Enter Shikari's frontman Rou Reynolds checks in ahead of the band's Australian tour with Knotfest (and side shows) this weekend.
Catching up with Rou, a mere week out from the band's Australian return, we catch the vocalist and keyboardist in a brief moment of reflection.For the British rock group, 2025 is already off to a fruitful start: new music is coming together across studio sessions that have been taking place when they're not jetting out to Japan and preparing to add Knotfest Australia to their list of accomplishments.
The band's whirlwind Tokyo trip saw Enter Shikari perform as part of Crossfaith's Hyper Planet mini-festival. As Reynolds says, the trip has set Enter Shikari up for a brand new year of memorable experiences and quick-fire festival events.
With European, UK and US festivals already fleshing their calendar out, Enter Shikari are primed and ready to go. "It was amazing," Reynolds says of their first international jaunt of 2025. "We were literally there for, I think, just under 48 hours. We had three, three-hour pockets to sleep, it was nuts! It was an absolute whirlwind, but it was such a good time."
Their next whirlwind trip is almost upon them, with this year's edition of Knotfest Australia set to take place in Melbourne, Brisbane and Sydney the next two weekends.
Enter Shikari are no strangers to the Knotfest family, having performed under the banner in different territories, such as Tokyo and Mexico City.
However, with the Slipknot-curated festival and culture event being the catalyst for Enter Shikari to return to Australia, Reynolds is excited to reconnect with fans sooner rather than later.
"We are incredibly grateful. We've got so much love for the festival," he enthuses. "I can only imagine what the energy is going to be like down in Australia. It's a brilliant time whenever we've done it."
Along with the three festival shows, Enter Shikari have locked in select side shows – this time taking in regional venues on Sunshine Coast, Melbourne outer suburb Belgrave, and Newcastle.
A major coup for these smaller, intimate venues, the opportunity to see a band like Enter Shikari in this context is one that thrilled fans upon announcement. "I've been banging the drum for this for awhile, to start seeing more of Australia and to start playing some smaller towns," Lou laughs.
"We’re still very much in that south-east corner of the country. I'd love to do a proper tour and get to some of the other regions, but this is just exciting enough for now. We love it. I have to admit ignorance about these towns, we've never been to them and we don't know what to expect. The reaction online has been super exciting, there's also been disbelief!
"I can't remember what the capacity is in these, but I think they're small; it's going to be super interesting! We haven't done shows that small in a long time! I'm really looking forward to it."
For Reynolds and his bandmates, the importance of supporting smaller venues goes beyond simply wanting to do something different on tour. "I don't know what the situation is like in Australia, but here in the UK, the smaller, grassroot music venues; the off the beaten track ones, the ones in the smaller towns and cities, they're struggling so much," he explains.
"In the last two years, here in the UK, we've lost a music venue every week; whether it's been knocked down for luxury flats, or whether it just can't afford the rent anymore and it's been taken over and turned into offices. It's super sad. Every two years, we do a smaller run over here; they are still 800-1,000 cap venues, they're big places, but they're the ones that often get forgotten completely on the bigger tours.
"It's good to support those smaller venues, because they do such a great job of supporting flourishing new music, a wide range of music too. That's how we started out; that's how a lot of people get inspired. It creates community as well, which is something that is so hard to create nowadays – genuine community. It's going to be awesome to see these places, see these venues, we're really buzzing for it."
Once Enter Shikari's Australian tour wraps up, the focus returns to creating new music for what will eventually become the band's follow-up project to 2023's 'A Kiss For The Whole World'. It's still early days but so far, Reynolds is intrigued by the creative direction the band is currently following.
By releasing 'Dancing On The Frontline', a companion album of remixes and additional material for 'A Kiss For The Whole World', in 2024, fans were reminded of the breadth of influence that drives Enter Shikari's catalogue.
Never content to be pigeonholed into any one set of sounds, Reynolds is confident that where these new sessions take them, the core essence of Enter Shikari will remain a prominent presence. "That's something that has been central to our music, the range and breadth that it has," he agrees. "As long as that is there, it's still very much Enter Shikari, and it still has its original integrity.
"That was the original idea, when we were first starting out as a band. There were so many incredible bands in our scene and we were just so confused that it was all so regimented into genres.
"I don't know why, but there were all sorts of layers of inspiration and motivations, but we were inspired by so many different types of music; we were into so many different types of music, we had friendship groups in so many different types of music.
"It was natural for us to have that breadth. It's something that keeps it really interesting for us, it keeps everything honest."
- written by Sosefina Fuamoli
Knotfest Australia 2025 Line-up
SlipknotA Day To Remember
BABYMETAL
Slaughter To Prevail
Polaris
Within Temptation
Enter Shikari
Hatebreed
In Hearts Wake
HEALTH
Miss May I
Vended
Sunami
Knotfest Australia 2025 Dates
Fri 28 Feb - Flemington Racecourse (Melbourne)Sun 2 Mar - Brisbane Showground
Sat 8 Mar - Centennial Park (Sydney)
Enter Shikari 2025 Tour Dates
Mon 3 Mar - Solbar (Sunshine Coast)Wed 5 Mar - Sooki Lounge (Melbourne)
Thu 6 Mar - King St Bandroom (Newcastle)
