At first, Aeroplane‘s emergence as one of the top acts within Belgium’s Eskimo camp presented a bold new direction in millennial disco. The then-duo of Vito De Luca and Stephen Fasano put its own spin on the proceedings, injecting healthy doses of Daniele Baldelli and Italo’s flighty arpeggios into the cosmic-Balearic label’s m.o., making the sound infinitely more palatable—or at least more popular. By the time We Can’t Fly, the pair’s debut full-length, rolled out in 2010, anticipation was at a peak. Unfortunately, the members of Aeroplane had already passed their own. The record lacked the impact of much of the pair’s earlier work, and Fasano actually left the group even before it was released. Given that, offering up another single from We Can’t Fly, especially one as dubious as “I Don’t Feel,” several years later might seem like overkill, but enlisting Swiss deep-tech authority Deetron for remix duties does brighten the prospects considerably.
Ditching the misguided guitar riffing of the original entirely, Sam Geiser does what he does best as Deetron, significantly upping the amount of depth and nuance. The pitter-patter drumming of “I Don’t Feel”‘s disco roots remain, but takes on new meaning with the added weight of two churning synth lines, one quick and delicate, the other a broad stroke of muffled screams. Together, they give the track a deep complexion, one that’s fully realized with the addition of a billowing sub-bass line and rapid-fire vocal snippets which sound like they’re being fired from an MPC; it’s a potent mix of modern bass-techno and classic Detroit. It also creates a better bed for diva-soul veteran Merry Clayton, who sounds less out of place here than over the original’s prog-disco. At least with the help of Deetron, Clayton’s work here recalls Masters at Work’s heyday. That said, the likely course of action for most DJs will be to flip to the b-side’s instrumental mix, as Deetron’s production stands just as tall without a vocalist. There’s no feeling that something has been omitted, save for all but the faintest traces of the original, and in the face of the remix treatment here, that’s not anything that’s likely to be missed for long.
