Disco has long been about more than dancing. Hercules and Love Affair (2008) was born of mainman Andy Butler’s first recovery from addiction. Success plunged him back into the lifestyle. Omnion, this New York outfit’s fourth album, finds Butler living clean again, producing slinky and varied club bangers alongside off-plan songs with greater undertow. From Anohni onwards, guest singers have figured; here, the Horrors’ Faris Badwan gets sultry on the synth-pop of Controller, while Sharon Van Etten voices Butler’s tremulous side on the title track, one gilded with unexpected, lyrical brass. The overall impression is still a kind of fretful hedonism, in which returnee vocalist Rouge Mary soulfully verbalises “a choir of pain” on Wild Child while Butler’s beats percolate relentlessly on.
