Three years since the release of ‘Nothing Is True & Everything Is Possible’, Enter Shikari are back with a new album.
This week saw the start of the first stint of Enter Shikari’s 3 month ‘residency’ shows, taking place across the UK during February, March and April, at venues in London, Manchester, Wolverhampton, Bristol & Glasgow, all in celebration of their upcoming album ‘A Kiss For The Whole World’ (released April 21st).
Tonight we’re at the recently renovated and re-opened New Century Hall in Manchester, a gorgeous 1960s music hall, which once played host to the likes of Jimi Hendrix and The Rolling Stones.
Kicking us off this evening are German outfit Blackout Problems, made up of Mario Radetzky (vocals & guitar), Marcus Schwarzbach (bass), Moritz Hammrich (guitar) and new drummer (from March 2022) Marius Bornmann.
Hailing from Munich, the band released their third album, ‘Dark’, back in 2021, and put out their first ever live record ‘Live & Lonely’ in October of last year.
Tonight sees them bring the energy from the word go, as, after being on the stage for mere seconds, vocalist Mario Radetzky climbs over the barrier and disappears into the crowd for opening number ‘Murderer’.
The band keep this frenetic pace throughout, with a circle pit forming during fourth song ‘Darling, before a large portion the crowd raise their hands for the following track ‘Rome’.
Closing with ‘Germany, Germany’, Blackout Problems have got the night off to a fantastic start and have won over several new fans in the process (myself included) judging from the reaction around the room. Ones to watch this year and beyond.
Second on stage tonight is Noahfinnce, who, I must say bears a striking resemblance to a certain Billy Joe Armstrong! He dives into an eight-song set of catchy pop-punk with tracks from albums ‘Stuff From My Brain’ (2021) and ‘My Brain After Therapy’ (2022).
During third song ‘Mind Blank’ the crowd begin to get involved and, as requested by Noah, a circle pit forms, before the anti-tiktok anthem ‘LaLaLa’ brings about the first sing-along of the evening.
Noah wraps up his set with the trio of ‘Life’s a Bit’ (which starts with a sneakily short intro of Fall Out Boy’s ‘Dance Dance’), ‘Worms’ and ‘Stupid’.
The crowd are ready for their headliners now, with rallying cries of “Oh, Enter Shikari!!” and “And still we will be here, standing like statues” (taken from ‘Enter Shikari’, the opening track of debut album ‘Take To The Skies’).
Not only is tonight a sell-out, the entirety of these ‘residency’ shows sold out and sold out FAST. Next month Enter Shikari return for the second leg, with As Everything Unfolds and Cody Frost, before their final stint in April sees them hit the road with Tokky Horror and Higher Power.
The lights go out on stage, the wait is almost over now, as a single red pulse dances across the LED poles situated along the back of the stage before the whole room is lit up in shades of yellow and orange. Enter Shikari have arrived.
They launch straight into their debut single from ‘A Kiss For The Whole World’, the catchy and hopeful anthem that is ‘(pls) set me on fire’, which, despite this being only its second live outing, goes down equally as well as some of their more classic tracks displayed tonight.
The set, however, gets off to somewhat of a false start, as during the opening number, frontman Rou Reynolds pauses and, upon noticing that Rory Clewlow has retreated off-stage after the briefest of appearances, apologises to the crowd that ‘We seem to have lost our guitarist….so we’re going to have to leave, but we will be back as soon as possible’.
Technical difficulties will, and do happen, but there is a silver lining to all of this, we get to watch ‘(pls) set me on fire’ from the beginning once again, and this time they make it through, with confetti cannons firing from both sides of the stage and into the audience.
Next up is ‘Radiate’ from 2013’s ‘Rat Race’ EP, performed live for the first time in over 4 years, which see’s Reynolds joining Clewlow on guitar, followed by ‘Juggernauts’, which will never fail to get a crowd going, and sees the first of what imagine are hundreds of crowd surfers tonight.
‘The Void Stares Back’, released in 2022 in collaboration with Wargasm is given new life in the live setting, slotting into the set perfectly before latest single ‘It Hurts’, a song Reynolds describes as being ‘about perseverance, and the importance of reframing failure as a fruitful and, in fact, pivotal route to progress’, is given its second ever live showing.
Next up we have the ‘Quickfire Round’, where Shikari give the audience snippets of ‘Common Dreads’’ ‘Havoc B’, 2022 single ‘Bull’, ‘The Last Garrison’ from 2015’s ‘The Mindsweep’ and arguably their biggest hit (certainly in a live capacity), ‘Sorry You’re Not A Winner’ *ClapClapClap*.
After the chaos of ‘Sorry You’re Not A Winner’, which saw some crowd members on others shoulders, and what seemed to be an infinite number of bodies sailing over the barriers throughout, Shikari bring it down a notch with ‘Undercover Agents’.
For me, the highlight of the night comes next, as Shikari perform ‘Anything Can Happen in the Next Half Hour…” followed up by ‘Labyrinth’ and ‘Zzzonked’.
Somehow, I managed to make it through the 800+bodies between myself and the back of the room in order to retreat to the balcony for final song, the anthemic and upbeat ‘Live Outside’, which, like opening number ‘(pls) set me on fire’, has to be restarted.
The crowd are still on a high, rightly so, and want more, starting once again with the chants of “And still we will be here, standing like statues”.
Their call is answered as Enter Shikari return, performing ‘Enter Shikari’ and ‘Satellites**’, a powerful, compassionate and supportive LGBT+ anthem, which is given an incredible accompaniment of rainbow strobe lights and even more confetti cannon fire, before the set ends with ‘{ The Dreamer’s Hotel }’.
Tonight there may have been a few teething problems, which is to be expected with new material and a new stage show, in a live setting where anything can happen, but all were met with humour from the band and understanding from the crowd, who will no doubt remember the night for all of the right reasons.
Same again next month, and the month after that? Count me in.