utilise two drummers playing out of unison, the panning effect was doubly impressive live, while Joey was still doing the intro with the originally intended throat singing technique that ended up being too harsh on his voice to continue using. Doom City into Rattlesnake made a great peak in the crowd energy, who moshed out the last of it in preparation for the finale, the very unexpected Lonely Steel Sheet Flyer. I didn't understand why it wouldn't have been The River, which was also a favourite of mine (and still their most played song that I haven't yet seen), but in hindsight the rarity of this track made it a real treat to cap off what would be the second last Gizzfest. I allowed the exhaustion of seeing five or six sets to wash over me, and it felt like even the rest of the band did too, leaving Stu front and center with us all in his hands. That was the most I ever thought he looked like a classic rock star, confidently channeling a mellow energy into the atmosphere that I used to start stretching my sore lower back in preparation for the seemingly endless uphill walk to the train station and home. It is a long song anyway, and made for one of those moments that felt like it would go forever, not even in the style of jamming, I have no idea if it was even extended beyond the studio version, but in a sense it feels like Stu is still bathed in yellow light and sustaining some of those chords even now.

Some of the crowd stuck around chanting for an encore, but I had the sense that they were not that kind of band, and I think most of the crowd had also realised the finality; I think it would have probably even spoiled the moment for them to come back out.
I already had tickets to their next show the week later in Canberra, which was another leap for me as I'd never seen the same band twice up until that point. I could never have forseen the value of the investment that this first show established, but looking back I am infinitely glad that this was my first King Gizzard performance.