bernard sumner and hot chip kick it for converse

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On the heels of Monday's post looking back at Electronic comes the news that Converse is releasing a brand new collaboration between Bernard Sumner, Alexis Taylor and Joe Goddard of Hot Chip, and new kid Hot City.

The UK Converse website will offer the track, "I Didn't Know What Love Was", as a free download tomorrow.

It's part of a year-long celebration of music that has also mashed up Kid Cudi, Rostam Batmanglij of Vampire Weekend and Bethany Cosentino of Best Coast, and features an upcoming release with Graham Coxon of Blur.

The Sumner/Hot Chip track would be right at home in the Electronic catalogue. The piano line is reminiscent of "Disappointed" and the song soars to equally grand synth-pop heights:

IDKWLW by oldwaver

A video for "I Didn't Know What Love Was" is due November 7. For now, enjoy Barney retrace his steps through Manchester in a pair of Chuck Taylors:

reminiscing about electronic

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Morrissey once called Johnny Marr's post-Smiths project with Bernard Sumner and Neil Tennant "totally useless".

 
I'm not going to try to convince Moz otherwise...  however, I do have a soft spot in my heart for Electronic. Sure, in retrospect I can admit the whole thing was a bit cheesy. The synths and strings were over the top, the guitar work of Johnny Marr was thin, and the entire idea of a synth-pop supergroup was really quite silly.

Still, I wore this record out. It spoke to me. Maybe it just quelled my desire for new material from the defunct Smiths and distracted me from the maybe-they're-broken-up maybe-they're-not saga of New Order. Or perhaps I just wasn't as cynical back then.

Regardless, I still get misty when I hear "Getting Away With It":



"Feel Every Beat" was another favorite, but seeing it live from 1992 you can witness hip-hop Barney starting to lose his mind:




Electronic put out three albums over the course of the 90's, none nearly as good as the first. But now that Marr has moved on to The Cribs and Sumner is carrying on with Bad Lieutenant, I think it's safe to look back on that debut with fondness.

It appears Barney does, too: