As we reported this morning, King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard are back in a big way. With the release of their eagerly anticipated eighth album, Nonagon Infinity, just on the horizon, the band have now dropped a new single and music video.

‘Gamma Knife’ premiered this morning alongside pre-orders for the vinyl edition of the band’s new album. Just 1,500 copies were available for pre-order and the band managed to sell every single one in less than two hours, forcing them to release another 1,500 limited edition vinyl copies.

“Eric, who’s our drummer, runs Flightless, so he sort of just put it up this morning and an hour and a half later or two hours later he messaged me saying, ‘Hey dude, all the vinyl is gone,'” frontman Stu Mackenzie tells Tone Deaf, fresh off the band’s latest UK run.

“And I was like, ‘Holy shit, that’s crazy.’ I think we’ve got a bunch more, like a second variation we’re going to chuck up, but then that’s it. We’ll have a bunch going to stores, but that’s it for the Flightless edition, so maybe we didn’t do enough copies, I don’t know. It’s pretty surprising.”

When pressed on whether the band, one of Australia’s most loved and prolific exports in recent years, were really surprised to see the demand, Stu admits they’ve never seen so many of their records move so quickly, leaving him at a loss for why it went down this time.

“Flightless [the band’s label] copies are all sold through Bandcamp, it’s super easy to use. We send stuff to stores and stuff now and they do their own thing. I guess the last couple of records, we’ve sort of pressed more copies,” explains Stu.

“The earlier ones were only runs of 300 or 500 or something like that. They’re harder to come by now.” Indeed, King Gizz’s cult following has seen collectors from around the world hunting down multiple versions of their albums.

“I don’t know if it means we would’ve charted if ARIA did count the sales, but I sort of don’t really care about that.”

“We have a label in the US and the UK now and they do vinyl runs with different variations and stuff,” says Stu. “It’s getting more and more confusing. We’re getting heaps of people in the US and UK and even Japan and South America buying our records.”

“But I mean, those labels are getting Australians buying US and UK versions, because there’s people who want to collect all the variations. I think it’s probably around 50 percent Aussie on our end.”

So will the 1,500 records translate into chart success for the Melbourne psych rockers? “I believe that ARIA don’t count Bandcamp sales, which is sort of funny,” says Stu. “I don’t know if it means we would’ve charted if they did count them, but I sort of don’t really care about that.”

“I don’t know, if ARIA’s listening, I think that’s lame. I’m not sure what their reasoning is, but to me Bandcamp is a pretty awesome tool, especially for artists who want to take control of their own careers.”

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“To me, selling physical product is not really a way to make money. If you can, that’s very fortunate, but I think in this day and age it’s not really something you want to rely on. Obviously, it’s a handy bonus.”

“But pressing records is super expensive as well and time-consuming and a lot of effort goes into even the artwork involved and the record itself. Once you tally up the time and the costs involved, it doesn’t really add up to many dollars.”

King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard’s eighth album, Nonagon Infinity, is available to buy 29th April. Check out the video for the album’s first single, ‘Gamma Knife’, below. Get more info or get the album via the King Gizz website.