Photo credit: Fiona Garden
Hot Chip have announced their ninth album A Long Way From Kansas – set for release on January 8 via Domino, it finds the band at their most primal. Paraphrasing The Wizard of Oz, the title is a nod towards Dorothy, her dog and the distance they needed to travel to get back home and find some sense of normality.
The first single to be shared from the record is “Random Violence,” a majestic tribute to Optimo’s Keith McIvor which sets the tone for the album. A passionate socialist, Keith (aka JD Twitch) was a DJ, a curator and one of the country’s most forward-thinking promoters, a man who inspired the power of positivity in the people he worked with and played for — an effect echoed in what Al Doyle calls the song’s “human connection.”
Joe Goddard says: “Last year in September our old friend and brilliant DJ Keith McIvor of Optimo in Glasgow passed away after a diagnosis of an inoperable brain tumour a few months earlier. He largely inspired the words of the song. He was a passionate music lover and a staunch believer in socialism. Many of the words relate directly to his death and to memories of being in Sub Club in Glasgow where we met 20 years ago.”
On “Random Violence,” Goddard sings: “And your friends will tell their stories / About a man who spent his life / Sending songs out into the world / Tall ships in the wind” before Alexis Taylor joins and proclaims: “You gave me something to believe in.”
Directed by Jack Cole, the video for “Random Violence” features the all-female progressive morris dancing group Boss Morris and is a beautiful celebration of togetherness, music, resistance, love and a life well lived. They shall not pass.
“We invited some woodland spirits, cursed animals and crazed dancers to join us in a celebration of humanity, remembrance and resistance. The genesis of the idea came from the Optimo Espookio Halloween parties we experienced at Sub Club and we wanted to capture that feeling in the video. It was exactly as much fun as it looks, which is to say we had an absolute blast.” – Al Doyle
