Bloc Party: The Prayer

First thing you notice: the Satanic Red Indians are back. Here they come out of the mountains, making their first attack on the Bloc Party wagon train since ‘Banquet’; circling a dark electro-voodoo drummer and firing flaming darts of war chant foreboding over ‘The Prayer’. Second thing you notice: Bloc Party’s sinister soul swagger is back, having been left on the bus to the studio to record stop-gap single ‘Two More Years’. ‘The Prayer’ sizzles, snaps, clicks and fizzles with nervy, pent-up pop energy – an ADD-rock, inner-city classic: “Tonight make me unstoppable/And I will charm/I will slice/I will dazzle them with my wit” jitters Kele Okereke over a synth chorus like a deranged Killers trying to gnaw their way out of a padded cell, and what emerges is a song equally suited to soundtracking a pilled-up night down the last ever Trash and the first ever vampire version of The Fast And The Furious. As fresh and vital as the best of their ouvre; as the new-rave tsunami threatens to wash away all before it, Bloc Party have masterfully bolstered the barricades. Welcome, Kimosabe, to new brave…