More Psych Sunday, this time with an hour of Tame Impala, born from the brilliant mind of Kevin Parker.
I've been really enjoying No More Lies, the (hopefully not one-off) collaboration between Thundercat and Tame Impala that was released at the (excuse the pun) tail end of April. I'm on the Ninja Tune mailing list and received an email reminding me that the single is being released on "limited edition single sided cheetah screenprint 7” vinyl" on 22nd September. I'm not sure I love the song enough to fork out £16.00 for a physical copy but it does look rather gorgeous.
As often appears to be the case, I was surprised to find that Tame Impala haven't featured on this blog. Not once. I've also fallen behind with my own Tame Impala listening, the most recent album in my possession being Currents from 2015.
Undeterred, this 14-song selection draws from early demos, which were widely available online circa 2008-2009 when I first heard Tame Impala and investigated further. There are a couple of excellent cover versions of Massive Attack and The Flaming Lips, the latter reciprocating when the two co-headlined a tour in 2013.
Tame Impala's music has also lent itself well to remixes, their catalogue reworked by the likes of Richard Norris, Erol Alkan, Pilooski and, more recently, Devonté Hynes and Kieran Hebden. I've included a couple here, a superb retouch of Elephant by Todd Rundgren and Half Full Glass Of Wine by Canyons aka Leo Thomson and Ryan Grieve. Nearly neighbours of Kevin in Perth, Western Australia, Canyons have remixed several of Tame Impala's songs, this being an early example.
Today's post title is a line from one of the early demos, My Lover Mother Nature.
One thing I love about Tame Impala is that whilst Kevin Parker clearly has the production chops and there's an often mind-boggling level of detail and layering in his songs, he also doesn't appear too precious about his work, songs fading in abruptly mid-vocal for example. Pulling this selection together, it's also really interesting how well the early demos and live performances complement the later studio recordings.
1) She Just Won't Believe Me (2012)
2) Elephant (Todd Rundgren Remix) (2012)
3) My Lover Mother Nature (Demo) (2007)
4) Keep On Lying (2012)
5) Angel (Live @ The Toff, Melbourne, Australia) (Cover of Massive Attack) (2009)
6) Half Full Glass Of Wine (Canyons Drunken Rage) (Remix By Leo Thomson & Ryan Grieve) (2008)
7) New Person Same Old Mistakes (2015)
8) Desire Be Desire Go (2010)
9) Led Zeppelin (2012)
10) Silver Trembling Hands (Live @ Olympia Theatre, Dublin) (Cover of The Flaming Lips) (2013)
11) Be Above It (2012)
12) Milky Way Spiral Gets A New Arm (Demo) (2007)
13) The Less I Know The Better (2015)
14) Nothing That Has Happened So Far Has Been Anything We Could Control (2012)
2008: Tame Impala EP: 6
2009: Live @ The Toff, Melbourne, Australia, 17 May 2009 (bootleg MP3): 5
2010: Flow: Unreleased Songs & Demos (bootleg MP3) : 3, 12
2010: Innerspeaker: 8
2012: Elephant EP: 2
2012: Lonerism: 1, 4, 11, 14
2012: Lonerism (limited edition LP +7"): 9
2013: Peace & Paranoia Tour 2013 EP: 10
2015: Currents: 7, 13
Outer Space Is The Only Place To Hide Now (59:07) (KF) (Mega)
