Bloc Party

- Founded in London in 1999

- Kele Okereke (vocals, guitar)
- Russell Lissack (guitar)
- Gordon Moakes (bass)
- Matt Tong (drums)

The music of Bloc Party has been compared to others of their generation, such as Franz Ferdinand and Razorlight, but also 80’s post-punk bands: Okerekes singing style is reminiscent of The Cure, the group’s use of bass/drums can remind us of Gang of Four, and their debut album “Silent Alarm”’s photo of a deserted, snow covered landscape seems seems nostalgic of Joy Division.

The first initiatives to Bloc Party began in 1991, when Kele Okereke and Russell Lissack met each other at the Reading Festival.

When the bass player Gordon Moakes joined the two the year after, the group began practicing under the name Angel Range. The band did not have a steady drummer before Matt Tong came in the beginning 2003. The band changed their name the same year, first to Union, and later Bloc Party.

In the start of 2004, the band’s debut single was released in 500 copies, and three months later another single came along, ‘Banquet’. Both songs were later gathered on an EP.

The band gradually started to attract a good deal of attention from the English music press, and the third single, ‘Little Thoughts’, acheived a spot on the English Top 40.

In July 2004, the group ventured to Thomas Troelsen’s Deltalab studio in Copenhagen to record the debut album with Paul Epworth as producer.

The album was in the end of 2005, awarded “Album of the Year”, by the influential English music magazine NME. In February 2007 the band’s second studio album was released, ‘A Weekend in the City”, which included Bloc Party’s highest charting American single, ‘I Still Remember’. The band’s newest studio album, ‘Intimacy’ was released in August 2008.

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