Rating: 8 / Available on: Kitsuné Maison 7

In the first half of 2008, Heartsrevolution – an ice-cream truck-driving duo from New York – put out a 10″ EP on Kate Moross’ Isomorphs label called Switchblade. It featured five great songs, the best of which, ‘Digital Suicide’, ended up as FACT’s official track of the year. Not much happened after that – the band toured a lot, but the only physical output they had consisted of re-releases, remixes and compilation appearances. There’s never been a proper follow-up to Switchblade, basically.

‘The Rose and Her Prince’ doesn’t represent a physical follow-up, but it’s a new Heartsrevolution song, from Kitsune’s next Maison compilation, and it’s the best thing they’ve done that isn’t ‘Digital Suicide’. Because Heartsrev are best when they’re not making bolshy electro: ‘Digital Suicide’ might have had that crunchy intro, but what made the song was the deep-mixed, Steve Shelley-style drumming, the star-eyed keys and Lo Safai’s subdued vocals. They’re most affecting when they go all the way over to the organic side (like the Lullaby version of ‘Digital Suicide’ that ended Switchblade), and that’s what they do here, Lo even getting croaky and quotable with the “I’ve got the weight of the world on me” line, in what seems like a hark back to ‘Suicide”s “stop the world” refrain. It’s pretty short, but stick it on repeat for half an hour and you’ll remember just how good this band are.

Tom Lea