Having been a fan of Tame Impala since the release of their debut album Innerspeaker in 2010, it has been exhilarating to watch the rest of the world slowly wake up to the awesomeness of this retro-flavored Australian garage "band" led by multi-instrumentalist Kevin Parker.
On their first two outings (the aforementioned Innerspeaker and 2012's Lonerism), they created a streamlined vintage psych-rock with just enough tasty FM radio hooks to make you think they had a chance at crossing over to mainstream success, but on this new record, it's as if they've decided to give up their guitars for a soft-synth and the latest version of Ableton. The end result is an album that left me wondering if someone hadn't given me the new Foster The People album by mistake.
Album-opener "Let It Happen" is a sprawling seven-minute opus that features not a single guitar and winds up being about four-minutes longer than it needs to be.
By track #4, the prophetic "Yes I'm Changing", it becomes quite clear that the Tame Impala that rejuvenated my belief that rock wasn't dead has sold out to the proverbial company store which, in this case, just so happens to be Interscope Records.
Finally, five tracks into this new album, we "Eventually" hear a song that sounds like the Tame Impala we know and love; a living breathing rock & roll machine, only to return to the synthy Foster The People imitation on the next tune ("Gossip").
Here's where it gets interesting...
Track #7, "The Less I Know", is actually a pretty cool tune, even if it does ramp up the Foster The People production style. So its all the more fitting that Parker said in a recent NME interview that the tune doesn't belong on a Tame Impala album, to which I would have to agree.
Sadly, most of the songs on the rest of the album don't either.
VERDICT: Meh. I mean, if FTP is your thing and you were a litte disappointed by their last record, this one will totally float your boat, but if you already love Tame Impala, this will feel a little like a bait-and-switch.