St John-at-Hackney, the patron saint of subdued art-rock, can rarely have seen such delirium. When Bloc Party unleash fidgety funk-punk favourites Hunting for Witches and Positive Tension there’s genuine pandemonium; at the segue from Bret Easton Ellis tribute Song for Clay (Disappear Here) into early hit Banquet the venue ignites like an Adele ticket hotline.. “I was having so much fun in the last song my belt got stolen,” singer Kele Okereke appears to say through a PA made of marshmallow; indeed, few among tonight’s distracted congregation would notice what Gwyneth Paltrow might call a conscious unbuckling.
The euphoria greeting these urban noir rockers’ return, even in a venue that tends to act as a pillow to the face of sophisticated rock music such as this, is born of relief. As recently as March, Bloc Party looked a crumbling lost cause. Bassist Gordon Moakes tweeted his departure following drummer Matt Tong’s 2013 exit, while Kele appeared to have disowned rock altogether in favour of a solo career as the Ilford Weeknd. This comeback – with a new rhythm section and sensual, quasi-religious fifth record, Hymns – is as unexpected and exciting for the indie class of ’05 as a punctual Pete Doherty.
As they weave their compulsive pop malevolence – Russell Lissack’s guitar sketches subterranean labyrinths; Okereke’s voice shrieks torture-dungeon confessions – the tide of alternative culture flows directly through Bloc Party tonight. Nodding to their forebears, Kele drops in snippets of Pixies’ I’ve Been Tired and Björk’s Big Time Sensuality and revels in the way new track Virtue resembles the Killers’ Mr Brightside in a cryogenic stasis. Meanwhile their own influence on Alt-J and Foals radiates, respectively, from Signs and Flux, the mathletic electropop hit that, somewhat ironically, sets off crowdsurfing chaos to Kele’s entreaty of “we need to talk”.
As expected from a band who mutated from funk-punk indie rock to visceral death disco over their first three albums, the Hymns material is peppered with signs of creative engines still sparking: the goblin vocal effects on Different Drugs, or the dubstep warps on The Love Within, which resembles Flat Eric piloting a fighter jet. They exhibit their progressions boldly, indulging the layered gothic textures of Eden and daring to dampen the climax of the main set with the downbeat romantic paean Exes. But it’s the thrill of seeing these cult titans back from the brink that has them roared back for two wild, celebratory encores – Helicopter, This Modern Love, She’s Hearing Voices – despite the house lights rising and Okereke insisting his voice is shot. Their state of flux is over; St John wishes he’d installed a safe room.
