Tame Impala’s Kevin Parker opens up about “creative strain”

Parker did add that the Arctic Monkeys frontman "can't play drums as good as me"

Sarah Jessica Parker is returning to Broadway! The former star will be joined by her husband, Matthew Broderick, in the first-ever New York revival of Neil Simon’s marriage comedy. And ET has your exclusive first look at the actors as three different pairs of couples visiting the famed Manhattan hotel. 

Sarah Jessica Parker is selling a new version of her Sex and the City character’s iconic pair of mismatched heels.

Tame Impala nab a second No. 1 in Australia with The Slow Rush (Island/Universal), while The Weeknd enters a fifth week at the summit of the national singles chart with “Blinding Lights” (Republic/Universal) and Billie Eilish cuts another slice of chart history. Kevin Parker’s Tame Impala bowed at the top of the national albums survey in 2015

Inside of The Slow Rush, there are many different markers of time. Tame Impala principal Kevin Parker has often written about how time moves—its inexorable march, its nostalgic allure, the feeling of being inside and outside its current. But his project’s fourth album really digs into the idea, as its paradoxical title implies. Parker plays with tempo and duration to make an album that exists both in the past and the present, moving quickly and strolling along at the same time.

There’s a heavyweight battle brewing on the U.K. albums chart, where new sets from Tame Impala and Justin Bieber are slugging it out. 

Tame Impala and Justin Bieber are battling for the UK's Number 1 album this week with their new releases The Slow Rush and Changes.

Tame Impala just returned with The Slow Rush, and it finds the band’s architect Kevin Parker revisiting the theme of time’s passage with an evolving embrace of the future this time around. It’s a concept that bleeds into the finer details of the LP—and he just told triple j’s Lucy Smith that the mysterious voice at the end of “Tomorrow’s Dust” actually belongs to his wife.

In typical press release form, the press release for Tame Impala’s upcoming album, The Slow Rush, makes some lofty claims. “Continuing the expansion of a musical palette that started at psych rock and shattered from [debut album] Innerspeaker upwards, The Slow Rush explores new space and sounds,” it gushes. 

Tame Impala’s hotly-anticipated fourth album The Slow Rush arrived today (Feb. 14).

“I was so in my own head about the song”

Tame Impala has released their brand-new album The Slow Rush!

Tame Impala just returned with its fourth album, The Slow Rush. The tracklist includes the previously released songs, “Lost In Yesterday,” “It Might Be Time,” and “Borderline.” This is the act’s first LP since 2015’s Currents.

Beginning with the psychedelic vibes of Tame Impala’s 2010 debut, “Innerspeaker,” the group — which, on record, is Kevin Parker alone — has gained acclaim for creating soundscapes that skirt the boundaries of pop, rock and dance music. The constant is Parker’s ethereal falsetto, which can sound like siren call from a distant world.

Tame Impala have released their long-awaited Currents follow-up. The Slow Rush is out now via Interscope/Fiction. Listen to the album below. (Pitchfork may earn a commission from purchases made through affiliate links on our site.)

Beginning with the psychedelic vibes of Tame Impala’s 2010 debut, “Innerspeaker,” the group — which, on record, is Kevin Parker alone — has gained acclaim for creating soundscapes that skirt the boundaries of pop, rock and dance music. The constant is Parker’s ethereal falsetto, which can sound like siren call from a distant world.

No matter how introspective or emotionally specific his music has been, Kevin Parker — the producer and multi-instrumentalist who records as Tame Impala — has always found a way to draw a kind of surreal, wobbly ecstasy out of it.

Both the album and "The Slow Rush Time Warp" arrive this Friday

Tame Impala’s new album, The Slow Rush, arrives this Friday, February 14. In anticipation of its release, frontman Kevin Parker sat down for an interview with Beat 1’s Zane Lowe during which he revealed how collaborating with Travis Scott helped shape his creative process.