Bloc Party at Bangers in Austin on 3-17-16 during SXSW & at Governors Ball this Friday, 6-3-16.
Bloc Party is one of the more interesting rock bands in the world. They are nothing but flavorful and modern; unpredictable from minute to minute within songs, from tune to tune on albums, and from album to album.
When frontman Kele Okereke and Russell Lissack began hatching an embryonic group in 1999, Okereke’s love for electronic music was not a secret. It’s part of their secret sauce that propelled the quartet through four studio albums from 2005 to 2012. Four ended up being the final album featuring original rhythm section of Gordon Moakes on bass and Matt Tong on drums. The dreaded phrase ‘indefinite hiatus’ was heard and the safe money was on no more Bloc Party as Okereke has been DJ’ing a lot more and producing tracks over the past five years. His last solo album, Trick, was the culmination of a lot of his ideas that drew from house and techno.
So…the new album Hymns is Bloc Party Mach II – or maybe that is Mark II – with Louise Bartle on drums and Justin Harris on bass. Bartle (born in 94) is a fresh face who has gigs with Selena Gomez and Eliza Doolittle. Harris is half of the duo Menomena and has roots in East Northport, Long Island. “Making music by myself is great but I’m excited about making music with other people,” said Okereke and pointed to the beauty of getting to other worlds glimpsed only by collaboration. Harris described the recording process as being quick and seamless.
Bloc Party is slated for Friday night at 8 on Randall’s Island. Governors Ball ’16 also includes Kanye, Beck, The Strokes, Miike Snow, Fidlar, The Killers, and Courtney Barnett among other delights. Here are all the set times for the 3 day romp.