Rizzle Kicks have today (November 8) announced their first album in over a decade called ‘Competition Is For Losers’ with shimmering single ‘New Sport’ – check it out below.
Back in 2008, Jordan Stephens and Harley Alexander-Sulé formed Rizzle Kicks and went on to have major success throughout the 2010s with their fresh and unique take on UK rap, blending hip-hop with pop rather than the rising grime trend of the time.
They scored two UK Top 10 albums (2011’s ‘Stereo Typical’ and 2013’s ‘Roaring 20s’) and two platinum singles before taking a break from the limelight in 2016 due to Alexander-Sulé being diagnosed with Generalised Anxiety Disorder.
The duo will release their new album on February 14 via BMG – you can pre-order the new work here. The latest single ‘New Sport’ follows on from comeback singles ‘Javelin’ and ‘Gumdrops’, which arrived earlier this year.
Speaking to NME about their comeback in August, Alexander-Sulé revealed that the pair had been “writing for a long time, maybe three or four years on this music. We went through different phases and versions of what this next record should sound like, but the more we wrote together, the more natural it became. It became clear what the sound should be, and we met in the middle somewhere. That’s what ‘Javelin’ encapsulates what we’re feeling in the moment.”
“There are loads of moments on the album that are pretty introspective,” Alexander-Sulé added, “but we wanted this first moment [‘Javelin’] to really capture the public and show what we represent, which is fun and joy and carefree.”
Stephens said it would be easy for Rizzle Kicks “to leverage the nostalgia” and go on tour and just play the songs they are best known for. However, he explained that “me and Harley rekindling our joy of creating music together” was more important.
The Brighton duo combine funk and soul on their latest track, which has been mixed by Tucan (Superorganism, Jungle) and you can listen to it here:
COMPETITION IS FOR LOSERS. THE NEW ALBUM. OUT 14TH FEB 2025. 🏆https://t.co/UVS6IsCdtR pic.twitter.com/WxLkGPGSpJ
— Rizzle Kicks (@RizzleKicks) November 8, 2024
A press release adds that the song’s new video, which you can watch above, showcases “another creative duo…Andy Warhol and Basquiat” and explores “the idea that the art represents their new work and new sport. Art and culture is a key part of the new Rizzle Kicks world, mirroring themes from the album of evolution, growth and maturity.”
Speaking about the video, director Earthboi adds: “Rizzle Kicks were an early part of my childhood and their resurgence, still as icons was something I really wanted to capture. In the search of crafting iconicity, which largely speaks to their upcoming project, I stumbled upon a series of images of Basquiat and Warhol posed as athletes. I felt like this image fully encompasses the idea of art as a “new sport”.
Speaking about the new album, Stephens said: “We allude to the fact that we acted off the cultural encouragement and the reality of the time. I think now we’d like to believe that we’ve distanced ourselves from those just through experience.”
Themes on the album according to a new statement include sobriety: “Not in a prescriptive way. But more like we did a lot of crazy stuff, but now we don’t”, and paternity: “not just with Harley becoming a father and all the growth that comes with that role, but also in a larger sense as we get older we feel a responsibility to share our wins and our failures”, Stephens added.
The pair will also perform a sold out show at London’s KOKO this evening (November 8), with tickets for the event having sold out in less than a minute following its announcement. It will be the first time the duo have performed together in a decade.
A tour is set to follow next spring with shows planned in Manchester, Birmingham and London. They’ve also confirmed a homecoming headline shot at The Great Escape 2025 in Brighton. Tickets are on sale for the events here and you can check out all the dates below:
Rizzle Kicks’ upcoming UK tour dates are:
NOVEMBER 2024
08 – KOKO, London
MARCH 2025
19 – O2 Ritz, Manchester
21 – O2 Institute, Birmingham
22 – O2 Forum Kentish Town, London
MAY 2025
16 – Brighton Dome, Brighton (The Great Escape)
After last performing together, both Stephens and Alexander-Sulé embarked on solo careers, with the latter releasing music under his pseudonym Jimi Charles Moody.
They both found success in acting too: Alexander-Sulé had lead roles in the crime drama Unforgotten and the 2014 film The Guv’nors, while Stephens starred in the Star Wars spin-off Rogue One: A Star Wars Story and Mae Martin’s sitcom Feel Good.
