Mike Simonetti’s «Loud Places» remix stretches the definition of the term «remix». There is nothing of Jamie xx’s wholesome production outside of his xx bandmate Romy Madley Croft’s vocal. What was once angelic is now sinister. «Loud Places» is one of the tweer songs on Jamie’s In Colour, closer to a xx song than club track. Simonetti inverses that and makes it perfect for an Italian goth techno party in the early ’80s.
Mostly it’s okay, though as in in-joke it’s excellent when he replaces the song’s bubbly crescendo of multiple sky-rising voices with the eerie noise of a horror movie soundtrack that means someone is going to die very soon. It makes his version of the track feel less like a reworking than a kidnapping.
If the original was late night TV appropriate, the remix is for snuff films. It works on headphones at your desk, too, but for a surprising reason—the late song choppy vocal panning turns Madley Croft into a devil on your shoulder, whispering into your ear.
