Kevin Parker

Kevin used this compressor to get the drum sound on lonerism. “Compressors are what make awesome drum sounds. So I have a couple of vintage compressors. One of them is a dbx 165 that’s pretty much responsible for making the drums sound like John Bonham. I got it purely by chance. I bought it just before working on Innerspeaker because I felt like I should get some boxes with knobs on them with the album budget. I thought, ‘alright, I’ll just go on eBay and get a vintage compressor.’ I didn’t even know what I was doing the first time I used it, but I put the drums through it and it sounded pumping, like hip hop — it sounded awesome.”

"Tim Holmes (of Death In Vegas) was with us, encouraging me to use more professional methods, like running the mic through Neve preamps and running the bass and vocals through an (Empirical Labs) Distressor." - Kevin Parker from this Tape Op article.

In the bottom-middle of this photo of Kevin's effects board, a Boss BR-600 Digital Recorder can be seen. This pedal is the pedal behind the famous synth guitar tone that appears on many Tame Impala's songs such as Alter-Ego and Why won't you make up your mind.

I got a few new keyboards. All i had last time was a Roland Juno 106 and a Sequential Circuits Pro One.

I fell in love with those naff' 90's sounding keyboards. I've got a Roland JV1080 synth module that you can plug a midi keyboard into

"I'd mixed one of the songs on the little Boss [BR-864] 8-track until it sounded good and, without knowing it, I'd completely limited the whole thing by putting the master fader of the final mix up until it was flat lining!"

Beside Kevin there's a Sequential Circuits DrumTraks. Probably used in the studio and as the first part to the songwriting process.

In this screenshot of Kevin's rack from the 'Lonerism' episodes, a DBX 166XL can be seen in the middle of all his rack mounts.

In this photo of Kevin's rack during the Lonerism episodes, a Shure SE-30 Gated Compressor can be seen underneath the KTG.

At 2:11, it is possible to see Kevin Parker playing an Akai MPK Mini.

It says on the Sound on Sound article published July 2020 "Another important element in the punchy drum sound that Parker achieves is the fact that he'll often feed a stereo mix of them onto one of his three reel-to-reel tape machines — a Revox B77, Ampex ATR-700 and TEAC A2340R — for added saturation.

"I'd say probably half of the drums on the album were run onto either the Revox or the ATR. I bounced some drums, put them on the tape, took them off and then never went back to the stems. Even if it didn't sound right, or something could've been better, I didn't go revisit from before the tape. It was like, 'These are the drums now... deal with it.'"

"since then i got a Motu Ultralite, which is my new love. we got three of them on stage at the moment. "

In this article it states : "The main adjustment to his mixing routine has been an analogue summing setup that takes that task out of Ableton Live’s hands and adds a bit of colour to the stereo bus. He bought two 16-channel Lynx Aurora converters that feed a pair of passive 16-channel RMS216 Folcrom passive summing mixers. The sum of the 16 stereo channels hits a pair of Neve 1073DPA preamps first to “crunch the mix up” and make up gain, then an SPL Vitalizer, the one piece he’s had for a while and is “just like a glorified EQ that adds a bit of artificial valve quality.” The last thing strapped across the master bus is a Manley Vari- Mu compressor before it gets fed back into the DAW to print. The gear doesn’t see any use other than for mixing, so it allows Parker to leave it set up and return to any mix at will. “I’ve always loved mixing with Ableton,” said Parker. “But I love the sound of a mix being crunched together in analogue. I love the sound of a desk, but I hate not being able to recall any time I want. I flit between songs, sometimes every few minutes. It goes completely against my workflow to have to set up for one song by going around the room and setting EQ knobs on a desk and adjusting faders to how the mix was last time. It’s against how I’ve grown up working.” For the recording of Tame Impala's album Currents

At 1.03 of this video from the Lonerism Episodes, a Chandler TG2 can be seen in Kevin's rack.

you can see two br recorders on Kevin's desk, the large one in the middle is a Br-1600 used for recording Innerspeaker.

In this photo of Kevin in his home studio, an SPL Vitalizer can be seen on his rack module behind him.

Kevin Parker uses a customized Studer 900 Series Console for his mixing needs. This is highlighted in a post on the official Tame Impala Instagram account, where the console is visible. Studer consoles are known for their modular design, allowing users like Parker to swap out parts for personalization.

Seen above the KTG-1. I believe this is the vocoder/sampler Kevin explained as the "vocoder" effect in "Let It Happen"

'"Let It Happen," there's this part at the end where I'm singing through this keyboard sampler thing, almost like a vocoder but not really" (http://undertheradarmag.com/news/tame_impalas_kevin_parker_discusses_let_it_happen_in_cover_story_outtake)

**after a bit of research and watching a few videos, this is definitely what he used on Let It Happen.

in this video kevin is using the digidesign pro tools controller in 1:24.

At 0:47-0:52 seconds you can see a Lexicon Prime Time Digital Delay model 93 sitting in one of his racks with a Roland SDD-320 Dimension D and what looks to be another Lexicon effects unit (maybe a reverb or multi-effects) above it.

In the YouTube video "Tame Impala - FIFA 21 World Premiere," Kevin Parker can be seen with a Roland SP-404 in his setup. While it's unclear if it's the SX version, the sampler is visibly part of his gear.

In this image, it is possible to see an Akai MPK25 next to Kevin Parker.

Througout this video the Roland Space Echo RE-201 is shown directly behind Kevin in his studio

In this post the TR-808 is shown on the top rack to the left of Kevin Parker

The vintage oscillosope can be seen at 0:03 and other times through the video teaser for the album "The slow rush"

Kevin Parker uses the Mackie Onyx 1640i Firewire Mixer, as seen in a user-uploaded photo on Tonedeaf.

You can see the Teczon 4 track cassette recorder in this picture on the back of the Lonerism album.

This is a photo taken during the recording sessions for Innerspeaker. The entirety of Innerspeaker was recorded to a Boss BR-1600. Kevin considered it an upgrade as he was already fluent with recording with the BR-864.

At 0:47-0:52 seconds you can see Roland SDD-320 Dimension D sitting in one of his racks with a Lexicon Prime Time Model 93 and what looks to be another Lexicon effects unit (maybe a reverb or multi-effects) above it.

In a post on Instagram by Tame Impala, Kevin Parker is shown with two Roland TR-707 Rhythm Composers, highlighting their use in his setup for "One More Year."

At the 0:02 on the slow rush video promo there's a klark teknik DN60 real time spectrum under the oscilloscope