Stu Mackenzie of King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard

Listen On

“I feel truly, truly filled with dread if I can’t create something.”

Your favorite song by King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard may have originated in the time signature of a car alarm.

I’ve been a fan of King Gizzard for a while, but when I realized that they put out five albums in one year (2017) and had sixteen studio albums over the course of ten years, I had to discover how Mackenzie creates. Surely this man is always creating. Surely he spends all day thinking about songs. Surely he gets anxious when he’s not creating something, anything.

Yes. Yes. And yes.

Not even a newborn has stopped Mackenzie from constantly. I mean, look at that promo shot. He’s so busy with the creative process that he can’t even be bothered to look at the camera! (For the record, I love this promo shot and Mackenzie does too, and I do think it represents him well.)

“I don’t love stopping,” Mackenzie told me. “It’s hard to stop, but I also realize it’s a problem I have. When I go on holiday and decide not to write, I’ll do something like 500 sudokus. I have to be filling my brain with something.” He’s at his most calm when his hands are busy. And as you’ll hear, Mackenzie draws inspiration from everything around him—even the time signature from the alarm in his old Ford that would tell him when he left his lights on.

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