Surely a basketball arena wasn’t too small for humble psych rock project Tame Impala, right? I would have said so, but the obscene lines wrapping around the outside of Barclays Center on the first of Tame Impala’s four Brooklyn concerts in support of new album Deadbeat suggested it was an underplay. I’ve been to many New York shows and many at Barclays Center, and never have I ever waited over 30 minutes in line just to enter the building.
The security staff siphoning off entrances was one thing; the sheer pandemonium around seeing Tame Impala live, most of us for the first time in several years, was another. Apparently, according to a security guard, the crowd density for this show was particularly high, and that’s why the bottlenecked entrances were employed. Some 15,000 fans were set to see Tame Impala kick off their “Deadbeat Tour,” and upon entering the arena, it became apparent why the concert felt so supremely packed: The show is in the round. The GA floor capacity was huge, and the entirety of the arena’s seating chart filled with bodies.
When I finally found my seat mere minutes before the band took the stage, the arena rumbled with such an energy you’d have thought it was Tame Impala’s final show ever (it’s not, and you can get tickets here). Sabrina Carpenter may have been across town embarking on her own mini residency of arena dates, but Kevin Parker was the hottest pop star in New York on Monday night.
So, what’s all the fuss about another Tame Impala arena tour in 2025? Their last trek, themed to their 2020 album The Slow Rush, had also been an arena run — one on the tail end of a waning pandemic and leaning harder than ever on the idea that Tame Impala shows are meant to be psychedelic marvels. To call the “Rushium” experience a trippy affair would be an understatement; the band took their psych-rock majesty and enchanting catalogue to its arena-sized apex.
Now, however, it’s time for a little more immediacy. Parker and co. have resurfaced with new album Deadbeat, which is as club-ready and dance-forward as they come. It’s designed to be communal and entrancing, with slick, throbbing beats and even slicker pop star moments from Parker. So it’s fitting that they take the Tame Impala live show experience in the round. From the center of the room, Parker and his band absorbed all of the crowd’s energy and filtered it back through their own sonic language, itself marked by Parker’s texturally-specific ear and penchant for spacey, kaleidoscopic breakthroughs.
When the band launched into an electronic-style remix during the bridge of opening track “Apocalypse Dreams,” there was a possibility that the entire concert would be the Tame Impala catalogue rendered in DJ format — a band reinterpreting their own songs is always an interesting choice, but part of me feared that for Tame Impala to truly do a rave set, it would strip the awesome power away from songs like “Feels Like We Only Go Backwards” and “Elephant.” Overall, though, the evening wasn’t exactly a Tame Impala show-meets-Fred again.. (though for about 15 minutes on the B-stage, that’s exactly what it was), but it did seek to combine the band’s two dominant modes of pulsating euphoria and hazy, psych-addled zone-outs.
But let’s say you caught the band during their last arena tour, or you’re maybe not the biggest fan of Parker’s Aussie rave stylings on Deadbeat. What’s in the new show for the casual Tame Impala fan?
I’ll tell you right now: this tour has some fucking awesome lights. Nine Inch Nails’ recent “Peel It Back” tour was a great exhibition of how creative, stylized production can greatly enhance the experience of a rock show. This show aims to do the same, and its production is pretty outstanding. On that centered stage, so much of the lighting originated from the nexus point and expanded into gorgeous panels of color. If you have ever found yourself thinking “you know, there just aren’t enough lasers at concerts anymore,” you’ll probably like what they’ve concocted on the “Deadbeat Tour.”
The screens were similarly adorned in a circle, but they shifted and moved throughout the show; as Parker adjusted his own positioning within the stage’s ovular format, the lighting rig and screens would change with him. There was a particularly entrancing ring of light that slowly bent and contorted around the stage with each movement, creating some dazzling stage pictures. The production elements were similar to the massive, tilting circle of light from the last tour, but bringing that circle of light to life in the round and fracturing it made the experience more immersive and engrossing.
Tame Impala, photo by Kevin Mazur/Getty Images
The spectacle was a treat, but perhaps fittingly, it doesn’t always distract from the fact that Kevin Parker isn’t Dua Lipa or Chris Martin. Parker’s everyman persona has been a big part of the band’s narrative over the years, even as he’s scaled up his sound and pushed his pop star impulses to the furthest limit. But no matter how outsized the production, he’ll always be doing these Tame Impala shows as just some guy. On Monday night, that meant donning a casual sweater, engaging in some rather dry small talk, and occasionally laying down on the floor and singing to the ceiling, as if revealing how Parker prefers to work privately in the studio.
In the Currents and Slow Rush eras, maybe this was an aspect of the Tame Impala experience that Parker felt he had to compensate for. Now, in the Deadbeat days — promoting an album where he explores a lowly, ‘I’m just a loser’ mentality — Parker’s casual demeanor makes even more sense.
Still, Parker’s stamina and vocal endurance were not quite tour-ready. Last night was the first time he’s played a two-hour show in over two years, and Parker has never made it easy for himself regarding range; so much of his material is situated between his head and chest voice, and even with thousands of people shouting along, the responsibility is on his shoulders to make the band’s anthems sound, well, anthemic.
But right before the encore, where he gave his hit collab with Justice, “Neverender,” a live debut, Parker noted that his voice doesn’t really sound as strong as it usually does, not really disclosing why. Parker could still hit most of the high notes, but after the first hour, it was very clear that his instrument wasn’t operating at full capacity for the tour’s kickoff.
Besides some challenging vocal moments, the only other aspect to the Tame Impala show that didn’t exactly work was, predictably, Parker’s little B-stage detour in the middle of the set. There, he sat on the floor and DJed mixes of “Ethereal Connection” and “Not My World,” two Deadbeat cuts that sprawl out and unfold without ever really feeling like they arrive somewhere interesting. The same could be said about the mid-show DJ set (which was very much the opposite of what Trent Reznor, Atticus Ross, and Boys Noize have been doing to great success during the recent Nine Inch Nails shows).
The worst thing about it, beyond the fact that the songs are pretty unremarkable, is that it halted the momentum of the show and brought the audience into a very different environment. I wouldn’t expect Parker to fully abandon the DJ set moment, given the scope of Deadbeat and his own foray into DJ-hood this year. But as much as I wanted to vibe out and surrender to the loop, I was just wondering when he’d rejoin his band and play some psych-rock songs again.
Ultimately, the “Deadbeat Tour” represents Tame Impala at a crossroads — torn between the intimate club energy that inspired the new album and the arena-rock spectacle they’ve become. When it works, like during the kaleidoscopic light displays accompanying classic “Let It Happen” or the communal euphoria of deeper cuts, it’s a testament to Parker’s ability to scale his vision without losing the plot. When it doesn’t, like during the rather monotonous DJ set portion, it exposes some of Parker’s own limitations.
Based on Monday night’s showing, it’s clear that Parker is still searching for new ways to make Tame Impala’s live show genuinely transcendent — even if he occasionally gets lost in the loop along the way.
Tame Impala Setlist — October 27th at Barclays Center in Brooklyn, NY:
Apocalypse Dreams
Dracula
Endors toi
Loser
Breathe Deeper
Borderline
Gossip
Elephant
Afterthought
My Old Ways
Feels Like We Only Go Backwards
B-Stage – DJ Set
No Reply
Ethereal Connection
Not My World
Let It Happen
Nangs
Obsolete
Alter Ego
Piece of Heaven
Eventually
New Person, Same Old Mistakes
Encore:
Neverender
The Less I Know the Better
End of Summer
