After losing two band members since their last album Four, the new Bloc Party line-up got back into the recording studio and back on stage. Bassist Justin Harris and drummer Louis Bartle blended seamlessly into the band for the NME Awards Tour 2016, in which the band were accompanied by alternative rock two-piece Drenge, nineteen year old musician Rat Boy, and Mancunian grime artist Bugzy Malone.

The supporting acts varied in quality, with the main supporting act Drenge inspiring less excitement than the searing Bugzy Malone and nominee for NME magazine’s Best New Artist 2016, Rat Boy, who certainly proved his worth with an energetic performance.

Bloc Party, however, were the main spectacle. They opened their set with the incantatory Only He Can Heal Me from their latest album Hymns before moving straight into one of their biggest hits, Hunting for Witches. This opening proved effective but the balance between new and old material was not quite right. Fan favourites such as This Modern Love and Banquet were omitted in favour of some songs for their new albums and the notably youthful audience appeared visibly sapped of their vivacity and energy during the middle of the set, where a lot of their new material was being played in succession.

As Kele Okereke returned after a somewhat contrived interval, proclaiming “we have a few more rockets in our pocket”, and the tracks Flux and Helicopter, both powerful singles from early in Bloc Party’s career, were played one after another, the band’s deep and beloved repertoire was made delightfully patent. The powerful guitar solo at the end of Positive Tension elicited an appropriate eruption of dancing and commotion in the mosh pit and Mercury was neatly accompanied by the intermittent sounds of a saxophone.

The lighting was used to great effect throughout, shifting between abrasive flashes during the fast-paced tracks from the noughties and dimmer atmospheric beams for their more mellow new material, including the surprise inclusion of the 2005 single Two More Years, for which Kele took to the piano. The lighting even accentuated Kele’s towering shadow onto the walls during the barrage of hits at the beginning of the concert.

As the NME Awards Tour 2016 draws to its conclusion, the band’s energy and talent remain unabated, even with the two notable losses in their line-up. The imbalance in favour of their new material was the only real problem with the set, but this is understandable for a band touring their new album. It is difficult for a band of Bloc Party’s calibre to keep all their fans satisfied, and even as they showed off to the audience of their strength and depth, more of their first two albums, Silent Alarm and A Weekend in the City, would certainly not have gone amiss. After all, just like NME itself, they are an integral part of the teenage years of so many. A reminder of that would have been very welcome.