Bloc Party's Kele Okereke Listened to 'A Lot of Nirvana' Making 'Four' Album
It's been four years since Bloc Party's last album, Intimacy, came out. In that time, the band's lead singer Kele Okereke put out a solo album entitled Boxer, while guitarist Russell Lissack and bassist Gordon Moakes focused on their own respective side-projects. This prompted several rumors that Okereke had left the band and that the "hiatus" would be more than temporary.
Obereke, Lissack, Moakes, and drummer Matt Tong quashed those rumors earlier this year and are set to release their fourth album, the aptly-titled Four, on August 20. Whereas other bands might have trouble getting back into the groove after so much time apart, Okereke says they had no problem once they stepped into the studio.
"Once we started playing it all came very quickly and it was all very instinctive how easy it was to write again," Okereke told Spinner backstage at Montreal's Osheaga Festival, several hours before the band's set.
Working with producer Alex Newport, Okereke explains that the album came together very quickly.
"We've never had a problem making an idea come together," says Okereke of his bandmates.
The first single from Four, "Octopus," sees Bloc Party turning the guitars all the way up and it might remind longtime fans of the band's debut album Silent Alarm, but the frontman says that looking backwards wasn't one of their goals.
"I think we were conscious about not trying to borrow anything from the past and make it feel like it was its own thing," he says.
When asked if there were any unlikely musical influences when making the album, the singer pauses for a few minutes before offering a Seattle-spirited answer.
"I was
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