Pitchfork Forkcast: On Repeat: Aeroplane [ft. Kathy Diamond]: "Whispers" [Stream]

On Repeat: Aeroplane [ft. Kathy Diamond]: "Whispers" [Stream]

When anyone around here other than Mr. Burns mentions aeroplanes, they're probably talking about In the Aeroplane Over the Sea. Or The Aeroplane Flies High, all right? Belgium's Aeroplane slip the surly bonds with spacey, romantic disco on "Whispers", a sultry vocal by UK disco diva Kathy Diamond putting what would've been a blissful instrumental over the stratosphere as a regret-choked pop single. "I'm lifeless," Diamond sings at one point, but the ecstatic handclaps, strobe-like synths, funky bass, and sighing backing vocals make it sound as if the narrator has found a freedom to cut loose since you been gone. That doesn't mean she's happy-- "I couldn't care less" isn't quite "carefree"-- but it does mean she's going to dance the night away, to music that would sound just as good on some Balearic morning-after. "We were dancing in the moonlight," Diamond repeats, already in the past tense. It shouldn't come as a surprise that Norwegian disco cosmonauts Prins Thomas and Lindstrom included Aeroplane on their BBC Essential Mix last year; equally unsurprising, though incredibly exciting, is news that Hercules and Love Affair give the track a pared-down remix on the flipside of this 12".