This second track from the xx's forthcoming second album plays Oliver Sim's vocals off Romy Madley-Croft's, and the result is like Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell circling each other in a space station, uniting only for the relationship post-mortem hook: "We used to get closer than this/Is it something you miss?" Jamie XX's sleight-of-hand minimalism – the off-beat kick drum, the thunder-rumble ride cymbal, the rimshot syncopation – is no less intoxicating; at present he may be the most elegant beatmaker in pop. That they also have the best haircuts in indie rock hardly matters.

Listen to "Chained":

“1999”

“I don’t consider myself a great poet,” Prince told Rolling Stone. “I just know I’m here to say what’s on my mind.” In the case of the apocalyptic party anthem “1999,” he was worried about then-president Ronald Reagan’s foreign policies. The song’s melody is based on a riff borrowed from the Mamas and Papas’ “Monday, Monday,” and Prince originally envisioned the first verse with three-part harmony but later split the vocals between himself and members of the Revolution. Because Warner Bros., with whom Prince was locked in a contractual battle, owned the original’s masters, Prince rerecorded the song and appropriately released that version in 1999.