Isaac Howlett x A State of Flux – Spiralling

Isaac Howlett is best known as the front person of Empathy Test, one of the more consistently compelling acts in contemporary synthpop. His solo work runs parallel to that project and has been carving out its own identity. “Spiralling,” a collaboration with European collective A State of Flux, is the strongest evidence yet of what that identity looks like when it operates in a more solo capacity.

The instrumentation marks a departure from his previous solo single “House of Cards,” which leaned heavily into a retro synthpop feel. “Spiralling” pushes further forward, landing closer to futurepop territory. The production from A State of Flux is immediate on the surface and rewards closer listening underneath. Dance-floor rhythms paired with layered textures that carry emotional weight rather than just sonic movement.

But it is the lyrics that define this track. Howlett draws directly from lived experience, building the song around something his late grandfather said: “depression runs in the men, on your mother’s side.” That line sits at the center of the song and everything radiates outward from it. The verses move through anxiety, loss of control, and the particular pain of knowing your suffering is affecting the people around you. The emotional delivery is extraordinary. The pain comes through completely and without artifice.

“I felt like a time-bomb waiting to explode,” Howlett has said of the song’s origins. That tension is present in every bar.

This is the kind of song that justifies the collaboration format entirely. Two distinct creative voices finding a piece of material that needed both of them.

Label: Self-released Released: July 3, 2025