Tame Impala: Innerspeaker

Label: Modular

People have been coming into the store and asking about this album for more than a year. Even though Western Australia's hottest export since...since...well, I have no idea, sorry, but Perth quartet Tame Impala are about that good. More than a year since their debut LP, Innerspeaker, came out Down Under, it still sounds fresh and undated to American ears -- mine and yours. Sounding a bit like Dungen in their easy swirl of melody, Tame Impala throw a spectrum of guitar techniques and textures into the air and every single one works: the airy mass and angelic vocals of "Solitude Is Bliss," on which guitarist Kevin Parker almost coos, "No one knows how I feel," sounding like an early-'90s Creation band; the fuzzed-out "Desire Be, Desire Go"; and "The Bold Arrow of Time" makes me think of a band that perfected "Smoke on the Water" in its garage and immediately moved onto the Spacemen 3 catalog. The album might've gotten to the States quicker if it had swam, but now that it's here -- no complaints. Dig it.