EP Review: Page One Is Love - Aeroplane

Back when Aeroplane were a duo they felt a little bit untouchable, their early EPs on Eskimo marking them out as leaders in the newly emerged rebirth of disco. The eponymous Aeroplane, Pacific Air Race and Whispers all carving out a loose, organic take on house and disco that eskewed the previously prevailing artificial funky house sound.

Once Stephen Fasano left to leave remaining member Vito de Luca to continue operating under the same name it felt a little like the directions that could be pursued exploded. Single We Can't Fly was more eclectic, a dub-influenced track that retained the unmistakably Balearic sound of Aeroplane's early EPs but applied to a maximalist template. 

We are four years on from the release of debut album In Flight Entertainment and it feels like de Luca is re-embracing a more restrained sound, albeit applied to a more straight-up classic house template. On the heels of his collaboration with Benjamin Diamond, the title track of Page One Is Love sees Aeroplane team up with original house innovator Jamie Principle, and together they create something that sounds like it has been taken out of Frankie Knuckle's song book. Keys pound out a repeated uplifting refrain, with the track riding a warm four-four beat. De Luca undoubtedly adds a little modern polish - the track infuses that irresistible vintage house sound with perfect modern production to create a little slice of summer for your ears.

Dancing With Each Other follows a very similar template, to the extent that it could probably be mistaken for a re-imagining of the title track. Female vocals are woven into the track like an additional instrument and the track features an irresistible distorted synth in the final third that couldn't sound more White Isle of it tries. 

A remix of each track features. Cassara's take on Page One Is Love includes a shuffling US garage beat and closely looped piano melody but it lacks the heart of the original. The Ten Ven version of Dancing With Each Other fares better, carving out a clipped tech-house track that plays with filters to create some gorgeous drops. 

It is great to hear Aeroplane putting out music again and the straight up quality of the title track feels like a winning balance of nostalgia and modern house. The two original tracks here are arguably too similar to know whether de Luca has lots more to deliver, but as a standalone release this feels a bit like some of those early Eskimo releases, albeit drawing more now from classic house than disco.

Page One Is Love is out now on Eskimo Recordings, preview the title track below:

Stream: Earned It (The Weeknd Cover) - Monogem

Check out this cover of The Weeknd's single (from Fifty Shades Of Grey) Earned It, by LA musician Monogem. Real-name Jen Hirsh, Monogem turns the original into a thick and syrupy synth-heavy electronic R&B record and I can't help but prefer this version, it's just plain class.

Equally great is Monogem's current single Wait and See, a slow and beautiful electropop record. Listen to Earned It below, then check out the video for Wait and See further down. You can catch Monogem live in LA on September 1st for Tunesday's acoustic music series at the Soho Mondrian.

Stream: I'm Yours - Hans Island

I'm Yours is the new gloriously sun-kissed single from Hans Island, a collaboration between Canadian producer Mawhs and Scandinavian singer Marie Dahlstrøm. It's a record of blind infatuation, Dahlstrøm's vocals enraptured and besotted. The soundscape Mawhs creates is gentle like waves that lap gently against the shore - sensual, intimate, and just a little bit hard to resist.

Stream: Envy - Peter Lyons

Envy is the latest release from UK artist Peter Lyons, and on it he weaves dubby, looped R&B production, classical strings and Thom Yorke-esque vocals to create this stunningly dramatic track.

The track is taken from Lyons' forthcoming EP Oh, To Pull You Up and follows on from his debut single Leave Me back in March. Lyons also features as one half of pop-folk duo Peter & Kerry, was featured on Bonobo's Late Night Tales album and has composed music for Sadler's Wells.

Oh, To Pull You Up will be released on 2 October 2015.

Album Review: Death Magic - Health

Death Magic arrives more than five years since Health released their last full studio album amid a swirling cacophony of noise and smoke that seeps out of the speakers like a sort of toxic presence. It sucks all the air out of the room before accusingly asking you what the hell you have been up to for the last half a decade, because Health have been doing THIS.

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Death Magic - Health

Following Get Color and their second remix album ::DISCO2, Health's soundtrack to the Rockstar video game Max Payne 3 pointed to their future. More cinematic in scope, the sound exhibited on that record felt distilled and amplified. Where the lo-fi production of The band's first two albums helped create the aesthetic the band are known for, their newer sound is all the darker for removing the blinds and letting the sheer volume stand tall and pure. Sometimes a little polish actually lets you hear more.

On original song Tears, taken from that Max Payne soundtrack, Health experimented with a more melodic sound combined with their trademark wall-of-noise - the result was an emotive centrepiece for the game's climatic final scenes, but more than that it stood out as the band's strongest work to date. Death Magic is what happens if you extend that widescreen ambition, a heart of darkness and an ear for pop music into full album territory, and it sounds a lot like the future.

After opening track Victim seeps into your skull it is brutally savaged by the slamming and acerbic bass of Stonefist, a track that feels like a break-up letter from your soulmate delivered wrapped around a brick. It is a stunning statement of how Health see music in 2015. Having toured with Nine Inch Nails in 2008 it is easy to see the LA band as Trent Reznor's natural successors, and if they are then Death Magic just might be their Downward Spiral. 

The melodic edge and pop melodies introduced on Tears, and now here on Death Magic, only make what surrounds them feel more ferocious. The synths and big chorus of Flesh World (UK) rumble through a darkly blank vacant space, like Joy Division lost in the corridors or a warehouse rave, complete with lasers and a smoke machine.

And between those brief moments of light there is so much darkness. Early interlude track Courtship gets a sequel, and it is a pummelling assault on the senses. Even when the vocals echo through the darkness with innocent melody the vocals are often loaded like a switchblade, deeply cynical tells of a relationship so dysfunctional. 

Only on Life, positioned at Death Magic's middle, does this apparent discomfort ease... Chants of "I don't know what I want, know what I don't, know what I want... No, nobody knows, nobody does, nobody knows" sound like they could be a confused anthem for a confused generation. It's weirdly uplifting - an abandonment of trying to understand and control everything.

The feeling you are left with is that Death Magic is what happens if you extend a widescreen ambition, a heart of darkness and an ear for pop music into full album territory. And it sounds a lot like the future.

Death Magic is out now through Loma Vista Recordings. Order on iTunes.