Enter Shikari
We caught up with the boys at their sell-out Aberdeen gig.
St Alban's Enter Shikari have brought something decidedly different to the UK music scene; an unusual mix of hardcore and trance. Trying to give it a name is, well, near impossible. That hasn't stopped them from selling venues left, right and centre across the UK. We caught up with the boys at their sell-out Aberdeen gig.
Guys, how's the UK tour going so far?
Chris (bass): Very well so far. The first few shows have been really good, we had a few sell out shows, one was Stoke and Newcastle was absolutely unbelievable. Although the bouncers there were knobs, a bit disappointing for an established venue where they just weren't letting people move around or dance.
Rob (drums): Yeah, I was climbing on a speaker and the guy just grabbed me and chucked me down.
Chris: But at least he didn't get chucked out! That's happened before! Luckily they let him back in to finish the set.
Your forthcoming show in London has been upgraded to The Astoria, for a band with no album and no label, is pretty impressive. You must be pretty pleased about that?
Chris: Yeah! We kept a close eye on the ticket sales for the Mean Fiddler and over the last few weeks it took a massive jump, we thought it might sell out, and when it did our agent came to us and said we could move the gig to The Astoria if we wanted to. We were a bit anxious about it to begin with though because we didn't think we'd fill it at all, and we might as well play to a packed smaller venue than a half full bigger venue, but then we figured we might as well try and get as many people in as possible and make it more fun that way.
Do you think you'll be nervous?
Chris: Yes! Just a little bit!
Rory (guitar): I think we'll need to sink a few beers before we go on!
The sell-out shows have been down to growing reputation, and a couple of songs that's been released.
Rory: Yeah pretty much, we've touring fairly solidly for two years, and the internet has been a big help.
The music media tend to highlight your unusual blend of trance/dance and hardcore. How did that sound evolve? Did you set out to something completely different?
Rou (vocals): Pretty much yeah, we were playing sort of alternative rock about three years ago as a three piece, just me Rob and Chris, and then when Rory joined I moved off guitar and onto electronics and just started experimenting really with dance sounds and synths and stuff.
Rob: It's not like we said let's make something really different, we love hardcore music and we love dance music, it's not just random things we put together because they're different. We did it because it's what we love.
Rou: It seemed something quite obvious for us to do, and we couldn't really believe it was something no-one had done before.
Chris: There's so much passion in hardcore music, and the euphoric side of trance and dance stuff is on a whole other level. And we just had fun listening to it so figured why don't we just integrate it into what we're doing.
How have you found reactions from musicians from the two different genres?
Rob: We've had loads of people say that they're not into dance, but I like you guys, and dance guys that aren't into rock say that they've been to one of our shows and loved it. We seem to be making a bridge between the two.
Rory: There are some people that just seem to think that we're murdering whatever genre they think is theirs. But mostly people respect that fact that we're doing something a little bit different.
Back to touring. You're on the road with :( who are an Aberdeen band. What do think of what they're doing?
Chris: We really like them, the first time we saw them was at Download and we just thought they were really different, really catchy and good fun guys as well.
You set your own label recently, why did you decide to do that?
Rob: I tried answering this one earlier and didn't make a good job of it, so someone else can have a go!
Rou: I think we wanted to keep it as DIY as possible, for as long as possible. Having our label gives us the power to do exactly what we want and to release exactly what we want.
Chris: It has taken us by surprise though, the amount of work there really is. There's things like artwork, getting everything pressed, working to deadlines, we didn't really realise what it'd be like.
Rob: We are the worst band for deadlines! Thank god we have a tour manager, because even with him, every show we go to we'll be an hour and half, two hours late!
Have signed any other bands to the label?
Rory: We haven't even actually signed ourselves to it!
Chris: It's the kind of thing where we don't want to run before we can walk. We'd like to just get things going first and if it starts going well, then yeah, it's definitely something we want to try and do.
You've had a lot of label interest, some major ones too, is that something you're dismissing altogether?
Chris: Not at all actually, we've never said we don't want to sign with a major at some point, it's just that we wanted to do the first couple of releases on our own, and push ourselves as far we can. We're strong believers that a label can help you appeal to more people. And that's all we've ever wanted.
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