King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard Release 28th Album 'Alien Metal' — Built on a Synth Called Nathan
King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard released their 28th studio album, Alien Metal, on August 14, 2026, through p(doom) Records — their first full-length in 14 months and their most radical gear change yet: an entire record built on a modular synthesizer the six members nicknamed "Nathan." (Billboard; JamBase)
The Melbourne sextet ditched guitars entirely for the project. In their place sits a Eurorack modular synthesizer — a format developed in the 1990s in which individual sound-generating modules are patched together with cables — large enough for all six members to play simultaneously. The band built and modified the rig themselves inside their own Melbourne warehouse studio over roughly two years. (Billboard)
Nathan was not a studio-only experiment. King Gizzard began using the rig for "rave shows" in late 2024, and the synthesizer's evolution fed directly into the new record. The band also released Mango Sticky Rice, a batch of modular ambient recordings, in late 2025 — a stop along the same path. (Billboard)
The album's eight tracks include 'Sapience,' 'Alien Metal,' 'Superheavy, Supercritical,' 'Kill for the Steel,' 'Level 5,' 'Rapid Alpha Decay,' 'Uqt,' and 'Atomic.' (Pitchfork) The title track arrived as a single on July 28, 2026. (Pitchfork) Pitchfork described the album as EDM; Consequence of Sound called it techno. (Pitchfork; Consequence of Sound)
The path to Alien Metal was not a straight line. The band scrapped more material for this record than for any previous one, according to Billboard. The announcement itself shifted: King Gizzard first announced the album on July 8, 2026, with an initial release date of July 24 via Sargent House, before the record landed on August 14 through p(doom) Records. (Billboard; Instagram; JamBase)
Electronic music is not new territory for the group. Their 2023 album The Silver Cord incorporated electronic sounds, and frontman Stu Mackenzie, 35, has long rotated through genres at a pace few bands match — the band's 28 studio albums in roughly 15 years now spans psych rock, thrash metal, jazz, microtonal music, and ambient. (Billboard)
For fans, the live dimension is already locked in. King Gizzard plan to play their second annual Field of Vision camping festival near Denver and four New York City shows later in August 2026. (Billboard)
The album also arrives in a busy release year for the band. Phantom Island came out on June 13, 2025, and Flight b741 was released on August 9, 2024. (King Gizzard official site) What sets Alien Metal apart is the instrument itself: six people crowded around one machine, patching cables, shaping sound together in real time — a band that built its reputation on guitar-bass-drums virtuosity betting the next chapter on a box of modules they named like a friend.
