Late last year, the Blessed Madonna released her first solo single in half a decade, “Serotonin Moonbeams” featuring Uffie. Today Marea Stamper is back with another collaboration, this time with Chicago house pioneer Jamie Principle. Per Stamper, it’s a track years in the making:

I wrote and recorded a version of this alone in my attic over a decade ago, writing the lyrics on the back of a record sleeve and recording them into a blackberry under a blanket. I distorted my own vocals on the original, but imagined that the song would someday be performed by Jamie Principle, arguably the first real writer in house music and my hero. Jamie had recorded the original demos of Waiting On My Angel, Your Love and so on as a teenager at home in the ‘80s. Later on they would be reengineered by Frankie Knuckles and company, becoming worldwide smashes and fundamental pieces of the story of Chicago house. Eventually, years later, Jamie and I met, sitting next to each other at Frankie’s memorial and we’ve been beloved friends ever since. “We Still Believe” never felt done correctly, so I bought the rights to it back. Jamie kindly agreed to re-record the song I wrote for him before I knew him and here we are, writing the next chapter together and doing it the way I imagined it all those years ago.

“We Still Believe” is somehow both euphoric and understated, a contagiously funky groove that maintains the utmost control. “We still believe in love,” Principle says before the final beat drop. “We still believe in being ourselves.” Listen below.