Tame Impala have covered Seal’s “Kiss From a Rose” for triple j’s “Like a Version”, returning to a song Kevin Parker loved as a child. The Australian musician said the “Batman Forever” soundtrack, which featured the track, was the first CD he bought. The session also included a new live performance of “Dracula”, bringing one of the group’s own songs into the same studio.
Tame Impala chose a familiar 1990s song for their return to “Like a Version”, performing Seal’s “Kiss From a Rose” with layered voices, synthesisers and guitars. The performance appeared on October 30 alongside an interview with Kevin Parker. He explained that the selection reached back to the beginnings of his own record collection, rather than a recent discovery.
The connection starts with the 1995 film “Batman Forever”. Parker remembered going to the cinema to see it and being struck by its music. He bought the soundtrack on CD and played it repeatedly, getting to know every song. It was the first CD he had purchased, giving the collection a particular place in his memories of listening as a child.
“Kiss From a Rose” was one of his favourites on that soundtrack. Long before Tame Impala gave him an opportunity to revisit it professionally, Parker knew the recording through repeated plays at home. His account linked the cover to that personal experience, rather than presenting it simply as an opportunity to tackle a widely recognised hit.
Seal originally released the song in 1994 on his second self-titled album. Its inclusion in “Batman Forever” the following year helped bring it to a much larger audience. The recording reached number one on the US Hot 100 and won three Grammy Awards, including Record of the Year and Song of the Year.
Those achievements form part of the song’s wider history, but Parker’s introduction came through the soundtrack rather than an awards ceremony. For him, it was a recording embedded among the tracks on a CD he knew thoroughly. Returning to it meant approaching music that had been familiar well before he started making his own.
Familiarity did not make the decision to perform it straightforward. More than one member of Tame Impala had considered choosing the song, but the musicians initially hesitated because of its demands. Seal’s distinctive voice and the shape of the vocal melodies raised the question of how they could perform it convincingly within their own abilities.
Parker acknowledged that none of them sounded like Seal. Accepting that difference helped the group proceed without treating the session as an attempt to reproduce the British singer’s delivery. They could retain the song while finding an approach suited to the musicians in the room, allowing their own ensemble sound to determine the performance.
He also described a composition more complicated than it might seem on a casual listen. Although it does not depend on an unusually large number of chords, its changing rhythms and contrasting sections require attention. Knowing the recording as a listener was different from working out how each part should function in a live arrangement.
In the Tame Impala performance, vocal harmonies provide a central feature. The other musicians’ voices gather around Parker’s lead, while keyboards and guitar maintain the gentle, melodic character of the piece. The arrangement stays close to the composition’s basic structure, changing its texture through the performers’ sound rather than discarding the melody listeners already recognise.
The recording took place in triple j’s studio as part of “Like a Version”, where visiting artists perform a song of their own alongside a cover. That format gave the group room to place an older favourite next to its current material. Both performances were filmed and made available for viewers to watch. The live session lets listeners hear both selections in one setting, with the same musicians moving between familiar material and their own song.
This was Parker’s fourth appearance in the series. His earlier selections included OutKast’s “Prototype” in 2013, Kylie Minogue’s “Confide in Me” in 2015 and Edwyn Collins’s “A Girl Like You” in 2020. The new choice extends that sequence of covers, with the childhood soundtrack connection providing the explanation for this particular return to the studio.
Alongside Seal’s song, Tame Impala played “Dracula” from “Deadbeat”, the album released in 2025. This was a different live presentation of the group’s own recording, again giving synthesisers and voices a prominent role. Its arrival around Halloween also placed the title in a seasonal setting, while keeping the session’s second performance focused on original material.
The studio visit followed the end of the Australian leg of the “Deadbeat” tour. Concerts had taken the group to cities including Brisbane, Melbourne and Sydney, before two homecoming appearances in Perth on October 24 and 25. The radio session offered a smaller setting immediately after those shows, concentrating attention on the arrangements and performances.
“Kiss From a Rose” has attracted other covers since its release, but the Tame Impala selection comes with Parker’s own account of why the song mattered to him. No announcement of a new album or separate recording release accompanied the performance. It remains a filmed live interpretation of a childhood favourite, paired with “Dracula” within the programme’s established format.
