loop duplicate my heart

This week I’ve found two songs that rank amongst my absolute favourites this year, and both feature wonderful vocal looping that locks you in for the duration and leaves you feeling shaken and uncertain when they end.

Born Ruffians are a fantastic new band from Canada, whose quirky and skittish yet grounded and heartfelt songs have been bouncing around my headphones all week. The pop-math textures of “Foxes Mate For Life” are particularly holding my repeat button hostage. But this remix of their “I Need A Life” by Four Tet is in a different league. A conflation of his older bucolic sound with his new interest in the precision of minimal techno, it sets a series of beautiful clockwork creatures in motion, most effective of all being the cut-up and looped vocals of the Ruffians. The moment where the piano chord changes kick in on 5.21 is just perfection.

Born Ruffians – I Need A Life (Four Tet remix)

Julianna Barwick made one of my favourite songs of last year with her performance of “Dancing With Friends” for Portugal’s “Ma Fama” radio show. When performing she uses a core vocal loop that she builds other live loops around to create a swimming haze of intertwined melody. This track is from her Daytrotter session which at no point drops below absolute neck-bristling gorgeousness.

Julianna Barwick – You Were Waiting (Daytrotter session)

Listen and let the world click into place for a few minutes.