P-0: The Key
An infinitely looping album with 9 songs, Nonagon Infinity by a band from Australia, King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard, was released on the 29th of April, 2016. Last month was the 9th anniversary. Having made 27 albums since 2012, they have experimented a significant amount with how they want their music to sound. Eventually, they started to experiment with how the album itself worked, which is what led to Nonagon Infinity and its infinite loop. The music is some of the best I’ve ever heard. I want to know the greater story here. Why is Nonagon Infinity described as a tool to open a door? What is the door? Why do you have to wait for the answer before opening it? Questions like this are what bring me back to this album over and over. At first, it seems like the focus is on the loop of the songs and the abstract theme, but when you listen closely, it shows a whole new perspective.
Track 1: Robot Stop
Nonagon Infinity off the rip hits you right in the face with “Robot Stop.” It comes in loud and energetic, and the lyrics flow with the instrumentals. The lyrics give the feeling of reckless abandon, “Loosen up / Time to drop / F**k sh*t up / Don’t forget / My coffins all I see / Lately.” This song introduces the creation of one I will refer to as the robot. “Upload me to the robot brain,” and “When will my body work?” It is what makes me think this.
Track 2: Big Fig Wasp
The song is energetic as the instrumentals sway with the lyrics containing motifs from “Robot Stop” and the tail end of its chorus. This song is describing The Robot’s experience with fig wasps, asking “Does your God know / Insects grow / in my pome?” and continuing, The Robot adjusting to its new body.
Track 3: Gamma Knife
“Gamma Knife” is a roller coaster of a song. It builds energetic momentum to relax for a moment, then goes back to the build-up. It uses parts of “Evil Death Roll” and “People Vultures” instrumentals; “all I wanted was my youth” may imply the robot wasn’t always a robot and only made this transformation to maintain its youth.
Track 4: People Vultures
“People Vultures” builds with this very menacing tone and crashes into a more fast-paced rhythm, one of my personal favorites. I feel like the description of people vultures is of some mutated creature, not as a description of a person, because of lyrics like “People-Vultures, God approaches / Final hearing, disappearing / Tainted voodoo, headless guru”. This song could be tied to The Robot, possibly telling a story of how it escaped or fought these creatures.
Track 5: Mr. Beat
I don’t think this song ties to the story whatsoever. It’s a pretty jazzy, fun song about missing the beat, which happens during the chorus of the song. I initially thought this may be a new character being introduced because the title is “Mr. Beat,” but I haven’t found anything backing that up.
Track 6: Evil Death Roll
“Nonagon Infinity opens the door/Wait!/ For the answer to open the door,” a lyric that starts the album and reappears here in “Evil Death Roll,” a duel between someone, possibly The Robot, and some crocodilian animal, it sounds menacing and fun; whoever is fighting this creature is taking great joy in doing so. The mention of the door and Nonagon Infinity serves as a reminder that the “end” is coming. Maybe I should say the answer is coming soon, but it could also serve as a way to point this song out as an important moment.
Track 7: Invisible Face
The robotic lyrics flow with the spacey and jazzy instrumentation. The universe, described as a machine, has awoken from a dream. The lyrics being sung lack a tone, which makes me think it’s The Robot from previous songs. The song sounds like The Robot having a fascination with the cosmos and its implied sentience saying “The Universe / Has me.”
Track 8: Wah Wah
The sound rocks back and forth, then suddenly becomes intense and loud. The chorus mimics crying, and the lyrics outside the chorus sound whispered. Describing many strange creatures,” See him hover way up high / He is the bat with 16 eyes / He has a thirst to satisfy / A craving for your blood.” The title “Wah Wah” is meant to attribute the use of the wah-wah pedal, a guitar effect featured quite a lot on this album. This connects to crying as well, which is mentioned a lot throughout this song with lyrics like, “Mass around your favorite devil/Learn to make them cry.”
Track 9: Road Train
In my humble opinion, this is the best song on the album. The drums chug along. Shrill guitar cuts through with deafening intensity akin to a train’s wheels grinding and sparking as it locks up on the tracks. It sounds like it’s telling a myth as it describes this “dog at Satan’s heel” how “The road beneath it bleeds” with “Burning wheels of fiery red”. This being the last song on the album, it also mentions Nonagon Infinity, finally mentioning its approach, although it may just be mentioning the album starting to loop, as there is no mention of the door.
P-10: The Door
This album serves as a teaser to their album Murder of the Universe, which continues the world-building themes in Nonagon Infinity. The door is a world of strange creatures and cyborgs as a sentient universe observes and moves the pieces in the background. Nonagon infinity being the key, as it may take you multiple listens to form your theories on what the album means, and the answer at the door being the listener’s understanding of the album, making this a unique experience to everyone who listens to it. I have written out my view of the album compared with the communities, but I invite you to turn the key and listen. I encourage you to form your understanding through experiencing Nonagon Infinity. It truly is a unique concept