Currents

"Atmospherically potent" is perhaps the best way to describe the new album from Tame Impala. Appropriately entitled "Currents" synth-musician Kevin Parker, the man behind the moniker, dares his audience with this melodically fluid journey, a revelry of electronic beats and euphoric syncopation that is elaborately dense and enjoyable.

There's a sizable depth in the profound arrangements which are transcendently reminiscent, and yet refreshingly contemporary. The electronically enhanced vocals could have been a distraction but playfully work to ingest each full-length track with a musicality that is magnetic. Once you've set upon the current, you ultimately have to let it take you anywhere and everywhere.

As far as pop music is concerned, the spectrum has been so heavily saturated with commercialized EDM and lost upon copycat irritants, that when something like Tame Impala present a song as eloquent as "Yes I'm Changing" and pair it with the harder edge of its follow-up "Eventually," the musical landscape feels liberated to at least some extent. Creativity soars!

It doesn't take long to relent to the beat especially when it's delivered on the dance-floor ready "Gossip" which easily stimulates every after-hours, ambient desire, but is only solely intended to set up the following track "The Less I Know the Better," which has a stylized feel that will evoke 70s and 80s electro-pop. Some of the album's transition elements are eerily well devised, solidifying the album.

As a whole, "Current" is wonderfully experimental, and features some provocative singles. One particular track to keep on "repeat" is Track 9 "Disciples" while the somber-sense of "Cause I'm a Man" has a quality that hopefully will allow that track to excel in longevity. This song has a romantic groove that benefits greatly from Parker's vocals -- landing it at the top of sexy hits of the summer.

"Currents" blends several wonderful textures into a full-length album that is engaging and entertaining. There's a presence that is worth exploring, but the lack of a bombastic hit single -- a song that can penetrate beyond Tame Impala's fanbase -- make for an album that although will resonate with the artist's audience, it sort of keeps it all contained. Hopefully the current is strong enough to take it upstream.

Tame Impala "Currents"
CD and Digital Download
$10.99
2015 Universal Music Group