‘One Step Away’ was the track that drew the most attention for me in the short film ‘Confessions II’, but the one that disappointed me the most after hearing the full album. It seemed as if all the interesting moments in the composition had already been revealed in the one-minute teaser: some beautiful lines about how little separates us from the dance floor, described as an endless well of release and happiness, and a climax clearly built around Madonna shouting for freedom. Then, nothing.
I was wrong. ‘One Step Away’, our Song of the Day today, is in truth a carefully measured production in which the very few added details—on the techno kick, that is, a handful of piano notes, very light touches of deep house in the synthesizers, whispered voice samples, the classic percussion of house music—are elevating the track beyond its peak.
Frustrated by the drift of social media and the time we devote to it, perhaps also frustrated because young people no longer go out and prefer to stay home scrolling on their phones, the artist has written the entire album remembering that ‘we’re only one step from freedom, a breath from the dance of life’.
With a certain ‘free jazz’ inspiration, the exquisite production by Stuart Price is a solace for those of us who can no longer listen to Róisín Murphy’s music. It also calls to mind the existential angst present in Everything But the Girl’s ‘Walking Wounded’ (1996), for it isn’t entirely clear whether hope can exist in such desolation. The brightest ‘ray of light’ appears when, at the end of the song, the production makes way for the luminous ‘Bring Your Love’, which is undoubtedly the best transition on ‘Confessions II’. One cannot be understood without the other.
‘One Step Away’ is not one of the four singles we’ve released from ‘Confessions II’ nor does it look likely to be the next single if there were one. It doesn’t even have a chorus. The lyrics are built with anaphora, but there is no chorus as such. If there were more singles, ‘Bizarre’ with Martin Garrix or ‘School’ could work miracles on TikTok. But it doesn’t matter because this is the kind of track that, without commercial ambitions, carries an album to another place. Perhaps, specifically, to the Grammys.
Ultimately, this is the track that hides, in its spoken recitation, the album’s total concept, a concept more meaningful than it seems and that, as such, was pitched in Warner’s first press release: “People think dance music is superficial, but they are completely wrong. The dance floor is not just a place, but a threshold, a ritual space where movement replaces language. Can you feel it? Because I can feel it.”
