Bloc Party, and another story
Mild claim to fame first of all: I was Bloc Party's first bassist. A mutual friend gave Kele (then known as Roland) my number and he asked if I'd be up for joining his band.
I rehearsed with them for a few months, and went through about four drummers in that time.
(Once, memorably, a drummer played for two minutes in the practice room before it became clear he couldn't drum - Kele faked a pathetic "I want a day off school mum" cough, apologised to the drummer and said "I'm not feeling well, maybe we will practice again next week")
Back then the guitarist, Russell, was already fucking excellent and inventive. I was alright on bass, and Kele was not a brilliant singer or a great guitarist, but was painfully shy, though clearly had all the ideas for the direction.
The songs were alright - in fact the best sign that they knew what they wanted to do was that songs that to me sounded fucking excellent were ditched in favour of songs that attempted something different, to mixed success.

Anyway, I played one gig with them. It was a disaster. Maybe twenty people were there.Kele's stutter got exponentially worse with his nerves, and the more he stuttered the nervier he got.
At one point he tripped over his guitar lead and didn't quite go arse over tit, but he got very embarrassed and lost the confidence he had - in the next song he stopped playing mid verse to tune up while the rest of us played on - he then almost hid on stage for the rest of the time.
I liked their music, and had one further rehearsal, but I found them quite awkward company, and have never been nervous about playing - I also think they weren't massively impressed with either my musical ability or rapport with them, and so I stopped going to rehearsals and they stopped phoning me.
Only problem was I'd lent Kele my guitar.
I bumped into him once while he was on the way to a rehearsal, and he clearly had my guitar in his bag, as when I asked him about it he got all shifty and couldn't get away quick enough, saying he would give me a ring and get it back.
The next time I saw him was when I realised that the band I'd been in were now pretty massive. I emailed Kele and he said he'd lost the guitar somewhere along the way.
Friends of mine still shout "where's Keef's guitar?" whenever they catch Bloc Party at a festival
(clinteastwoodbradfield, Sat 27 Jul 2013, 10:46, 3 replies)

did you ever sing kele okereke's name to the tune of the hokey cokey?
i'd like to think you did.
( janet aylia y'all motherfuckers need jesus, Sat 27 Jul 2013, 21:24, closed)