Listen: Bloc Party – ‘Obscene'(Kele Okereke Remix)
Exclusive Track off Forthcoming ‘Tapes’ Mix Released October 14th on !K7
Kele switches gears from DJ’ing to producing, offering up a remix of the Bloc Party track ‘Obscene‘ off their recent ‘The Nextwave Sessions’ EP. Exclusive to his Tapes mix on !K7 Records and previously unheard, Kele transforms the dark and moody original into a UK bass banger.
“I’ve been exploring the idea of remixing other people’s music recently and I’m really enjoying it,” he says. “You can be a lot less precious about things. I turned what is a rather sombre ballad into a jacked-up early ‘90s house track. Remixing is a good way of being creative without getting too attached to something.”
Listen to ‘Obscene’ (Kele Remix)
Thought you had Bloc Party pegged? Prepare to be surprised. Make that very surprised. The London four-piece have always had an undertow of dance music, something to do with their propulsive rhythm section perhaps, but frontman. Kele Okereke’s Tapes mix for !K7 is pretty much a full-on dancefloor set, albeit one with a few twists and turns. “We always respected dance music,” explains Kele. “It’s where lots of ideas for our songs started. Our first single, ‘She’s Hearing Voices’, was very much inspired by the image of people dancing. Rhythm and groove has always been important to the band and I wanted to reflect that. I guess it’s something that I’m taking further with this mix.”
A lot further. The Tapes concept is a mix along the lines of an old school cassette tape, two sided with different moods on each. Kele’s starts in familiar territory and builds towards something altogether new. It’s a love letter to Bloc Party fans, a journey charting Kele and the band’s influences and favorite music. The mix opens with ‘I Love You La La La’ by Canadian band Do Make Say Think, a woozy drone of post rock. “They are a band I really liked before I even thought about putting Bloc Party together,” says Kele. “It’s this instrumental with atmosphere and rhythm, and it’s got this rolling jazz groove shuffling through it. It’s one of the tracks I heard in my youth that’s stuck with me. It made me appreciate how groove works with live instrumentation. Bloc Party fans will be able to hear a lot of us in it.”
It’s something for them to grab on to before things spiral off into uncharted territory, such as ‘Battle’ by Wookie. “That’s an old two-step garage track from the mid ‘90s,” says Kele. “He’s kind of a forgotten name, but I’ve always liked him. I grew up in East London, but I went to school in Essex, in Woodford. This was in the mid ’90s, so every other club was a two-step garage club. The first dance music I heard was garage. I have very fond memories of going to garage nights, so it was important for me to get some on there. It has a very triumphant, quasi-religious feeling to it, which is the reason it stuck with me. It’s almost gospel like.”
Then there’s ‘Space Alarm’ by French producer French Fries. “It’s the coolest thing I’ve heard for a long time,” Kele enthuses. “It’s this Parisian take on booty bass. You play it out and it levels everything else even though there’s so little happening. It’s very minimal but it has this huge bass sound. It’s just about people getting up and having a good time.”
Given that Kele’s parents are Nigerian, the inclusion of ‘Suffering And Smiling’ by Fela Kuti might seem like an obvious one, but not so. “When I was growing up there was always lots of Afrobeat playing at home, but I was quite resistant to it because it was the music of my parents,” he explains. “Now I’m in my 30s that’s the music I’m most gravitating towards. There’s a spiritual theme to his music. It’s about the language of joy and defiance, and it’s all groove based. It has a very hypnotic feeling because it’s just a few phrases repeated. To me it has the elements of a great dance track. It’s all about repetition. It’s trance-inducing music that’s played by real musicians. I only discovered it recently. I remember ‘Zombie’ from growing up. My parents didn’t play a lot of Fela Kuti though. They used to play a lot of King Sunny Ade, who is more high life than Afrobeat. It’s exciting to me that this really inspiring music was made by a Nigerian artist.”
Kele is keen to stress that embracing dance music whole-heartedly is no fad. He’s thrown himself into DJing. “I think it’s an artform,” he says. “It’s been quite eye-opening, seeing how you can manipulate a crowd by tweaking a mixer. It’s exciting seeing how the similarities in seemingly disparate worlds come together.” Nor does it any way signal the end for Bloc Party. “If anything this will be to the betterment of Bloc Party,” he reasons. “It’s like having an affair, then being able to come back home and realising what it is that you have. I don’t think exploring this electronic world will be to the detriment of Bloc Party. Quite the opposite.”
He pauses, before adding: “I hope that this mix will illustrate where my fascination with dance music has come from. To me dance music is about transcendence. I think this mix will show it’s not just a passing thing for me. It’s something that’s always been there and it’s something that I couldn’t live without.”
Pre-order the CD here – http://k7.greedbag.com/buy/tapes-18/
Pre-order from iTunes here – https://itunes.apple.com/album/tapes/id698064603
Tracklist:
01. Zia / Manifesto Meditations – Intro
02. Do Make Say Think – I Love You (La La La)
03. Tweak / Tony Allen – Leroy
04. Wiley – Numbers In Action (Sticky Remix)
05. Wookie feat. Lain – Battle
06. French Fries – Space Alarm
07. Bloc Party – Obscene (Kele Okereke Remix)
08. Double 99 – RIP Groove
09. Fela Aniulapo Kuti & Afrika 70 – Shuffering & Shmiling
10. Torske – Jeg Vil Være Søppelmann
11. Larry Heard presents Mr. White – The Sun Can’t Compare (Long Version)
12. Cajmere – Percolator (Jamie Jones Vault Mix)
13. Junior Boys – Like A Child (Carl Craig Remix)
14. Vaghe Stelle – The Platform (Samoyed Remix)
15. Jacques Greene – The Look (Koreless Remix)
Bloc Party online:
blocparty.com
facebook.com/blocpartyofficial
twitter.com/blocparty
www.k7.com/BlocParty