★★★☆☆
Lounge electro-pop with its head in the clouds, meets a deeper burning desire to get on the dance floor, which turns into a pitstop from a galaxian cruise, and returns feet to solid ground. It doesn’t sound like a best of both worlds situation hatched between Greg Paulus and Nicholas DeBruyn, particularly when some hippish rap leaves its mark as well, but all works unexpectedly well in No Regular Play’s covenant of cool.
The Marcy Hotel-educated pair look to out-dreamy other groove fantasists, with “Nameless” draping over a cosmic chez-lounge, dropped back down to earth by the techno-toothed “The Answer” taking out mumbling jazz pianos. The title track keeps the breathy vocal function over forward deep house in its keenness to look/sound the most dapper, with the first interjections of rapped rhymes acting like heavies on the door making sure you’re enjoying yourself.
Reaching for the astral doesn’t make Endangered Species a sleazy listening experience, defying a not unreasonable expectation of the electro vistas being given a lick of the slimy. “Never Had Enough” is seductive, but makes gentlemanly intentions known, cruising in a hover car with its bubble down as it does. “Kickback” is funkily playful, sounding like a Digital Underground jam for the year 3012 before providing an alternate ending, and “El Dorado” is chic deep house with a killer stab of bass interacting with the falsettos. Fashionable, yet vibrantly in touch with the common ear.
File under: Dave Aju, Jack Splash, Soul Clap