Enter Shikari - 'It Hurts'
Shikari have done it again — are you really surprised?
In case you missed it, Enter Shikari, with their soon-to-be-released seventh studio album, ‘A Kiss For The Whole World’, are back; and at first, we were graced with lead single ‘(pls) set me on fire’. Their first release since 2020’s ‘Nothing is True & Everything is Possible’, released just at the start of the pandemic, was a tense, anguished, explosive affair — literally bursting back onto the airwaves, pitched screams mingling with gentle, half-whispered pleas in a fiery three minutes of rebirth. It also offered little in the way of a warning, and ‘It Hurts’ was no different: a casual tweet by lead vocalist Rou Reynolds yesterday at 20:40 was the closest thing to an official announcement that it got before its sudden appearance on streaming services; however, the relative whimper from the band sure heralded a hell of a bang.
‘It Hurts’ is a shining beacon of light, a song bursting with energy and brimming with rebellious, recalcitrant rage. Opening with a gentle, somehow both mournful and hopeful croon over the strum of a guitar, it quickly burns into a kaleidoscope of sound and motion, almost overwhelming in its vividness. Instrumentals blur with the band’s signature, electronic charm, borrowing and blending elements so seamlessly that it becomes impossible to pick anything out being anything other than intensely, distinctly, uniquely Shikari-y.
That same intensity comes through in the lyrics, too. As the song progresses, and a frenzied fervour possesses Rou’s mind, colouring his vocals with anger and despair, the frantic need for change cries out for more — more sounds, more time, more feeling. If there's any slight complain about the track, it's simply that it's too short, seeming to burn up just as it reaches its apex; but, on the face of it, that's a damn good problem to have!
'It hurts every time we fall’, Rou cries between rapped verses, his voice at times cracking under the stain — ‘but your worth doesn’t change at all’. That deceptively simple chorus pervades both the track and the listener, the fire burning brighter as the vehemence grows, flitting between a call for change and a demand for a global wake-up call. ‘As you fight the inevitable/ you’ll never know if it truly was’ we’re told, in a bid to remind us to never give up, both on a personal and societal level, managing to encompass conflicts on both the small-scale and the large — basically, no matter how bleak it may be, just keep going. Simply trying is sometimes all it takes, and failure doesn’t mean defeat, just a next step. Perhaps not the most original idea, but in the guise of an Enter Shikari track, full of sound and fury, it takes on a new life. And, who knows? With the song manifesting itself practically fully formed as a dream, what's to stop this mentality from likewise taking root and shaping minds? 'Nothing', the band seem to say -- and that's the point. It's ultimately up to the individual. Sure, failure can shape a person, can damage them but it doesn't define them. So, listen to 'It Hurts' -- a lot, preferably, because it's a damn good song -- and reflect. In this day and age, a refusal to give up and lay down can only ever be a good thing!
With these two recent tracks serving as the first taste of ‘A Kiss For The Whole World’ — amazingly, incredibly, uniquely tracked using only solar power — and the demand for tickets to their intimate residencies over the next few months in their pre-sale managing to crash their website (more than once, resulting in a very stress-inducing hour for fans!), Enter Shikari really are sunstoppable.
Catch them at their shows between February and April if you can find tickets, or perhaps make the trip to Hatfield or Leeds for their headline set at Slam Dunk in May. Actually, do that last bit anyway — the line-up is stupidly good, with PVRIS, The Maine and others recently being added to an already ridiculous line up, along with some nasty looking clashes on the stage splits.
Basically, go see Enter Shikari ASAP.
Words by James O’Sullivan
