This Modern Love by Bloc Party

After listening to a lot of hip hop, r'n'b, Led Zeppelin, The Cure, Radiohead, Blink 182 and a few other bands through my teens, sometime around 2005 I started getting into the new rock'n'roll and electro that was coming out of London and the States, like Pete Doherty's bands, Kings of Leon, The Strokes, LCD Soundsystem and Bloc Party.

These two New Zealand dudes Steve Dunstan and Marc Moore — fashion designers at Huffer and Stolen Girlfriends Club, respectively, but also a DJ duo — were throwing these parties called People of Paris where they'd take over the clubs 4:20 and Rising Sun on K Road in Auckland Central. We'd go crazy dancing to their mix of the aforementioned bands, post punk new wave, hip hop bangers and the mashup remixes that were huge at the time, like Biggie's Juicy mashed with Aloe Blacc's I Need A Dollar.

It was a huge musical learning curve for me, and I'd be lying if I said it didn't heavily influence me when I eventually started DJing: Because of them I first heard All My Friends by LCD Soundsystem and This Charming Man by The Smiths; plus they always played Close To Me by The Cure, which, as you might have read, is probably my favorite song of all time.

[Sidenote: That's the first time on this new blog that I've linked back to one of my other posts, which is a classic blogger move to keep you trapped on the site foreverrrrrrrrr.]

Around this time, I borrowed the compact disc musical album Silent Alarm by Bloc Party from my friend John Randerson and never gave it back. Sorry John. I played it in my car on repeat constantly. My three favorite songs were the three saddest songs: So Here We Are, Blue Light and This Modern Love (but my favorite party jam was Positive Tension).

When Bloc Party toured New Zealand in 2007 to promote the album I went (in a party bus hired by Marc Moore and Steve Dunstan!!) and at the end of This Modern Love when Kele sings, "Throw your arms around me," the girl standing next to me did just that, embracing me in a huge hug, and I remember thinking to myself, I'm going to remember this moment until the day I die, and so far this is true, and two weeks ago Bloc Party did a special one-off concert in Central Park, playing Silent Alarm in its entirety, and at the end of This Modern Love when Kele sings, "Throw your arms around me," I returned the favor, hugging the man and woman standing next to me, and at least one of us began to cry.

I will never forget that moment until the day I die!!!

The original version of This Modern Love is incredible, but there's something about this live version recorded by La Blogotheque that kills me. Kele got coerced into singing an impromptu acoustic version of the song outside a pub in Paris and it's so raw and vulnerable and real and I love it.

I LIKE YOU!