Sally Shapiro: "I'll Be By Your Side"

Cold winter evenings never sit with the stereotypical ideal. There're no muffled shoppers slipping home to tonal, amber fires and slow brandy; the streets aren't shrouded in fog and shimmering pearlescent illumination. The Christmas lights are chasing themselves around the wall and the walls are weeping with condensation. Inside it's warm, but it's still and empty -- it's just another night. Sally Shapiro's lithe, phased voice bleeds out, crushed with frost and twinkling white light. A glacial blue neon synth ache frames her attempt at empathatic dancefloor release, riding a hollow Italo disco heartbeat before falling in time with her acceptance that none of this will turn her lover's head. It's all internal: these promises are meant for no one. She's dancing alone under a cool sapphire spotlight and no one's waiting to take her home.

Everyone wants to be able to deliver that undeniable plea, a pure moment of emphatic perfection to sway the mood. Producer Johan Agebjörn understands this, constructing a swelling icy sea of disco heartache that clings to the 80's like Antony Michael Hall clung to John Hughes; his Moroder affectations ultimately pull Shapiro under the waves, her voice finally succumbing to the lonely realisation in a ghostly vocodered fade. All that's left is an empty chill as the house lights go down.