ENTER SHIKARI
Share new single ‘Bloodshot’
New album A Kiss For The Whole World out 21st April via SO Recordings / Ambush Reality
Sold out intimate monthly UK residency shows continue in March & April. EU & US release shows sold out
Enter Shikari | Photo credit: Jamie Waters
Enter Shikari are today sharing ‘Bloodshot’, the third single to be taken from their highly-anticipated forthcoming album A Kiss For The Whole World, which will be released on 21st April via SO Recordings / Ambush Reality.
Hear ‘Bloodshot’ here.
Pre-order A Kiss For The Whole World here.
‘Bloodshot’ follows recent singles ‘(pls) set me on fire’ and ‘It Hurts’, both of which were instantly embraced with open arms by fans old and new, and received their first live outings during the band’s sensational run of sold-out February residency shows in the UK. For Enter Shikari, rejuvenation, resilience and resurrection have been on the agenda as they introduce new music to the world. However, in the arrival of ‘Bloodshot’ the band have more questions to pose themselves, and us.
Lead vocalist and producer Rou Reynolds explains:
“Every day, I seem to be asking myself “Is this article biased?”, “is this claim true?”, “Should I be more furious about this issue? Or less furious?”, “Am I being manipulated? Provoked? Radicalised by my own ‘tribe’?
Bloodshot is about how hard it is to find truth, and how easy it is to stop thinking for yourself and simply repeat your ‘team’s’ mantras.
Everyone’s so fucking angry with everyone else and it’s exhausting. It seems like social media’s main purpose these days is to hypnotise us to hate”.
Limited formats of the new album come packaged with the Live From Alexandra Palace 3 album & DVD, recorded live in December 2021 at the band’s sold out 10,000 capacity London show.
Enter Shikari 2023 UK / EU / USA shows posters
Enter Shikari are now also one third of the way through their run of very special, intimate, sold out UK / EU & US residency shows. February’s sold-out run saw the band introduce new singles ‘(pls) set me on fire’ and ‘It Hurts’ to the live stage, to a rapturous reception, giving fans the rare experience of an up-close-and-personal Enter Shikari show.
These very special residency performances continue through March and April, with Enter Shikari happy to announce the addition of Germany’s own Blackout Problems to the long sold-out Hamburg, Brussels and Koln intimate album launch shows. A further show has been added in the US too – an all ages matinee at Chain Reaction in Anaheim, CA.
Tickets for additional shows are available here.
Reynolds explains their thinking behind the residency shows: “It’s hard to do anything interesting with live shows today. We wanted to do something different. We’re going to become a local band to five major cities in the UK. It’s going to be interesting to see how the shows evolve every time we return.”
Feb 15 – HERE at Outernet, London, UK – SOLD OUT
Feb 16 – New Century Hall, Manchester, UK – SOLD OUT
Feb 17 – KK’s Steel Mill, Wolverhampton, UK – SOLD OUT
Feb 19 – SWX, Bristol, UK – SOLD OUT
Feb 20 – St Luke’s, Glasgow, UK – SOLD OUT
Mar 14 – New Century Hall, Manchester, UK – SOLD OUT
Mar 15 – St Luke’s, Glasgow, UK – SOLD OUT
Mar 16 – KK’s Steel Mill, Wolverhampton, UK – SOLD OUT
Mar 17 – HERE at Outernet, London, UK – SOLD OUT
Mar 18 – SWX, Bristol, UK – SOLD OUT
Apr 05 – Knust, Hamburg, DE – SOLD OUT
Apr 07 – Botanique, Brussels, BE – SOLD OUT
Apr 08 – Luxor, Koln, DE – SOLD OUT
Apr 13 – St Luke’s, Glasgow, UK – SOLD OUT
Apr 14 – New Century Hall, Manchester, UK – SOLD OUT
Apr 15 – KK’s Steel Mill, Wolverhampton, UK – SOLD OUT
Apr 16 – SWX, Bristol, UK – SOLD OUT
Apr 17 – HERE at Outernet, London, UK – SOLD OUT
April 30 – Chain Reaction, Anaheim, CA, USA (All ages matinee)
May 03 – Echoplex, Los Angeles, USA – SOLD OUT
May 05 – Bottom Lounge, Chicago, USA – SOLD OUT
May 10 – Bowery Ballroom, New York, USA – SOLD OUT
More about Enter Shikari and new album A Kiss For The Whole World
As the calendar now signals three years since Enter Shikari last released an album – their UK #2 charting album Nothing Is True & Everything Is Possible – it is useful to think back to the final question the band last posed fans: “Is this a new beginning? / Or are we close to the end?” Little could they know just how close to the end things would end up feeling as the events of the early ‘20s dimmed the light in the furnace of their live juggernaut, and connection to their fans. “At the time it felt like we ourselves, as musicians, were experiencing the death of our band,” says lead vocalist and keyboardist Rou Reynolds.
Unsurprisingly, the key in the band’s ignition came in the form of a live show as they headlined the Download Festival Pilot in front of 10,000 fans. Where not a single new word flowed from the pen of Reynolds in the two years prior, a realisation was born that would come to define the band’s seventh LP: “I just didn’t realise that the human and physical connection to other people were so central to how I write,” he says. Enter Shikari isn’t just four people – it’s hundreds of thousands.
The album’s lead single ‘(pls) set me on fire’ sparked the next stage in the band’s evolution, and the first words we hear from Enter Shikari 2.0 don’t come in the form of a question this time, but a command: “Please set me on fire”. In other words, ignite the spark inside us and set us free. This may be a new Enter Shikari but they’ve lost nothing in their flair for bold opening gambits.
Reynolds comments on the single’s conception: “Honestly, I thought I was f*****. I’ve never felt so detached from my soul, my purpose, my f****** spirit. I didn’t write music for almost two years. The longest I’d gone before that was two weeks. I was broken. It’s almost as if my brain had asked: “What is the point in music if it cannot be shared? What is the point in writing music if it’s not to be experienced with others?” and then promptly switched itself off. ‘(pls) set me on fire’ grew out of that desperation. This song is a projectile vomit of positive energy. Every emotion trapped inside me for two years, finally set free.”
It was in the Spring of 2022 that the band descended to the coastal town of Chichester, and a delipidated farmhouse, to rebuild their studio setup and capture their renewed momentum on record. Using only solar power to track the album – in what Reynolds says was to “bring back some sense of naivety” – the life-giving properties and Technicolor palate of A Kiss For The Whole World were made real. Reynolds continues: “Back to basics. This band – my best friends – bundled into an old farmhouse, miles away from anywhere. Off-grid, and ready to rediscover ourselves. This album is powered by the sun, the most powerful object in our solar system. And I think you can tell. It’s a collection of songs that represent an explosive reconnection with what Enter Shikari is. The beginning of our second act”.
Enter Shikari – A Kiss For The Whole World album artwork
Enter Shikari – A Kiss For The Whole World album track listing
1. A Kiss for the Whole World x
2. (pls) set me on fire
3. It Hurts
4. Leap into the Lightning
5. feed yøur søul
6. Dead Wood
7. Jailbreak
8. Bloodshot
9. Bloodshot (Coda)
10. goldfĭsh ~
11. Giant Pacific Octopus (i don’t know you anymore)
12. giant pacific octopus swirling off into infinity…