Erasure's Tomorrow's World

Key concept for 21st-century Vince (Clarke) & Andy (Bell): convergence. That's right, everything's getting closer together, in the mix, in the lyrics, and not so as to stumble and fall, but so as to stand shoulder to shoulder. I'd be more suspicious of this all-togetherness (shepherded by producer Frankmusik, born the same year, 1985, that Vince & Andy set up shop), except that, one, in today's climate of us-vs.-themness, "It will fill us with fire.... We will fly into heaven" forms a not-out-of-line anodyne; and, two, Vince topped off the sound with some of his old analog synths pulled out, perhaps, for that Yaz reunion.

Frankmuiskally, you can't tell where old tech ends and new tech begins — again, convergence — and even the audible Autotune or its equivalent integrates into this approach, melding one of Andy's sweet soul tones as much as possible into the next and simultaneously infusing otherworldliness. Think rave music with repetition dialed down a few hairs, all-oneness weighted down deftly with soul music's classic concerns. The lyrics wonder why you aren't closer (except for the cracked actress in "Whole Lotta Love," Zeppelin's "wanna" swapped out for an arch we-don't-want'cha); everything else sets out that same closeness. Come to me lover, sit down by the fire — cybernetic though it may be — and, hell, melt with me. "Then I go twisting," and in twisting, two sets of arms manifesting the turning, the rotary engine, and finally that helix in which resides life, lies the transcendence. The mighty divine sigh.

• Album: Tomorrow's World
• Artist: Erasure
• Label: Mute
• Songs: (1) Be With You (2) Fill Us With Fire (3) What Will I Say When You're Gone? (04) You've Got to Save Me Right Now (5) A Whole Lotta Love Run Riot (6) When I Start to (Break It All Down) (7) I Lose Myself (8) Then I Go Twisting (9) Just When I Thought It Was Ending