Kele Okereke’s Musical Banquet
SixtyFour Talent’s new composer signing, Kele Okereke, first found fame as the singer in acclaimed British rock group Bloc Party. He has gone on to release a range of solo records ranging from atmospheric folk, electronica and ambient soundscapes. In 2019 Kele scored his first musical, the acclaimed ‘Leave to Remain’ with British screenwriter Matt Jones (Doctor Who, Shameless). The musical took sonic inspiration from West African highlife music and fused it with a contemporary electronic score. Kele is currently working on its follow up, ‘Tristan’.
We caught up with Kele to tell us about a few of his favourite scores and syncs from over the years.
Probably one of my favourite adverts ever is the breath-taking Sony Bouncy Balls ad, featuring Jose Gonzalez's cover of The Knife's song ‘Heartbeats’. The combination of the striking visuals paired with the stripped-back fingerstyle guitar makes for something quite mesmerising.
When it comes to music for games, my favourite is definitely C418 aka Daniel Rosenfeld’s score for Minecraft. The understated score is sublime; sparse piano compositions weave in and out, never overstepping. It has definitely helped to introduce ambient music to a new generation.
The first TV show where I really remembered the score was David Lynch's Twin Peaks. Composed by Angelo Badalamenti, everyone knows the title theme with its naive motif and its light jazz sonics, but its the eerie calm mixed with the subtle suggestion of impending horror on tracks like ‘Laura Palmer's Theme’ that ultimately resonated with me. The sense that there was something very wrong under the surface is so clear in this music.
I watched David Fincher's Social Network recently and was immediately struck by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross’s score: placid electronic and percussive grooves transform and coalesce in the background but never intrude. I was really impressed by the world the score evoked, even though it was quite separate from the world of the narrative. It really complemented the tense, neurotic nature of the film.
Another film score that really stuck with me was Koyaanisqatsi, by Philip Glass. I remember watching it when I was at university. The film is an experimental dialogue-free non-narrative directed by Godfrey Reggio consisting primarily of time lapse footage of natural landscapes. Exploring humanity’s relationship with nature and technology, it’s the addition of Philip Glass's minimalist score that really helps to create something daring yet at the same time entertaining.
