Kevin Parker has shed some light on the meaning behind the tracks on Tame Impala’s latest album. Speaking to Under The Radar (via Stereogum), the Perth band’s barefooted frontman revealed that the first single from their forthcoming album is about “how weak mean are”.

The band unveiled the first single to be taken from their eagerly anticipated third album, Currents, earlier this month. Titled ”Cause I’m A Man’, the track was certainly a curveball for most fans, with its slow-burning, ’80s R&B meets Roxy Music sound.

“Lyrically I’m not usually that out there and straight up saying things, but it’s meant to be really tongue-in-cheek at the same time,” Parker said of the tune. “The song is about how weak men are, basically, and how we make all these excuses but really we’re just these odorous male members of the animal kingdom.”

“We don’t have any self-control and are pathetic, basically,” Parker continued. “Again, that was probably a bad description of the song, but I guess I’ll let people figure it out for themselves.” However, Parker insisted the song was not sexist in nature.

“When I say it’s tongue-in-cheek, I’m not saying it’s insincere,” he explained. “The apology is sincere, but the excuse of saying, ‘Oh, it’s because I’m a man’ is the tongue-in-cheek bit. I hope people don’t see it as sexist in any way.”

“That would upset me,” he continued, “but I wouldn’t put it past people to interpret it like that because people have wack interpretations of things sometimes.” Speaking on the recording of the track, Parker said it was meant to sound “kind of sexy”.

“I’m really putting myself out there vocally more than I have before. I usually bury my vocals and sing quite ethereally and stick in a laser beam melody washed in reverb. I just love that dreamy, silvery vocal sound.

“But here I just forced myself to put myself out there and really try something more than what I would feel comfortable doing with a vocal performance. I was like ‘Fuck it, man. Just do it.'” The single in question was released as a follow-up to the swirling, eight-minute epic ‘Let It Happen’.

“For me, [that song is about] finding yourself always in this world of chaos and all this stuff going on around you and always shutting it out because you don’t want to be part of it,” Parker said of the latter tune. “But at some point, you realize it takes more energy to shut it out than it does to let it happen and be a part of it.”

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“The analogy I use is that you’re stuck in this really rapid river, and it’s washing you somewhere, and there’s a wharf at the end. You’re clutching at these branches or logs and trees, trying to not let the river wash you down. You don’t want to be washed away; you want to stay in control.”

“But at some point, you realize that you’re only wasting energy by trying to resist. You might as well let go and let it take you where it’s going to take you and let it rush you off the side of a waterfall. Who knows? It might be amazing down there.”

During the interview, Parker explained that the theme of the album deals with personal change from a first-person perspective and discussed several tracks not yet released, including ‘Yes I’m Changing’, which he has absolutely no memory of making, and ‘Less I Know The Better’, which will have a Michael Jackson / Stevie Wonder vibe.

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