“The Less I Know The Better” is one of the more retro offerings here, sounding like an 80’s Michael Jackson single through slight psych-pop filter. “Gossip” is another brief instrumental interlude in the vein of “Nangs”, but compared to the latter it seems forgettable and unimportant. It’s a shame that the second half of this album fails to build on what makes this song great. Like the other songs, “Eventually” is precise and polished, with bright tones, although the expertly-placed moments of silence and juxtaposition of a heavy guitar riff with smooth synth chords show that Kevin Parker really is a master of arrangement as well as melody. The 80’s pop influence is more subtle and complimentary here, and the strengths of this track are the dynamics and progression, areas which a lot of the album fails to deliver on.
Next up is the highlight of the album, “Eventually”, which is fast becoming one of my favourite Tame Impala songs. “The Moment”‘s restrained and polished groove is one of the better examples of Parker’s experiments with synth-pop, as is “Yes I’m Changing”, a melodic and moving ballad.
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“Nangs” is a perfect example of how to make psychedelic music: even in its short running time it takes you to another world. There are moments where the disco-pop influences work very effectively, such as the extended vocoder-led outro to the epic psych-disco opener “Let it Happen”. Although the whole album is unmistakably Tame Impala, some of the songs veer close to 80’s pop parody.Ĭriticisms aside, the album has certainly grown on me over the course of several listens. There seems to be an almost constant high-pitched frequency in the synths on this album that is actually a little grating on the ears to listen to for too long, and many of the songs are too predictable, and if you’ve heard the first minute or so you’ve basically heard the whole song. My first stream of the album (admittedly in very low sound quality) left me a little cold: I still loved the three I loved before, but the rest seemed closer to the other two. Of the songs released before the album, three filled me with anticipation (“Let it Happen”, “Nangs”, and “Eventually”), while two left me undecided (“Cause I’m a Man”, “Disciples”). I was sceptical at first, although to nowhere near the extent of the usual (very vocal) crowd whose reaction to the first hint of keyboard is of disgust, and whose measurement of a song’s merit is in how many guitars can be heard and how loud they are. Currents strays even further from this sound than Lonerism did, in fact it almost entirely abandons it in favour of disco and synth-pop. Tame Impala’s first album, Innerspeaker, was thoroughly enjoyable, yet leaned closer than Lonerism to the retro, classic psych-rock sound. So Currents had a lot to live up to for me. Listening to Lonerism was, and remains, like taking a trip through a colourful kaleidoscope of sound. Tame Impala has been frequently compared to The Beatles, John Lennon, Pink Floyd, and various other classic rock acts, but I heard something distinctive about their music, a combination of retro and futuristic, of familiar and far-out that just worked perfectly for me.
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Lonerism was so full of emotion in the music and lyrics, the production so otherworldly and the sounds so inventive, it sounded to me like nothing I had heard before. Tame Impala’s last album, 2012’s Lonerism, completely and utterly captivated me when it was released, and continues to be one of my favourite albums. For live performances, Tame Impala becomes a full band, made up of Parker’s friends from the current Perth psychedelic-rock scene (which includes other bands such as Pond and Gum who are definitely worth checking out). Tame Impala is the project of Australian singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and all-round musical prodigy Kevin Parker. I’ve had a couple of weeks now spent with Tame Impala’s third full-length LP Currents, and now feel like I’ve got to know the music enough to try and make sense of my thoughts on it.