Tim: We’ve only featured one of Rhys’s tracks before, and also only one of Felix’s. Hers we liked; his not so much.
Tom: Liked is an understatement: Last Dance turned out to be one of my favourite tracks of last year.
Tim: Let’s try a combination, then.
Tom: Well, that takes its time to get going, doesn’t it?
Tim: Weirdly, I got a sense that this was about to get special a second or so before it actually did, so I listened back and realised there’s some brilliant production work going on.
The first verse is of the variety that could go either way – massively overblown vocal samples, deep r&b, even tropical, wherever. That pre-chorus makes it a bit clearer, but then it’s the 1 minute point, where there’s a very brief rising string bit, which suddenly drops into an absolutely lovely chorus – and just that tiny bit makes it sound so so good.
Tom: And that chorus, in turn, explains the verse: oh, that’s why it sounds like that. I do reckon that this track would have been better by briefly previewing the chorus at the start — I nearly tuned out — but perhaps it’s just a grower. It’s no Last Dance, but it’s certainly got a spark of the same genius.
Tim: We’ve no lengthy traditional build to get up hopes and expectation that might not be met, nor a really sudden shift, but just a tiny, almost imperceptible interlude, saying ‘hey, you’ll enjoy this’. And I really did. I’d say it’s great anyway, but that one smidgen of a note switched it up to brilliant.