Mouse on Mars teaming up with Justin Vernon, the mastermind behind Bon Iver makes so little sense that it makes perfect sense. The Berlin duo of Andi Toma and Jan St. Werner, who’ve spent 25 years on the pioneering fringes of electronic music, might appear to have little in common with the bearded Wisconsin singer-songwriter, who has come to personify the rugged, sensitive folk musician. The reality is more complicated, and so it couldn’t be more fitting that their first collaboration sounds like, well, a Mouse on Mars track.

Toma and Werner have a long history of bringing intriguing possibilities out of their collaborators. And Bon Iver have been growing more experimental in its own right, to the point that the anxious glitches of 2016’s 22, A Million sound potentially influenced by Mouse on Mars, in hindsight. Their cross-generational pairing on “Dimensional People Part III,” the first single from Mouse on Mars’ upcoming album Dimensional People, continues in this abstracted direction, with twitchy blips, fragmentary sax skronks, and Vernon intoning evocative phrases like “ready to pass the torch” and “Did it hurt?” There’s a jazziness here, too, that suits Vernon’s honeyed vocals. Once again, Toma and St. Werner have molded a perfect world for their featured guest—and for themselves.