TADPOLES Release MAKE BELIEVE (SMOKY REMIX) EP
The five-track EP pairs hallucinogenic visuals with psychedelic rock rooted in post-punk, grunge, and shoegaze influences.
New York-based psychedelic rock ensemble Tadpoles have released a new EP, Make Believe (Smoky Remix). Now available on digital platforms worldwide, the EP offers a re-envisioned viewpoint on Make Believe, the 2025 EP that ended the band's twenty one year hiatus.
Paired with hallucinogenic visuals that match the EP's sonic aesthetic, the five-track journey sounds nostalgic while inhabiting a modern lens. Throughout the EP, Tadpoles possess the freeform jamminess and psychotropic qualities of cult favorites like Animal Collective or The Flaming Lips.
EP highlights like 'Something Sparkly' (Smoky Remix) offer both a sonic and visual display of trance-y psychedelic rock that helps the listener further dive into Tadpoles' unique world. Creating a timeless approach with reverb-drenched vocals and extraterrestrial synths, Make Believe (Smoky Remix) evokes feelings of wonder, mystery, and sometimes dread. Elements of post-punk, grunge, shoegaze, and indie all pile atop one another, creating a memorable and unique listening experience.
Beginning fruition in the summer of 2021, the Make Believe EP solidified an exciting new journey for the band. Continuing production through 2024, the group began production for the EP and eventual remix EP by exchanging loose ideas with their instruments, which eventually took shape into a more structural sonic foundation. A bulk of the EP's recording occurred in the picturesque Poconos mountains of Pennsylvania, originally beginning as a reunion of friends, and then turning into an unintentional comeback record.
About Tadpoles
Tadpoles turned heads in the 90's with their magnetic stage presence, unique takes on indie rock, and their affiliation with Australian psych label Camera Obscura. Founded in the 1980s by songwriter, singer, and guitarist Todd Parker as a home recording project, Tadpoles had been shaping a sound of heavy space rock and pastoral psych — laced with whimsy, feedback, and found strangeness — since coming together as a live group in NYC in 1992 with core members David Max (bass) and Nick Kramer (guitars, vocals). Gigging around New York's clubs and venues up and down the East Coast, the band released its debut album, 1994's He Fell Into The Sky, produced by Kramer (Shimmy Disc), on their own Hoboken, NJ imprint, Bakery Records. In a surprising twist, their second LP, 1996's Far Out, earned a four-star review in Rolling Stone from famed critic Jim DeRogatis — a rare feat for a self-released album.
As the new millennium commenced, the band broke apart to focus on solo projects, while Todd Parker released various solo albums, David Max joined the art and music collective Psychic TV as guitarist, and Nick Kramer focused on engineering and production, working with MGMT, Panda Bear, and Sonic Boom amongst others. After a twenty one year hiatus, the band reconvened in 2021, paving the way for the 2025 EP Make Believe, which was mixed by Sonic Boom and released on NYC label The Sound of Sinners. Nowadays, the band is gearing up for the release of Timeseeker, a fourteen song double-vinyl album slated for a February 2027 release.
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