Review
Genre and Mood
Jan Blomqvist sings and Animal Trainer remix on Big Jet Plane (Animal Trainer Remix), a deep house reworking of a much-loved folk song. As a remix it keeps the original’s tenderness but sets it in motion, and the mood is melancholic, dreamy and full of longing, the sound of watching city lights recede from a night-time window seat.
Song Summary
Big Jet Plane is a song about wanting to fly away with someone, a gentle fantasy of escape. Blomqvist’s version keeps his hushed, close vocal at the centre, and Animal Trainer wrap it in a rolling, late-night groove of deep bass, soft percussion and pads that swell and recede like breathing. The memorable detail is the contrast between the fragile voice and the steady, propulsive beat beneath it.
Musical Breakdown
The remix runs to six minutes and forty seconds and takes its time getting airborne.
Intro
A soft kick and gentle percussion establish a patient pulse, with airy pads hovering above.
Build-up
The bassline rises out of the mix and the percussion tightens, a slow taxi down the runway.
Verse 1
Blomqvist’s voice enters, intimate and slightly weary, floating over the groove rather than riding it.
Chorus
The familiar melody of Big Jet Plane lifts on swelling chords, the moment the remix feels truly in flight.
Bridge
The beat falls away and the vocal hangs in the air, a quiet, almost weightless passage.
Climax
Drums and bass return with more weight, pushing the emotion to its peak without breaking the hypnotic flow.
Outro
The arrangement thins until only the pulse and a final vocal echo remain, like a plane disappearing into cloud.
Concepts in Focus
This track is a remix of a cover, and that double step is the lesson. Dantze released Blomqvist’s version with two remixes, by Niconé and by Animal Trainer, digitally in November 2011 and on a 12-inch in January 2012, where the original played at 45 rpm on one side and the two remixes at 33 rpm on the other. Animal Trainer stretch the track from Blomqvist’s 5:51 to 6:40 and give it more of the steady, rolling motion of deep house; the voice and the melody stay, the frame changes.
Underneath it all is a cover version. The 12-inch calls side A, Jan Blomqvist – Big Jet Plane, Blomqvist’s interpretation of Angus & Julia Stone – Big Jet Plane, which Angus Stone wrote and first recorded under his alias Lady of the Sunshine. Blomqvist sang the cover himself rather than sampling the original vocal, which is why the remixers had a voice of his to work with. Put the three versions side by side and listen for the one thing that never changes: the title melody.
Artistic Context
Jan Blomqvist, born Jan Freter in 1982, moved to Berlin at nineteen, studied aerospace engineering and mathematics before giving them up for music, and played his first show at the Berlin club Tresor in 2008. Big Jet Plane, produced with his keyboardist Felix Lehmann, was his first single, released on Dantze in 2011; his Ink EP followed in 2012, and a rooftop video for its song “Something Says” made him known internationally. Animal Trainer are the Zürich duo of Adrian Wöllhaf and Samuel Gmür; in 2016 they compiled and mixed the 53rd edition of the German magazine FAZEmag’s mix series.
Impact and Reception
The remix has become a regular in melodic and deep house sets, the kind of track that works in sunrise and closing slots where a recognisable song can gather a whole crowd. It is on this playground because it bridges folk intimacy and club hypnosis so gracefully. Listen to it on a night flight, or just imagine one.
