Bloc Party have announced a short run of shows in the US to support the release of their current album 'Intimacy'. - Source

Bloc Party's third album 'Intimacy' has already been released in MP3 format so Xfm spoke to the band to find out why they decided to do a 'Radiohead'... - Source

Some folks think Bloc Party's "Mercury" sounds like "Shock The Monkey," an idea reinforced by the Planet Of The Apes video for the track. The CD version of the single comes with remixes of the track by CSS, Flosstradamus, and John Lydon (one of those is a lie), which could possibly dampen some of the Peter Gabriel echoes. Or not. We have CSS's fizzy "Mercy" shakeup via YouTube, where it's busy scoring someone's game of Audiosurf, a game I know nothing about. - Source

BLOC PARTY have announced a new leg of U.S. dates (the first since drummer Matt Tong's illness forced the cancellation of their last jaunt.) We've got 'em over on the Tours page...

Jools Holland took to the stage (um some stage?) in London this morning to announce the shortlist nominees for this year's Mercury Music Prize. As I'm sure you all know, this is one of the most prestigous awards to be given out in the UK music world... as well as the fabulous cash prize of £20,000. Personally it lost a little prestige in my eyes the year they overlooked Pulp's "His n Hers" in lieu of giving the prize to M People. Upon reflection I'm sure they now agree with me... anyhoo...We'll find out September 6th exactly who won but for now we can all argue about the list below to suss out who deserves it most...

BLOC PARTY and NPR are offering a recording (MP3 or stream) of the Party's DC show at the 9:30 Club last Thursday as a free download. If you want to hear what the boys had to say... as well as play you can also stream an interview that ran on All Songs Considered.