- Arbutus
![“No One Like You” artwork](http://web.archive.org./web/20170726131036im_/http://media.pitchfork.com/photos/5977532f6e0b9374ad06f01c/1:1/w_160/ABT061_Tenderness_Digi-3000_Alt.jpg)
Listen to the track below
“No One Like You”
Blue Hawaii—the avant-pop duo of Raphaelle Standell and Alexander Kerby—completely reinvented themselves in the last four years. Their past records, Blooming Summer and Untogether, were ennui-filled projects exploring humid vacations and breakups. They were electronic records, lush with textures but grounded by their very blue emotions. Tenderness, their new record, is much more airy in construction and concept: The record will explore more explicitly digital realms by looking at the complications of online relationships, romantic or platonic, expressed in a sound that they described as “Björk meets the xx and DJ Koze.” They dug through disco deep cuts and 1990s house to arrive at this sound, and it bears itself out in the sparkly dancefloor sing-along and first single, “No One Like You.”
The track is built-around a sample of Kenix’s “There’s Never Been (No One Like You),” and Blue Hawaii’s new song is more or less a reinterpretation of the original. The production submerges the synth rhythms and drum shuffles in reverb and echo, still resulting in the brightest Blue Hawaii song they’ve ever released. Standell’s vocals augments the production’s jauntiness, dropping the austere and choppy delivery of her previous records, for something bouncier and more straightforward. It was unlikely listening to their past records that Standell and Kerby would try their hand at house diva mimicry, but in the end it's a great look for them.