Kele Okereke appears to criticise Kanye West in the lyrics for his new song ‘Jungle Bunny’.
The single, which arrived earlier today (September 4) along with the announcement of his next album ‘2042’, features lines that namecheck the rapper (‘Ye’) and cite Calabasas, the Los Angeles city that he lives in.
‘Jungle Bunny’ hears Okereke muse about “the responsibility of the black entertainer” in an era of profound “public racism”.
The lyrics in question read: “He’s trying to run/he’s trying to run to outrun a gun/he’s gone full Ye/and he’s starting to feel that shit might pop off.” Later in the track, he rants: “you go back to your home in Calabasas/with your wife and your kids/safe in the knowledge/on a gated street/where life is sweet/but no one looks like you.”
The lyrics hint at a dig at Kanye, who drew the ire of the black community, fans and contemporaries alike last year by making a number of politically incendiary comments and cosying up to Donald Trump.
Okereke has said of the song: “There is a history of black entertainers feeling that after they have achieved a certain level of success that they are above discussions of race but that idea is a delusion. As a person of colour living in the western world, it does not matter how much wealth one accumulates, race will follow you wherever you go.
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“With ‘Jungle Bunny’ I wanted explore this idea: In a time of such rampant division and public racism, what is the responsibility of the black entertainer?”
‘Jungle Bunny’ is the Bloc Party frontman’s first solo release since January’s soundtrack album ‘Leave To Remain‘ and 2017’s solo record proper, ‘Fatherland’. It’s released on November 8, 2019. Pre-order the album here.