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Bloc Party's Kele Okereke releasing solo debut, moving to NYC, playing Webster Hall (and other dates)

Kele

Kele Okereke is moving to New York.

The Bloc Party frontman fell in love with the city while recording his debut solo LP ‘The Boxer’ and is determined to relocate within the next few months.

He said: “Making a record has really made me fall in love with New York. I’d never seen the soul of the city until I recorded my record there.

“It made me realise I have to move there. I’m going to move there this year.” [Monsters and Critics]

Kele will be playing his soon-to-be hometown with a Wednesday, August 4th show at Webster Hall. Tickets go on sale Friday at noon.

The debut was produced by XXXchange (who did Spank Rock’s last record) and comes out June 22st on Glassnote. Its single, “Tenderoni” (hopefully a worth addition to the list of songs with that name), is expected before then.

Kele’s band, Bloc Party, have been on indefinite hiatus since October – they played Terminal 5 last March.

When the band decided to take a hiatus after five straight years of touring, Kele had originally intended to walk away from music for a year. But when downtime presented itself, he found his creative impulses were too strong, and ended up booking himself some exploratory time in a recording studio on a whim. Alone with an engineer, he gravitated towards new instruments, hardly ever picking up the guitar. “I plugged in synths with no idea what they would do. I began programming drum beats, which I had never done before. It was completely back to the drawing board. It was exciting and terrifying. In most cases, I sat down, pulled a drum beat out of nowhere, and arranged stuff around that. It was as exciting to me as the first time I picked up a guitar.”

In that dancy vein, Kele guested on a track on Tiesto’s album that came out last year. That song, The Boxer tracklist and all tour dates (in Ireland, UK and Europe) are below…

Tiësto feat. Kele Okereke – It’s Not The Things You Say

“The Boxer” tracklist
01. Walk Tall
02. On The Lam
03. Tenderoni
04. The Other Side
05. Everything You Wanted
06. New Rules
07. Unholy Thoughts
08. Rise
09. All The Things I Could Never Say
10. Yesterday’s Gone

Kele Okereke – 2010 Tour Dates
May 14 – Dolans, Limerick IE
May 15 – Cyprus Avenue, Cork IE
May 16 – The Academy, Dublin IE
May 17 – Spring and Airbrake, Belfast IE
May 20 – E-Werk (Electronic Beats), Cologne DE
May 21 – Prinzenbarhalle, Hamburg DE
May 22 – Weekend Club, Berlin DE
Jun 12 – Warehouse Project Fest, Manchester UK
Jul 16 – Melt Festival, Germany DE
Aug 04 – Webster Hall, New York NY
Aug 27 – Rock En Sein, Paris FR
Aug 28 – Leeds Festival, Leeds UK
Aug 29 – Reading Festival, Reading UK
Aug 31 – Ibiza Rocks, Ibiza ES