Hot Chip is clicking its heels through the chaos. The British electronic adventurers will release their ninth album, A Long Way From Kansas, Jan. 8 via Domino, previewing it with “Random Violence,” a tribute to late Optimo DJ Keith McIvor (aka JD Twitch) that finds the band turning loss into a rallying cry for music, solidarity and human connection.

McIvor, who died after being diagnosed with an inoperable brain tumor, helped shape Glasgow’s club culture as a DJ, curator and promoter. Hot Chip will celebrate his legacy with a DJ appearance alongside friends at the city’s Sub Club on Wednesday (Oct. 21), where the band first met McIvor 20 years ago.

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Group member Joe Goddard says McIvor “largely inspired the words of the song. He was a passionate music lover and a staunch believer in socialism. Many of the words relate directly to his death and to memories of being in Sub Club in Glasgow where we met 20 years ago.”

On the track, Goddard sings, “And your friends will tell their stories / About a man who spent his life / Sending songs out into the world / Tall ships in the wind,” before Alexis Taylor joins him with the declaration, “You gave me something to believe in.”

The “Random Violence” video, directed by Jack Cole, features Boss Morris, an all-female progressive morris dancing group, in a celebration of togetherness, remembrance and resistance. As group members Al Doyle explains, “We invited some woodland spirits, cursed animals and crazed dancers to join us in a celebration of humanity, remembrance and resistance. The genesis of the idea came from the Optimo Espookio Halloween parties we experienced at Sub Club and we wanted to capture that feeling in the video. It was exactly as much fun as it looks, which is to say we had an absolute blast.”

Thenew album finds Hot Chip confronting an increasingly bleak world with a sound that embraces distortion, decay and dissonance without abandoning the communal pleasures at the heart of the band’s music. It was recorded earlier this year at Goddard and Doyle’s East London studio, Relax and Enjoy,

“A Long Way From Kansas reflects the general sense that the world we live in — the world we were making our record in — is particularly harsh, discordant, violent and depressing,” Taylor says. “Maybe none of that’s new, and that doesn’t mean that every song is talking about the world and politics and genocide, but it was an unavoidable backdrop while making the music. Distortion came to be a bit of a watchword for the whole record.”

The album also features guest appearances from the Gossip’s Beth Ditto and Eddie Chacon, alongside expanded contributions from within the band. “In addition to myself and Joe, Owen and Felix are singing (Felix for the first time on a Hot Chip record), there’s also a choir and lots of group singing,” Taylor says. “I think we like opening out our interior world and bringing all these voices together.”

The announcement arrives after a busy year for the group, which appeared in the second season of Netflix’s Beef, performing live alongside Oscar Isaac and marked the 20th anniversary of its second album, The Warning, in May with an appearance on Song Exploder.

Hot Chip has also announced a U.K. and European tour for 2027, including a March 12 show at London’s Exhibition White City. The dates follow the band’s sold-out four-night residency at Brixton Academy.

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