Antony Hegarty might not be an obvious choice to rework the title track from Brooklyn synth-drone wizard Oneohtrix Point Never’ recent album, but his dismantling of the humid, unreal original is truly astonishing. Gone are the synths, echoes, and other layers of dreamy distance. In their place, just Hegarty’ voice and Daniel Lopatin’ skeletal piano. Hegarty couches his trademark vocal flutter and yet completely inhabits the sparse lyrics about love and machines. In fact, he makes them nothing short of devastating. There’ some light double-tracking of his vocals, lots of open space, and a pairing of voice and piano that recalls Gary Jules and Michael Andrews’ famous take on Tears For Fears’ “Mad World’. Words linger in the air – especially the aching refrain “Returnal, you’ve never left / You’ve been here the whole time†– as the track mines emotional richness and catharsis without drama or strain.
A lush tinkering of the A-side, Christian Fennesz’ flip employs that voice and piano among the basic elements but plays with the distance of those and other bits. Fennesz sustains the depth of certain piano notes beautifully, and though the track is overtaken by vague washes of sound throughout, that artificial air is a welcome contrast – or melding, really – with the pure and grounded source material. It builds at one point, but there’ no big release. Rather, the track just fills up and drains away again, leaving us gaping.
Available as a vividly designed 7-inch or digitally, these two tracks make for an odd, cleansing experience.
Doug Wallen
