PC Music co-founder A. G. Cook released a lot of music last year, including the refreshing album Apple. He also produced longtime collaborator Charli XCX‘s great album how i‘m feeling now, which was written what feels like a thousand years ago at the beginning of quarantine. Today, he’s releasing a remix of “Xcxoplex” with XCX, a track that Cook called “the dark, industrial heart of Apple.” The remix is apparently the first song to feature both of the musicians, even though Cook and XCX have produced together across four albums.
Jagged synths open up the track to XCX’s blurred vocals. “Xcxoplex” soars to new heights during the chorus as she sings, “I close my eyes and elevate.” Cook said of the remix that “‘Xcxoplex’ started as a track called ‘Xxoplex’ made at Charli XCX’s house before I played a show at the Echoplex… My favorite songs are never-ending, existing beyond albums in the form of remixes, covers, demos, live versions and edits. When Charli and I started working on ‘Xcxoplex’ we subliminally both wanted to do something high energy—in my mind it became a kind of tribute to all the live shows and DJ sets that we’ve done together, and a way of putting the intensity of those moments back into something new.”
“Xcxoplex” with Charli XCX is the third remix of Cook’s music we’ve heard this year, but it’s the first to come with the official announcement of his forthcoming remix album Apple Vs 7G. “When I was working on both Apple and 7G, I really wanted to capture the fun, limitless potential of music—a sense that anything could happen at any time. After so many directions, it felt logical to tie up both campaigns by pitting the two albums against each other. The remixers range from frequent collaborators to longtime influences, and the tracklist includes edits and covers that happened naturally over the last few months, either as part of other people’s mixes or virtual live sets. There’s really no organizing principle other than the feeling that everything is a remix,” he said in the press release.
Watch the striking video for the “Xcxoplex” remix below. Apple Vs 7G is out May 28 via PC Music.
