Ride with James Blake into the world of avant-garde electronic music. Blake returns from his hiatus with "If The Car Beside You Moves Ahead."

After a year of inactivity, the British musician is back with a brand new single and a music video to match. Directed by Alexander Brown, the music video released on Thursday, Jan. 25, turns an ordinary night drive into an almost futuristic light show reminiscent of 2001: A Space Odyssey.

Blake Is Back

"If the car beside you moves ahead / As much as it feels as though you're dead / You're not going backwards," Blake sings.

In "If The Car Beside You Moves Ahead," Blake uses his own chopped up and distorted voice as an instrument backed up by synths and metronome. Together with the bright lights of the music video, the song creates a hypnotic experience.

The track is the first original song released by the London-based artist in two years. His third and most recent album, The Colour in Anything, was released back in 2016.

He has been silent for the past year but, on Christmas, he released the studio version his cover of the famous Don McLean single of the song "Vincent," that recounts the life of the renowned painter Vincent Van Gogh.

Blake has been routinely performing the song during his concerts. "Vincent" is now available to stream or download from all major services.

The music producer also contributed to the soundtrack of the upcoming superhero movie Black Panther. He collaborated with Kendrick Lamar, Future, and Jay Rock on the song "King's Dead."

Blake will reunite with Lamar in the coming months for a series of concerts. The electro singer-songwriter will perform the opening act for the rapper's DAMN tour across Europe.

In a previous interview, the 29-year-old artist talked about his collaboration with Lamar. Blake revealed that he has been sending music to the rapper and one of them eventually became "ELEMENT," a single from the album DAMN.

"Sounwave and the rest have a really good understanding of how music works and I was really excited about to hear it," he told The Fader. "When that got sent back I was like, 'Oh God. We should do this again.' We'll see about the future but hopefully we'll be able to sit down and piece things together."

Blake will also head out to the United States this summer to perform at the 2018 Governors Ball in New York City. He will also hold a show at London's Roundhouse on Feb. 5, Monday.

Join the Discussion