Alexis Taylor & Mike Simonetti – “Perfect Kiss”

There is a small, unsettling pleasure in hearing a title and expecting one thing, then getting something else entirely. “Perfect Kiss” is not New Order’s “The Perfect Kiss”; it borrows some of that late 80s sheen in its bloodstream but ends up its own strange, warm creature.

Alexis Taylor arrives here with a short but steady solo run behind him. Paris In The Spring landed a couple of months ago and made the rounds among Hot Chip faithful — the album is intimate and uneven in a good way, even if its release framed by AI-generated promo clips felt a little clumsy. Hot Chip themselves have been doing weird crossovers of late: they popped up in the second season of Netflix’s Beef, with an over-eager Oscar Isaac leaping onstage to play keys. That kind of pop-cultural wobble matters because Taylor’s best moves happen when he lets songs sit in the public square, half-private, half communal.

He pairs up with Mike Simonetti for this new 12″ — Simonetti being one half of Pale Blue and the longtime label figure behind Italians Do It Better and, earlier, Troubleman Unlimited. The single is a neat, old-fashioned record: the new original “Perfect Kiss” backed with a cover of Bonnie Prince Billy’s “I See A Darkness” and remixes from claire rousay and Black Forces. It lands 6/12 on Smugglers Way.

On first listening “Perfect Kiss” feels like two songs in one. Taylor opens alone, voice low and vulnerable over a plucked acoustic pattern; the verses sit in a domestic hush. Then, without a forced moment of theatrics, Simonetti slides in claps, a pulsing synth bass and a steady four-on-the-floor that lifts the tune into a small, euphoric panic. It swells into a dancefloor-ready chorus that somehow keeps the intimacy intact. There are chords and melodic turns that nod to New Order, but this is clearer about hiding melancholy behind sugar-slick pop hooks, not mimicking a catalogue.

Taylor and Simonetti met in a more analog context: Taylor caught Simonetti DJing at Output in Williamsburg, the now-closed club that felt like a second home to many Brooklyn kids a decade ago. “I was really excited about the re-edits he was playing that night,” Taylor said, and you can hear that edit-minded approach in the way the single rearranges acoustic and electronic pieces so they fold into each other.

“I grew up listening to the radio on drives with my parents,” Simonetti told me, “on trips to the Jersey shore. I was raised on pop and the radio. The songs Alexis and I make are going to have pop elements, even when the subject matter isn’t strictly pop. That’s the beauty of a good song – hiding darkness behind a pop hook.”

The “Perfect Kiss” video, shot by Brian Deran on Super 8 in Los Angeles, leans into memory and heat. Grainy, sun-faded frames give the piece the texture of a cassette you find at the back of a box: handheld shots, quick slips between interior and street, and moments that feel personal rather than staged. Taylor, Simonetti and Elizabeth Wight (Simonetti’s Pale Blue partner) appear throughout, sometimes performing, sometimes just occupying small rooms and city corners. The Super 8 aesthetic makes the whole thing feel like a private band practice leaked onto the sidewalk.

For fans, this single matters because it promises more than a one-off. Taylor has spent years balancing the private and the communal in his work; Simonetti is someone who frames pop as both club-time and radio-time. Together they nudge at a space where a song can be tender, then propulsive, and still feel lived-in. The B-side cover of “I See A Darkness” is a smart counterbalance too — a darkness rendered in an acoustic palette that complements the A-side’s lift.

It is, in short, a record that expects listeners to move: to sit with it, then stand up. Put on the single and listen for the edit points, the moments when a clap or a synth line pulls you toward dancing while Taylor keeps whispering whatever the song is about. That tension is the appeal.

“Perfect Kiss” is out 6/12 on Smugglers Way on 12″ with remixes from claire rousay and Black Forces. If you like the halfway place between bedroom confession and late-night club, this will land nicely.