Enter Shikari's 'Nothing Is True & Everything Is Possible' has everything from electric fusion to macabre waltz
Enter Shikari, a fantastic British rock outfit from England are set to drop their new album 'Nothing Is True & Everything Is Possible' on April 17. The new studio LP, the band's sixth installment and first to be produced by frontman Rou Reynolds, is an exceedingly catchy addition to the futuristic generation of music.
Formed in St Albans, Hertfordshire, England in 2003, the band comprises Reynolds (guitar and vocals), Chris Batten (bass guitar), Rob Rolfe (drums) and Rory Clewlow (guitar) who joined the band later that year when the band adopted its current name.
Enter Shikari have received their fair share of critical acclaim and success. Their 2007 debut studio album, 'Take to the Skies', reached number 4 in the Official UK Album Chart and has since been certified gold in the UK.
Additionally, both their second and third studio albums have been certified silver in the UK after debuting on the UK Albums Chart at No's 16 and 4, respectively.
The new LP, at first listen, lists as one of those albums you find hard to put down and the description "interesting" doesn't quite cover it, but it needs to be said: it certainly is interesting.
Enter Shikari wants you left hit hard with their powerful music from the get-go with a proverbial bang on the album's first track 'THE GREAT UNKNOWN', a sort of techno-tinged fusion of post-hardcore rock with a pulsating up-tempo in spirit with the definition of Shikari (Hindi word for a hunter) and we hear an electrically-mirrored brother of a Mars Volta number.
The fourth track 'Waltzing off the Face of the Earth (I. Crescendo)', like the name implies, uses a waltz rhythm to drive its thoughts. Presenting a macabre inverse backdrop of the world, it plays out like a sort of pandora's box unleashing.
Only, with the presentation of dreadful figurative facts over carnival-themed music as we get lyrics such as "The earth isn't sphere and you're not really here," "You can't trust your own eyes and you only hear lies," "Regardless what you feel. Here comes the big reveal. Darling, you were a mistake and climate change is fake."
The lyrics also reference the album's title with "Nothing is true and everything is possible" in the chorus.
The album doesn't fail to surprise with every track-change, and in the fifth song 'Modern Living….', we get an unexpected example of that.
Following a melodic guitar-driven intro with similar chord structures and tones to a classic Roxette riff, the song breaks into a syncopated hip hop beat, and a few bars in, Reynolds gives a cheeky rap spit.
The album shows its experimental rock teeth in tracks like 'satellites- -', '{ The Dreamer’s Hotel }', which had an official music video release last month, and 'T.I.N.A.', a richly produced mixture of action-sequence power beats and an oriental-tipped melody on the electrical instruments.
The song 'thē kĭñg' features as a UK-rap-come-punk number. The verses use metallic-sounding instrumentation which warps and bends atop an unconventional drum machine rhythm before breaking out into a punk screamfest as Reynolds sings, "I used to be the king but they took everything" in the chorus.
'Nothing Is True & Everything Is Possible' comes highly recommended for those interested in post-hardcore/alternative/experimental rock bathed in aggressively creative electronic music Every track boasts something diverse and entertaining without being over-the-top, but instead, perfectly and slickly cocky.