This album is about progression, both in terms of sound and self. With
Currents Tame Impala marries the grooves of disco, soul, and psychedelia to manifest an exploration into the visions of what it means to be really human, the confusion and doubt of personal change. This is done with such grandeur and magneticism, sitting there allowing yourself to get lost in such a harrowing and strange album makes for one joyous experience. While the band has always been known for its revival of psychedelics this time around Kevin Parker seems to be fascinated by the hypnotic dynamics of pop music.
Look at album opener “Let It Happen” and find Parker’s variation of the pop music standard, a swirling and lush epic. As Parker croons, the song breaks from its catchy hook into a large, extended interlude, pushing into the outer limits of sonic consciousness. The song engulfs you. “Let It Happen” is the portal to this new world of sound. Each song unveils layer upon layer of soul and subdued psychedelia, conjuring lamentations for change and cries of isolation. What makes this album so great is the way it grabs hold of your emotions. Parker’s voice is loud and clean, his vocals are full of despair and possess an almost tragic sadness yet always allow for a tinge of hope to bleed through. This hope for some escape from his isolation and heartbreak makes you emotionally invested.
Except the problem with this magnetic emotionality is the way Parker crafts the songs. There remains a looming dichotomy within all of them. Listen to “The Less I Know The Better” where Parker sings about his wish to become less aware of an old love of his over a rolling and bouncy melody making you doubt his commitment to his own emotional investment. Where there should be melancholy, the album reveals a pop sensibility. Then there is Parker’s quest to escape the walls of solitude and find human connection. “Love/Paranoia” explores the emotional risks of falling in love while “Yes, I’m Changing” is a proclamation of his newfound persona. With
Currents, many have labeled it a break-up album, which makes Parker’s inability to acutally change in a personal level a sad affair because it reveals a tragic underpinning to the failure to change, no matter how much one may hope for self-progression. Even with the record's pop orientation, Tame Impala’s music still gives way to solitude. And that is the fun, letting yourself be taken and surprised in all the ways Parker can effortlessly funnel his internal struggles into bursts of musical joy.
Listening to
Currents is a woozy experience as the music warbles and flows, creating an almost mirage of sounds, each one hitting at the heart. Sonically it bombasts you with such pleasurable moments it will be difficult to find anything as pretty from Tame Impala than the songs on this album. With its cascading rhythms and melodies at times it flows into sonic dimensions of dreams, an eerie lull, with the next track waking to clarity. The album is such a cinematic experience as well that in its totality, the album creates the likeness of a nocturnal dance party, reaching heights of momentous pleasure yet at times spiraling into the nightmarish, with the strobe lights on overhead melting into a blur.
At the album's conclusion, we find the track, “New Person, Same Old Mistakes,” where Parker explores whether his newfound change will be permanent, illuminating all his doubts of his personal growth as it slowly burns to an end. This conclusion adds to the grand ambition of the album, letting the listener revel in the ambigous nature of the singer's metamorphosis. What is certified though is the levels of beauty to this album. Kevin Parker creates wonderlands of sound, an invitation to explore on each listen, every song a trip into another land sonically, swirling downward into another place.
